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A storm is brewing in Southern Europe. In Greece on November 6 and 7 another general strike will take place. On November 14 Portuguese, Cypriot, Spanish and Italian trade unions intend to go on strike in opposition to the austerity policies of the European Union. Belgian and British trade unions, as well as the European and German trade union confederations, are also calling for action. If the mobilization is successful, this transnational strike will be a milestone in the formation of a European protest movement desperately needed to prevent the final demolition of the European welfare states.
German Left Party Vice-President Wagenknecht on wage repression in Germany and the European Stability Mechanism
Today, our European discourse is built on lies. Has Greece really been aided? […] If Greece had declared itself insolvent back in May 2010, the financial sector and private investors would have suffered big losses, and European taxpayers would have suffered small losses. With every tranche of credits that has been approved under the purported aid scheme for Greece, the potential losses to the financial sector and private investors have become smaller, and the potential losses to European taxpayers have become larger. As early as 2010, it was clear that Greece's debts and the interest payments due on them were far too high for there to be any possibility of their being serviced over the long run. But every month by which the aid packages have delayed sovereign default in Greece has been advantageous for the banks, hedge funds and speculators. With every passing month, interest has been received that would otherwise not have been paid, and bonds have been redeemed that would otherwise have been worthless.
At a late hour on Friday 29 June 2012, the Bundestag took two far-reaching decisions. The so-called European Stability Mechanism (ESM), better known as the bailout fund, as well as the Fiscal Pact, a treaty modelled on the socially regressive German "debt brake" law and a blueprint for social service and public sector cutbacks in Europe, were up for vote. 491 Bundestag members voted for the ESM, 111 voted against it, and 6 members abstained. 493 members voted for the Fiscal Pact, 106 voted against it, and 5 abstained. Only the Bundestag members of the Die Linke party voted unanimously against these anti-social legislative packages. Because the Fiscal Pact is irrevocable and compels governments to implement a harsh policy of savings, these decisions set the course in Europe toward permanent reductions in social spending that will undoubtedly result in cutbacks to public services and the privatization of public property. At the same time, the ESM will make available massive amounts of money to safeguard the interests of banks and the wealthy. In her speech in the plenum Sahra Wagenknecht assailed the federal government for a policy that is driving all of Europe into ruin, and she directly addressed the Chancellor: "You are not saving the euro, but rather you are saving the euros of the millionaires."
Because no elected government would stand a chance of revoking this policy, I will vote against the ratification
A rising star in the German Left Party (DIE LINKE), MP Sahra Wagenknecht charges hat Europe is using the blackmail potential of markets to force fiscal policy and political change on countries
"The results of the EU summit have become obsolete after less than one week. When it comes to failure this German government really is in the lead. These negative achievements endanger the euro and democracy", comments Sahra Wagenknecht the euro crisis that is becoming ever more dramatic. The spokesperson on economic issues of the LEFT parliamentary group in the Bundestag continues:
Die-hard Marxists and others raised in formerly Communist east Germany feel Europe's sovereign debt crisis has vindicated their once-ridiculed warnings about the perils of unbridled capitalism.
The euro crisis is not just a crisis of the public finances of individual Member States; it is also a crisis of the monetary union and of the entire European integration project. After decades of cooperation, we are now at a stage where there are fears that the EU could disintegrate. The condemnation from some media camps of “the lazy southerners” diverts attention away from those who caused and have benefited from the crisis. It prepares the ground for dispossessing the majority of the European population through austerity programmes and cuts in welfare spending. This is accompanied by steadily growing nationalistic sentiments in many Member States. Right-wing populist parties and neo-fascist parties are achieving considerable election success with anti-EU and xenophobic campaigns. The calls for Greece to leave the euro area make neither political nor economic sense and represent what is, for the moment, the sad culmination of these developments.
Germany´s government are the last people who have a moral justification to dictate how things should go now, says a leading politician from the left.
The German Bundestag calls on the Federal Government 1) to introduce measures at national, EU and international level to stop agricultural commodities speculation and to limit commodity futures trading to what is needed for the purposes of price hedging.
Next week, the EU’s financial assistance for Ireland is set to be finalised, following intense wrangling about how to proceed in this case. The aim is clear: the Irish state is to receive support to allow it to bail out the Irish banks, which bet the farm during the property bubble. At stake are, above all, the profits of other European financial groups – with German companies ranking alongside those from the UK as having significant exposure to Ireland, reportedly amounting to up to 150 billion euros. It was unclear how a bailout of this kind was to be executed, however. After all, the EU financial stabilisation package was primarily designed to rescue states, not financial institutions, from bankruptcy. Yet Ireland is not currently insolvent. The crisis has only even come to a head in this way primarily because the rate of interest has shot up following Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel’s talk of insolvency, to an extent which has made loans ever more expensive for struggling states such as Ireland. And so the EU, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund have for days been trying to force Ireland to agree to the rescue package – and to agree on conditions.
