Martin
Schulz: ‘That’s when you hit a brick wall’
The
German politician has raised Parliament’s profile, but will he be
rewarded with a third term?
By FLORIAN EDER
4/22/16, 5:35 AM CET
Martin Schulz is
grumpy.
“It’s not the
time to be in a good mood,” says the president of the European
Parliament when I ask why he’s frowning. “Definitely not the time
to give up — but we’re living in turbulent and worrying times.”
Namely: the threat
of terrorism, the refugee crisis, concerns about Brexit and a
European Union characterized by rifts.
The latter, first
and foremost. Europe is Schulz’s life’s work. “I’ve invested
my whole political life in European politics,” observes the
highest-ranking German politician in Brussels, who has one of the
plum positions in the EU and is pushing back against the centrifugal
forces that would wrench it away from him.
His strategy is to
make himself indispensable, using all the means at his disposal: a
gift for public speaking and sharp intellect which have helped him
shape more legislation than any of his predecessors.
“Seldom in my
political life have I experienced more cynical behavior,” —
Schulz on EU member countries migration response.
“Here’s what I
vowed to do when I took office — I wanted to make the Parliament
more visible, more audible and more influential. And I get the
feeling that I’ve pulled it off,” he tells POLITICO during an
extensive interview in his office.
There was a time
when Parliament used to just react to Commission initiatives.
Nowadays, Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker first sits down
with Schulz and the heads of the main groups of MEPs to sound them
out on what the Parliament and Commission can jointly accomplish.
These talks are known as the ‘G5’ and its participants meet
regularly: Juncker and his deputy Frans Timmermans, Schulz and the
main center-right and center-left bloc leaders, Manfred Weber and
Gianni Pittella.
It is Schulz and
Juncker’s aim to fill the gaping power vacuum at the heart of the
EU, left by a European Council made up of national leaders riven by
discord. That is not necessarily to the liking of member countries,
but Schulz flips the argument.
“When the
Community institutions are able to act, they come up with solutions.
But they’re often prevented from doing so by governments in the
nation states who don’t want a solution. That’s when you hit a
brick wall. But it’s the capitals who are to blame for this, not
Brussels,” he says.
Dark fantasy
Renationalization is
the sort of “dangerous fantasy” that brought the Continent to
its current predicament, says the German Social Democrat, warning
those who spread this notion that they are keeping “irresponsible
company.”
Included in that
category, he says, are the right-wing nationalist governments in
Poland and Hungary who “aren’t remotely interested in pressing
ahead with European integration” but are focused on “purely
short-term tactics” despite their awareness of the benefits of a
stronger EU.
“This cynicism is
extremely worrying,” says Schulz, who is equally worried about the
complacency of those who dismiss the likes of Viktor Orbán as “just
a few nutcases calling Europe into question.”
Schulz and Juncker
are tired of hearing accusations that Brussels has no answer up its
sleeve to tackle the crises facing Europe.
Following the
European elections two years ago, when the former Luxembourg prime
minister Juncker beat Schulz in the first ever elections to the post
of European Commission president, and the German got another term as
Parliament president as the consolation prize, the pair embarked on a
mission to emancipate their institutions. Juncker said he didn’t
want to be a secretary for national leaders and Schulz said he didn’t
want to be what Germans call a Grüßaugust, or just a figurehead.
“What we’re
doing here — merging the community institutions in such a way as to
be able to act, that is — was a response to developments that one
was already picking up on prior to 2014. ‘If something’s not
working, it’s Brussels’ fault.’ We’ve had all that before,”
said Schulz, describing the executive and legislative bodies as the
“two motors” of European cohesion.
Merkel ‘not alone’
The Commission under
Juncker has defined itself as “political,” granted legitimacy via
Parliament’s support — to the occasional annoyance of the German
government, which called in a paper in December for a “firewall”
to be erected within the Commission, to ensure its role as guardian
of the European treaties isn’t compromised by its political
empowerment.
This sense of
empowerment has provided Juncker and Schulz with moral support during
the refugee crisis, which the president of the Parliament blames on
member countries themselves “doing nothing.”
“Seldom in my
political life have I experienced more cynical behavior,” Schulz
observes. “Twenty states are refusing to get involved in allocating
places for refugees and then in the next breath they’re criticizing
the EU for a crisis which wouldn’t even exist if these peoples had
done their bit.”
This stance turned
the Social Democrat politician into a useful ally for Angela Merkel
in the refugee crisis, as he has toured the TV studios to defend her
calls for a pan-European solution. In Germany’s ruling ‘grand
coalition’ between the chancellor’s conservatives and the SPD,
“it isn’t just the chancellor acting alone,” said Schulz.
He takes a swipe at
the Bavarian Christian Social Union, sister party of Merkel’s
Christian Democrats, for their opposition to the chancellor’s
open-doors policy on refugees. As far as Schulz is concerned, this is
something that SPD leader and German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel
should do more often.
“All I’m saying
is, there are people in the federal government, outside of the SPD,
who support this policy a great deal less than I do,” he says.
2017
When Germans go to
the polls next year to elect a new Bundestag, the keen campaigner
Schulz will be active in the fray, but in the lead-up his tactic is
to deliver as many EU policies that can be clearly identified as
Social Democrat ideas as possible, to help his comrades back home
“deliver results.”
First on his policy
to-do list is progress on the European Banking Union, which is facing
“a lot of resistance in some member states” despite its potential
to protect EU taxpayers from mistakes and mismanagement by bank
executives, he says. One of the main planks of banking union — a
common EU deposit insurance scheme — is resisted by German Finance
Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, presenting Schulz with a redoubtable
foe.
Next, Schulz wants
to use money from the €315 billion Juncker Fund for public-private
investments to target youth unemployment: “We should be awarding
tax benefits to companies who employ young people in places where
youth unemployment exceeds the EU average. Instead, we’re striking
tax deals with investment trusts. That’s not right.”
On immigration, he
wants a stronger legal framework that ensures asylum is not given to
those who are not victims of political persecution, while balancing
the interests of people who come to Europe to seek a better life for
themselves and their children.
“Working on this
until I leave office is of great concern to me. 2019 that is,” he
says, waiting for my reaction — then letting off a loud Martin
Schulz guffaw.
The president is
poking fun at the question on everyone’s lips in the European
Parliament: Will he still be in the job after January next year,
which will mark the end of his second two and a half year term in
office? Staying for an unprecedented third term would break his 2014
promise to the center-right European People’s Party to pass the
baton to them half-way through the legislative period. The Socialist
and EPP groups have long had a gentlemen’s agreement under which
they rotate the presidency half way through the five-year term.
Strictly speaking, Schulz would be violating that understanding if he
remains.
“I
get the feeling that he’s overrated when it comes to the impact he
has on his own faction,” — Herbert Reul MEP on Schulz
“He himself signed
the piece of paper limiting his second term of office to
two-and-a-half years,” says Herbert Reul MEP, leader of the CDU/CSU
delegation in the European Parliament, who doesn’t share his fellow
German’s sense of humor on this point. “It’s outrageous how,
behind the scenes, people are pushing for Martin Schulz to be
reelected president of the Parliament.”
Reul himself admits
Schulz is effective at brokering compromises between Christian
Democrats and Social Democrats: “We need that, and it’s something
he takes very seriously.” But here comes the caveat: “Martin
Schulz likes to give the impression that he’s moving mountains. But
I get the feeling that he’s overrated when it comes to the impact
he has on his own faction.”
For example, Reul
credits France’s Socialist government, rather than Schulz, with
convincing skeptical center-left MEPs to agree to a register of data
on plane passengers, or passenger name record (PNR), as part of
attempts to improve security after the Paris and Brussels attacks.
Prime Minister Manuel Valls lobbied MEPs himself in Strasbourg during
the April plenary.
As Schulz points
out, however, “holding a parliament together with 750 members from
28 countries, eight factions and around 300 political parties is
extremely difficult, and you can’t do it on your own.”
As for his longevity
in the presidency, the German politician is content to sit back and
let others do the canvassing for him, with the third-term debate
likely to come to a head after the summer recess.
“The debate’s
going on everywhere, it’s not me bringing it up. I am due to serve
until 2017 and will do what I have described and what I have already
done,” he says. “All in good time.”
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