French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday called for “a European regulatory break” regarding environmental standards, arguing that the European Union (EU) has “done more than any of its neighbours” and that it now “needs stability”.
“We are ahead of the regulation of the Americans, the Chinese or any other power in the world”Macron stated when presenting his strategy to accelerate France’s reindustrialization.
“Now we have to enforce it. We should not make any new changes to the rules, because then we will lose all the actors”defended the French head of state, adding that otherwise “the risk” is that the EU will have “the largest regulatory offer and the lowest financing offer”.
Ecologist MEP David Cormand joked on the social network Twitter: “The defender of the earth is back”.
“The French ask for a pause in the application of the pension law review … Macron proposes a pause in ecology”the leader of the French party Europe Ecology — The Greens (EELV), Marine Tondelier, also protested.
However, the Élysée insisted that Macron had asked for neither a suspension nor a moratorium, much less a withdrawal of “the norms currently under discussion”.
“The chairman does not speak of suspension, but of applying decisions already taken before making new changes”needed the same source.
“The decisions already taken are the most ambitious in the world to date”he stressed, adding that the French president “stated that it is above all necessary that such standards be applied homogeneously in Europe”.
Source: DN
