European Semester for economic policy coordination 2025

Wording as published by the EP, in English.

1. Amendment 1Rejected

   Recital F a (new)

   Tabled by Manon Aubry · The Left

   Added: Fa. whereas the 3 % deficit-to-GDP and 60 % debt-to-GDP reference values are arbitrary numbers invented in the early 1980s without a sound economic rationale; whereas the prevailing economic conditions at that time were significantly different from those prevailing today;

2. Amendment 2Rejected

   Recital P a (new)

   Tabled by Manon Aubry · The Left

   Added: Pa. whereas country-specific recommendations in the framework of the European Semester tend to incentivise cuts in social services and social protection instead of promoting an increase in public revenue; whereas from the introduction of the European Semester in 2011 to the year 2018, the Commission recommended 63 times that governments cut spending on healthcare or privatise healthcare services;

3. Amendment 3Rejected

   Paragraph 4

   Tabled by Pasquale Tridico · The Left

   4. Highlights the fact that an Removed: integrated, coordinated, Added: integrated and coordinated industrial policy encompasses both targeted and horizontal Removed: industrial policy is vital to increase Added: measures; stresses its relevance for strategically boosting investments in the EU’s innovation capacity, while bolstering competitiveness and the Removed: integrity of the single market; Added: EU’s strategic autonomy; welcomes the European Investment Bank to play a crucial role in guiding the investments;

4. Amendment 4Rejected

   Paragraph 4 a (new)

   Tabled by Pasquale Tridico · The Left

   Added: 4a. Welcomes SURE-like funds that are subject to social and environmental conditionalities as an effective tool to mitigate job losses in crisis-hit industries, particularly the automotive sector; recalls that saving manufacturing jobs also means preventing the dispersion of competencies and capabilities needed to build a competitive and dynamic industrial system; recalls that public funds should serve as a driver for improving working conditions;

5. Amendment 5Rejected

   Paragraph 5 a (new)

   Tabled by Manon Aubry · The Left

   Added: 5a. Recalls that failure to mitigate and adapt to climate change fast enough as a result of underinvestment or delayed investments will not only have catastrophic human consequences, but will also be much more costly in sheer economic terms, hence contradicting the very purpose of the fiscal rules, which is to support sound public finances;

6. Amendment 6Rejected

   Paragraph 9 a (new)

   Tabled by Manon Aubry · The Left

   Added: 9a. Recalls that the International Monetary Fund, a long-time supporter of austerity and structural adjustments, acknowledges that fiscal consolidation is not effective, on average, at lowering debt-to-GDP ratios;

7. Amendment 7Rejected

   Paragraph 21 a (new)

   Tabled by Manon Aubry · The Left

   Added: 21a. Regrets that the revised economic governance framework fails to enhance social progress and convergence and to foster the ecological transition; reiterates that instead of focusing on irrelevant economic indicators and pursuing endless debt and deficit reduction, EU economic governance should aim to eradicate poverty and inequalities, and provide a high level of social protection, qualitative public services and individual and collective well-being through fulfilling the essential needs of all citizens and ecological planification;

8. Amendment 8Rejected

   Paragraph 21 b (new)

   Tabled by Martin Schirdewan, Manon Aubry · The Left

   Added: 21b. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to exclude future-oriented public investment, and in particular investment in social infrastructure such as non-profit housing, from the fiscal rules of the Stability and Growth Pact;

9. Amendment 9Rejected

   Paragraph 23 a (new)

   Tabled by Manon Aubry, Martin Schirdewan · The Left

   Added: 23a. Believes that instead of promoting harmful budgetary cuts and structural reforms in order to reach the debt and deficit targets prescribed by the Stability and Growth Pact, EU economic governance should favour and facilitate the collection, by Member States and at EU level, of additional resources through fair taxation, in particular taxes on the wealthiest and multinational companies, taxes on ecologically harmful products and services, the cancellation of ineffective and unfair tax and social contribution exemptions, and the fight against tax dodging and tax evasion by wealthy individuals and multinational companies;

10. Amendment 10Rejected

    Paragraph 23 b (new)

    Tabled by Manon Aubry · The Left

    Added: 23b. Highlights that, in general, budgetary cuts justified to comply with the economic governance rules correspond to the cost of tax breaks and tax allowances granted to wealthy individuals and multinational corporations; notes that, for instance, in the specific case of France, the EUR 60 billion in budgetary cuts proposed by the French Government for the 2025 budget equate exactly to the annual cost of tax breaks and tax allowances granted to wealthy individuals and multinational corporations by the French Government since 2017;

11. Amendment 11Rejected

    Paragraph 31 a (new)

    Tabled by Manon Aubry · The Left

    Added: 31a. Regrets that in order to comply with the revised economic governance rules, Member State governments, with France at the forefront, have committed in their national fiscal and budgetary plans to reducing public expenditure and to implementing structural reforms; deplores that these commitments have already, or will in the near future, translate into concrete measures deeply affecting the population, such as a reform of the pension system, a reform of the unemployment scheme, a decrease in healthcare reimbursements and job cuts in public administrations such as public education, leading to a general degradation of public services; warns that these economic policies aimed at complying with the objectives of the European Semester will have a harmful and long-lasting impact on citizens and on our collective capacity to cope with the ecological crisis, while at the same time failing to achieve the deficit and debt reduction for which they were intended;

12. Amendment 12Rejected

    Paragraph 35 a (new)

    Tabled by Manon Aubry, Martin Schirdewan · The Left

    Added: 35a. Notes that the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, proposed a suspension of fiscal rules for defence investments; condemns the double standards that allow military spending to rise indefinitely while social and environmental expenditure continues to face budget cuts; calls for any modification of the fiscal framework to be democratically approved by Parliament; highlights the fact that fiscal rules were already suspended during the COVID-19 crisis and stresses that the need to amend this framework in every crisis demonstrates its long-term inadequacy;

13. Amendment 13Rejected

    Recital K a (new)

    Tabled by Giovanni Crosetto · ECR

    Added: Ka. whereas, in the context of the anticipated ReArm Europe plan, the President of the Commission indicated the intention to activate the national escape clause of the Stability and Growth Pact to allow Member States to increase defence-related investments; whereas this announcement was made in response to escalating geopolitical tensions, in particular the ongoing Russian aggression against Ukraine and the need to enhance Member States’ defence capabilities; whereas fiscal flexibility is essential to enable all Member States to contribute effectively to European security while safeguarding economic stability and competitiveness;

14. Amendment 14Rejected

    Paragraph 35 a (new)

    Tabled by Giovanni Crosetto · ECR

    Added: 35a. Encourages the swift activation of the national escape clause of the Stability and Growth Pact in order to provide Member States with the necessary fiscal flexibility to scale up defence investments without triggering excessive deficit procedures; underlines that reinforcing the Union’s security requires a structured approach to defence expenditure, ensuring targeted investments that strengthen industrial capacity and strategic autonomy;

15. Amendment 15Rejected

    Paragraph 3

    Tabled by Enikő Győri, Paolo Borchia, Jorge Martín Frías +1 · PfE

    3. Removed: Notes Added: Recalls the original objective of the European Semester, which was the coordination of budgetary and economic policies across the Union; regrets, in this regard, the Commission’s commitment Removed: to ensure that Added: over the years to continuously expand the original scope of the European Semester Removed: drives Added: in order to drive policy coordination for Removed: competitiveness, sustainability and social Removed: fairness, Added: fairness as well as the integration of the Removed: UN Added: United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and the European Removed: pillar of social rights; notes that Added: Pillar of Social Rights; regrets that, despite its negative impact on the European economy, industry and competitiveness, the European Green Deal remains a core deliverable for the Commission;

16. Amendment 20Rejected

    Paragraph 41 a (new)

    Tabled by Enikő Győri, Paolo Borchia, Jorge Martín Frías +1 · PfE

    Added: 41a. Reiterates, in this regard, that CSRs must always remain within the remit of EU competences and should never use double standards;