Consultation on the future of the Internal Market - Europe’s focus should shift towards social priorities
EPSU’s response to the open consultation by the European Commission on the future of the Internal Market calls for the EU to reorientate it policies towards the central objectives of sustainable development, equality, and social and economic cohesion. The Internal Market should be evaluated and judged against its contribution to these objectives, not the other way round.
EPSU recalls that solidarity, which is embedded in public services, is necessary for societies to function. Europe needs a positive EU law to anchor public service objectives such as just and fair pricing, universality, and continuity of service firmly in the EU’s legal architecture. The Internal Market’s insistence in seeing such objectives as obstacles to the quest for "dynamic markets in which firms can enter and exit more easily" and are only subject to "voluntary" standards, is in direct opposition to these objectives.
Furthermore, Europe is now confronted with problems, for example the need to conserve and reduce energy consumption, that cannot be solved - and indeed will be made worse - by the Internal Market’s single-focus on ever-increasing cross-border trade and goods and services.
The open consultation is a first, but insufficient step, towards a broad evaluation of the Internal Market’s policies to date and to a structured dialogue with all actors on its future reorientation towards the wider goals of Europe.
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