As the new European Commission has set out the ambition to reform EU competition policy rules in light of the challenges industry faces, industriAll Europe has developed a trade union perspective based on practical experience of competition rules. Europe urgently needs to rebalance the economic framework to create a real industrial policy. Read on for the new political position paper from industriAll Europe.
Currently, this is not the ethos of EU competition law and it is time for a deep reform.
When defining the Commission’s political priorities for the next five years in July 2024, Commission President von der Leyen stated:
“I believe we need a new approach to competition policy, better geared to our common goals and more supportive of companies scaling up in global markets – while always ensuring a level playing field. This should be reflected in the way we assess mergers so that innovation and resilience are fully taken into account. We will ensure competition policy keeps pace with evolving global markets and prevents market concentration from raising prices or lowering the quality of goods or services for consumers.”
We see this commitment from the new Commission as offering new opportunities to correct the current imbalances and blind-spots in the EU competition policy framework. IndustriAll Europe’s political position sets out its own priorities for such an approach to competition policy.
IndustriAll Europe believes that promoting our greatest asset as a global region – our people – and ensuring a well-educated workforce with access to good quality jobs, and the up- and re-skilling needed to anticipate industrial transformation, is both vital for reindustrialising and strengthening the European economy long term, and should guide all European economic policies.
Fundamentally, competition between companies should take place on the basis of quality and efficiency, not on the basis of depressed wages/salaries/labour conditions.
Well-trained, productive, healthy employees who feel safe are the real foundation of European industrial competitiveness in the future. They produce efficiently and have the ideas needed to create innovations and generate revenue. This must be financed in Europe in a spirit of solidarity so that companies in all member states/regions, and of all sizes, can build on excellent personnel in order to compete on the markets with the best, sustainable products.
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