:00:04. > :00:14.The third day of that trial has just finished. Now it is time for
:00:14. > :00:30.
:00:31. > :00:35.Welcome to these The World Debate coming to you from Rome. We are
:00:35. > :00:40.home to the British ambassador, who is hosting a conference organised
:00:40. > :00:43.by the British Council. Let me introduce the panel. Emma Bonino is
:00:43. > :00:47.the vice-president of the Italian Senate. She was also a commission
:00:47. > :00:51.at the European Union and in her long career has seen many crisis
:00:51. > :00:58.both in Italy and in the EU and yet you still describe yourself as a
:00:58. > :01:05.Euro-fanatic. Yes. From grace, the country which is at the heart of
:01:05. > :01:09.the current Euro and debt crisis, the education system -- education
:01:09. > :01:16.minister, Anna Diamantopoulou. Very tough at the moment being a Greek
:01:16. > :01:20.minister. It is something more than half. It is dramatic. And one of
:01:20. > :01:26.France's most prominent politicians, the Elisabeth Guigou. She acted as
:01:26. > :01:30.an adviser to a former President and was the minister for Europe.
:01:30. > :01:37.And you have also established a lobby group, Women of Europe. I
:01:37. > :01:43.hope you approve of the panel today. I am very happy. We have a man on
:01:43. > :01:47.the panel. Professor Markus Kerber, at the technology of take not --
:01:47. > :01:50.the University of Technology and Berlin. You lead the campaign
:01:50. > :01:54.against the Greek bail-out. The court said that the bail-out was
:01:54. > :02:02.legal but you are not giving up the fight. You are going to the
:02:03. > :02:12.European Court of Justice. Yes. We are bound to put certain limits.
:02:13. > :02:17.There has been outrageous behaviour for the ECB president. We will hear
:02:17. > :02:27.more about what you think in a moment. That is the panel. Welcome
:02:27. > :02:28.
:02:28. > :02:38.to you all. APPLAUSE. Professor Markus Kerber. Gentlemen first in
:02:38. > :02:39.
:02:39. > :02:46.this case. Should the euro be saved? The project is worth making
:02:46. > :02:52.a very strong effort to reshape the eurozone. Saving the euro it in the
:02:52. > :02:59.current shape is impossible. After more than ten years of experience,
:02:59. > :03:04.we have seen that the experiment turns out to be a catastrophe.
:03:04. > :03:09.Bonino, D remember Margaret Thatcher said, the emu is a bird
:03:09. > :03:13.that cannot fly. Is it right, it is not worth saving the euro?
:03:13. > :03:18.crisis we are in is much more political than financial and the
:03:18. > :03:23.real problem is the fact that what stands in between the crisis and
:03:23. > :03:29.the solution is the revival of nationalism. The question is that
:03:29. > :03:33.you do not save the euro if you do not save Europe. The two questions
:03:33. > :03:39.are linked. You do not just save Europe because you reduce the
:03:39. > :03:44.eurozone. Anna Diamantopoulou, should the euro be saved? The euro
:03:44. > :03:50.is a big achievement. It is a success story because the euro is a
:03:50. > :03:55.very strong currency. The euro is not just a currency. It is a symbol
:03:55. > :04:01.for European people. Let's think of our countries. We have our flags,
:04:01. > :04:09.our language. What all Europeans have in our hand is Europe. Yes, we
:04:09. > :04:16.must save it. Elisabeth Guigou? think the euro must be saved, both
:04:16. > :04:25.for political and economic reasons. If the euro is not saved, we will
:04:25. > :04:31.have a terrible consequence. Inside Europe, it is not only peripheral
:04:31. > :04:36.countries, I am sorry Anna Diamantopoulou, the gross national
:04:36. > :04:40.product would be a concern, but maybe Italy, Spain, France, and
:04:40. > :04:45.across Europe, even for those countries who do not belong to the
:04:45. > :04:52.eurozone, there will be tremendous consequences. Let's go to the
:04:52. > :04:56.audience. The panel has picked up that the eurozone needs to reshape.
:04:56. > :05:01.And also the comments that Europe is a political project. I disagree
:05:01. > :05:07.with that. It is an economic projects. For myself, many British
:05:07. > :05:11.MPs decided to stay out of joining the euro and my colleagues and I
:05:11. > :05:19.will fight tooth and nail to stop further integration. Another
:05:19. > :05:24.British MP. I am quite shocked by the denial of the realities of the
:05:24. > :05:30.panel by saying that this is a political problem. It is a fiscal
:05:30. > :05:34.problem. A country like Greece will not be able to regain
:05:34. > :05:38.competitiveness unless it can devalue its currency. If we keep
:05:39. > :05:43.pouring money into those who fail, ultimately we will run the German
:05:43. > :05:51.economy. Anna Diamantopoulou? me speak about Greece which is in
:05:51. > :05:57.the centre of the storm. Is it the euro the problem that Greece has
:05:57. > :06:01.the debt crisis? Know it is not. It is the political mismanagement, the
:06:01. > :06:05.fiscal mismanagement, and we are responsible for that. At the same
:06:05. > :06:13.time we are in the middle of an international and a European crisis.
:06:13. > :06:19.We have to work and go on with very painful reforms, very painful
:06:19. > :06:28.structural reforms. In this effort, it is very important to seek that
:06:28. > :06:32.we must avoid this kind of fiscal mismanagement at a European level,
:06:32. > :06:37.by changing institutions and procedures. Now in the last year,
:06:37. > :06:44.we can see things that we could not im imyear ago, mechanisms,
:06:44. > :06:49.ideas about fiscal ministers, different ways of co-operation
:06:49. > :06:53.between the ministers and different ways of decision-making. There are
:06:53. > :06:57.ideas in the pipeline that can change things. You said that the
:06:57. > :07:01.euro is not the reason why Greece is in this current problem.
:07:01. > :07:05.Political mismanagement. The fact is, the structures were not strong
:07:05. > :07:09.enough to check whether Greek was racking up this huge debt. He kept
:07:10. > :07:16.the budget deficit secret. OK, the government before yours did that,
:07:16. > :07:20.but nobody knew how bad it was. That means that the institutions,
:07:20. > :07:25.the structures of the EU are lacking, people are breaking rules.
:07:25. > :07:31.This is exactly what I was saying. Nowhere in the world do you have a
:07:31. > :07:38.single currency without a Treasury. We have a single currency but not a
:07:38. > :07:42.fiscal union and the mechanism to oblige countries to comply.
:07:42. > :07:47.Everything was left to the goodwill of co-operation and so on and so
:07:48. > :07:53.forth. In some part, I think of course the national states and
:07:53. > :07:58.governments cannot avoid their own responsibility, but from now on, I
:07:58. > :08:06.think that if you do not come to a fiscal union with much stricter
:08:06. > :08:16.control of the national budget, you cannot save Europe. Europe is much
:08:16. > :08:22.more than a single currency. Europe is also a political -- Europe's
:08:22. > :08:30.fiscal policy should be at the world stage. The alternative to
:08:30. > :08:36.save the euro and Europe is that we will go back nationally divided,
:08:36. > :08:41.totally irrelevant in the world stage and even somebody as big as
:08:41. > :08:45.Germany will be irrelevant. Anna Diamantopoulou, countries like
:08:45. > :08:49.Greece have spent money borrowing all these cheap money with the low
:08:49. > :08:59.interest rates. Your point is, why should you Germans be more fiscally
:08:59. > :09:01.
:09:01. > :09:11.responsible? Not only Germans. Why the effort of endless bail-out?
:09:11. > :09:19.should you? ould you? lf-awareness and we know very well while we have
:09:19. > :09:25.this debt crisis and why we are in this situation. It is two years now
:09:25. > :09:29.that there is structural reforms with unprecedented not only for
:09:29. > :09:34.Europe but for the world. I need to give you some examples. In two
:09:34. > :09:40.years, and because of the mistakes of the past and because we have now
:09:40. > :09:46.to change things, and the euro and what is behind the euro, the rules
:09:46. > :09:50.and stabilisd stabiliseferred to some of the changes we did. We
:09:50. > :09:54.changed the pensions system. We changed the health system. We
:09:54. > :10:01.changed the administration and justice of the country. We cut off
:10:01. > :10:10.salaries and pensions up to 30%. We cut the budget on health and
:10:10. > :10:15.education about 25% in 18 months. In my portfolio. In one year we
:10:15. > :10:20.closed down about 2000 schools, about 25 departments of
:10:20. > :10:24.universities. We did it in a very - - we are dealing in a depressive
:10:24. > :10:29.situation. What kind of response have you had? Of course there has
:10:29. > :10:36.been strikes. People are depressed. But I repeat that there is a self-
:10:36. > :10:42.awareness. People react in this way even if we are under this
:10:42. > :10:46.unprecedented situation. What is the goal of this in? Through these
:10:47. > :10:56.austerity packages, through what we have agreed with the European Union,
:10:57. > :10:58.
:10:58. > :11:05.to stabilise the country and at the same time to find the Gross wrote.
:11:05. > :11:13.Can you imagine a country which is under a huge struggle and we have
:11:13. > :11:20.every day and night a statement of a leader, an academic, a lawyer,
:11:20. > :11:24.that Greece is going to default, that Greece is going to...?
:11:24. > :11:32.when you critics say things like, why should they work until their
:11:32. > :11:38.mid-sixties in Germany? -- in Germany so that somebody in jet
:11:38. > :11:46.that -- somebody in Greece can retire in their 50s? People feel
:11:46. > :11:54.resentment. Just one word. If we want to stabilise the country, on
:11:54. > :12:01.the one side we have to put all of these austerity packages. At the
:12:01. > :12:07.same time we have to push the engine of growth. Can we do it when
:12:07. > :12:16.we have every day, from Germans and others, all these ideas that the
:12:16. > :12:24.country is going to be a fault? Let's remember other cases in the
:12:24. > :12:30.Europe of countries who had a huge deficit, who went on default
:12:30. > :12:37.because of those crises. They recovered. They did not recover by
:12:37. > :12:41.squeezing, only by squeezing, but by support of... You have been
:12:41. > :12:51.given 110 billion euros. You're getting another... In her... In we
:12:51. > :12:53.
:12:53. > :13:03.have agreed on that,... Its you are asking for another 109 million
:13:03. > :13:06.
:13:06. > :13:10.euros from the IMF and the EU. The Germans have paid... This is not a
:13:10. > :13:14.debate between Greece and Germany. I appreciate the enormous efforts
:13:14. > :13:24.which have been made in Greece under fiscal point of view. These
:13:24. > :13:26.
:13:26. > :13:36.the work of a generation. I speak as an economist. You Ali it -- you
:13:36. > :13:37.
:13:37. > :13:42.are losing your sovereignty. It is a de facto government. Your Members
:13:42. > :13:46.of Parliament do not have any powers. You lose all the self-
:13:46. > :13:51.determination. Secondly, with all these fiscal measures, which are
:13:51. > :14:01.too severe, which have brought recession, you do not regain your
:14:01. > :14:04.
:14:04. > :14:14.Regaining competitiveness in the short-term needs devaluation. You
:14:14. > :14:15.
:14:15. > :14:24.cannot evaluate. We double the exports in 18 months
:14:24. > :14:30.because something is changing in the country. The tourism industry.
:14:30. > :14:38.What will be the destiny of many of the German banks? Unhealthy
:14:38. > :14:48.products that they bought, not only in Greece but everywhere. I also
:14:48. > :14:48.
:14:48. > :14:53.speak of UK banks, not only Germany. The advantages for the German
:14:53. > :15:01.people of the European project as far raised exports. At the end of
:15:01. > :15:08.the day you other one you have been, like many others, you got the
:15:08. > :15:17.result of Europe. 70% of your export is still in Europe, China,
:15:17. > :15:22.India etc. All the picture has to be taken into account where leaders
:15:22. > :15:28.have do make the decision about saving Europe. We have the German
:15:28. > :15:33.ambassador in the audience. You have heard that 66% of Germans are
:15:34. > :15:38.opposed to bail out, and yet the Chancellor Angela Merkel said that
:15:38. > :15:44.the answer to the crisis is more. Do you think the German people will
:15:44. > :15:49.accept that? Germany is a country which has supported the European
:15:49. > :15:56.Community from the very beginning and we still have majority support
:15:56. > :16:03.in Germany for that. Angela Merkel made it very clear in a speech in
:16:03. > :16:08.the Bundesbank in which she said that we need more Europe, not raise
:16:08. > :16:18.Europe. We want a unified Europe which is strong politically,
:16:18. > :16:20.
:16:20. > :16:28.economic 'Glee' and culturally. There is scepticism in Germany,
:16:28. > :16:33.isn't there? Why should we be the paymasters? A brief response. Euro-
:16:33. > :16:40.scepticism. Be is a very strong discussion in Germany these days on
:16:40. > :16:44.who is paying one. Again it is not a crisis of the euro, it is a
:16:44. > :16:49.crisis of politicians who have not played the game by the rules. This
:16:49. > :16:52.was said several times already in the debate. The effort of my
:16:52. > :17:00.government is now to find stronger co-ordination within the European
:17:00. > :17:03.Union. To have an obligation and commitments which are binding. What
:17:03. > :17:12.we are lacking is sanctions if somebody does not play the game by
:17:12. > :17:18.the rules. Marcus, briefly. statement which I take for granted
:17:18. > :17:28.is disconnected from the sentiment of the German population. There is
:17:28. > :17:31.
:17:31. > :17:35.85% disagreement with the bail out policy. In Rome? A difficulty in
:17:35. > :17:42.telling the truth to the people. And so, Professor Markus Kerber, I
:17:42. > :17:47.think your idea is not so... it is in Germany's best interest to say
:17:47. > :17:51.the euro. Is not a question of political preferences. Recent
:17:51. > :17:58.studies show that the cost for Germans of the break-up of the euro
:17:58. > :18:06.would be much higher than the cost of the financial stability. What I
:18:06. > :18:13.wanted. Doubt is that it is not only Greece all Portugal of Ireland
:18:13. > :18:23.which are the cause of the eurozone crisis was the economic outlook is
:18:23. > :18:26.
:18:26. > :18:31.weak and it is Maliki in Europa and the US. -- week. We need is --
:18:31. > :18:39.discipline. Without growth, we were not even succeed in reducing our
:18:39. > :18:46.deficit. What we need is political leadership. Because what happened
:18:46. > :18:56.was that each of these national leaders, Mrs McConnell or Nicolas
:18:56. > :18:56.
:18:56. > :19:01.Sarkozy, they are Europeans of course, but both of them acted on
:19:01. > :19:09.their national grounds and failed in explaining their public opinion
:19:09. > :19:17.why it was in the German interest to continue to save the euro. Why
:19:17. > :19:27.it was in the French interest etcetera. And nationalism, of
:19:27. > :19:28.
:19:28. > :19:35.course, I agree with Guyana. -- agree with Emma Bonino. There is a
:19:35. > :19:44.healthy debate in Europe and they would wish to have the same debate
:19:44. > :19:48.in my country, France. Finally, I think that one of the crisis of
:19:48. > :19:58.Europe is that the question of Europe has never been debated at
:19:58. > :20:04.national level. That has been one of the most... between the project
:20:04. > :20:09.and international public opinion. People say about Greece and Italy,
:20:09. > :20:15.look at the tax evasion, the nepotism, the corruption and so on.
:20:15. > :20:19.And that makes a difference. It makes people, perhaps, in these
:20:19. > :20:25.other countries say, at least we are tried to sort things out. But
:20:25. > :20:31.we are not sure that the Greeks are. First of all, because there is a
:20:31. > :20:36.lot of discussion on this issue, I admire European people and I am
:20:36. > :20:46.very proud because each people has its own confederation. There were
:20:46. > :20:48.
:20:48. > :20:57.problems. It is our and full. Should we be punished, yes. Should
:20:57. > :21:02.we do it ourselves close mac yes. We do it in a way that we cannot
:21:02. > :21:09.imagine because beyond what I am saying now about reforms and
:21:09. > :21:15.decisions of reduction of everything they are people, their
:21:15. > :21:23.lives, retired people. We have to do everything in 18 months. Yes,
:21:23. > :21:28.there was political mismanagement. To do it, you have to sack 30,000
:21:29. > :21:35.Greek civil servants by the end of this year? Yes, and not only that.
:21:35. > :21:41.Last year there were 55,000 people fired from the public sector with
:21:41. > :21:47.Congress. Are you doing that? have already done it. That's why I
:21:47. > :21:54.tell do it was a dramatic situation. They decided, we are going to
:21:54. > :21:59.stabilise the country. You have got to get 50 billion euros from market
:21:59. > :22:03.privatisations. By you doing that? You say you're going to do this,
:22:03. > :22:06.that actually, we cannot see the evidence was they at is an
:22:06. > :22:11.interesting economic question because everything is not just
:22:11. > :22:18.political. We have to privatise a complete number of companies. We
:22:18. > :22:22.have put everything in the pipeline. Just think that in a country when
:22:22. > :22:29.everybody talks about the death toll tomorrow and the atmosphere.
:22:29. > :22:36.You can imagine how difficult it is to privatise the public companies.
:22:36. > :22:40.Who will come? Can you imagine any foreign investor who will put his
:22:40. > :22:45.money in a market where everybody, every day there is somebody who
:22:45. > :22:49.speaks like that. What about people increases say the tough austerity
:22:49. > :22:53.measures are too tough. We have seen the soup kitchens with
:22:53. > :22:59.pensioners queuing up because they do not have enough money to buy
:22:59. > :23:07.food. Doctors, lawyers, everybody. All social started going out and
:23:07. > :23:17.the seats. -- out on the streets. Have you ask them if they want a
:23:17. > :23:19.
:23:19. > :23:24.holiday? May be default, maybe that's what they want. Professor
:23:24. > :23:29.Markus Kerber, does the world need the European Union? The world is
:23:29. > :23:34.not conceivable without the European Union. It is not less
:23:34. > :23:41.Europe that we need, it is more Europe. What I expressly clear and
:23:41. > :23:45.I would like to make these public here. The euro project for, which
:23:45. > :23:50.from and economists pointed you is an experiment is now turning into
:23:50. > :23:53.an adventure. It will have disintegrating effect and will be
:23:53. > :23:59.responsible for the revival of nationalisms which we are, rightly
:23:59. > :24:07.or wrongly, afraid of. On that thought we in this debate. Clearly,
:24:07. > :24:12.there is consensus that this is the worst crisis. What will happen to
:24:12. > :24:22.the euro? Willette survive? What kind of Europe will survive once
:24:22. > :24:22.
:24:22. > :24:32.the dust has settled. That is also not certain. Thank you to my panel.
:24:32. > :24:44.
:24:44. > :24:50.Still a pretty good chance that we could threaten the record for
:24:51. > :24:55.October on Saturday. The current record is 29. 4 degrees Celsius.
:24:55. > :25:02.Yesterday they hit 28.8 at Kew Gardens and they will be higher on
:25:03. > :25:07.Friday. Starting off from temperatures of 15, 16. Mist and
:25:07. > :25:13.fog will clear quickly and it is basically sunshine across England,
:25:13. > :25:17.Wales and eastern Scotland. In Northern Ireland, outbreaks of rain
:25:18. > :25:23.and wait in western Scotland by the afternoon. More cloud for the
:25:23. > :25:28.western fringes of Wales, Devon and Cornwall. Foremost it is all about
:25:28. > :25:33.the sunshine and the heat. How high will the temperatures reach?
:25:34. > :25:38.Somebody, somewhere may reach 29 on Friday afternoon. It will people
:25:38. > :25:43.around the coasts, but even here temperatures in the low 20s are
:25:43. > :25:48.significantly above the average for the end of September. And the West,
:25:48. > :25:57.more cloud through Devon, Cornwall and Pen wrap sheet. More rain in
:25:57. > :26:02.Anglesey later in the day and the Isle of Man. -- Pembrokeshire. Much
:26:02. > :26:05.of eastern Scotland remains fine. Into the weekend, the weather front
:26:05. > :26:11.moves through, bringing cooler weather across Scotland and
:26:11. > :26:17.Northern Ireland. Some rain, particularly on Saturday. In the