The BBC will be rejoicing…Lithuania wants to join the Euro.
No wonder some sceptics will say, as they get 25% of their national budget handed to them on a plate by the EU.
But there is always a little rain cloud on the horizon that will take some explaining for the BBC.
The BBC likes to tell us that the economy is failing due to austerity…sometimes they take the subtle approach and expect you to pick up the cues by inference, dropping a knowing comment about austerity hamstringing ‘Europe’s’ economy…but occasionally they go for the jugular as Evan Davis did and openly admit their prejudices….claiming that Austerity is killing the patient here in the UK.
So I wonder what they will make of this, if anything….every chance they will ignore it completely…radical austerity resulting in a return to growth:
Lithuania’s President Dalia Grybauskaite explains that austerity is merely a question of political will:
Grybauskaite: There is not one rule you can apply to every state. In the Baltic states, after 2009 we had to implement very radical austerity measures. In Lithuania, we consolidated 12 percent of GDP in two years. We cut public salaries by 20 percent and pensions by 10 percent. Our adjustment was a lot deeper than what we see now in Southern Europe. And we saw growth return after 2 years.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: So Barroso is wrong?
Grybauskaite: Some countries need extra stimulus in specific areas. Something has to be done against high youth unemployment in Greece and Spain, for example. But in the end, there is no way around it: The debt levels have to come down.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: You say that reducing public debt is mainly about political will. Where do you see this will lacking in Europe?
Grybauskaite: I won’t name countries, but reforms could be quicker in many parts. There are different mentalities and different ideas about political responsibility in the North and the South.
Not far enough, not fast enough?….not sure Ed Balls will go for it…or Evan Davis for that matter.
Growth returned after two years? The BBC would never be that patient. Still, one has to wonder why Lithuania decided to join a troubled currency system. Although it’s probably for the simplest reason of all: easy money, with no need to worry about paying it back any time soon. Smart move, probably.
Grybauskaite is a fully paid-up member of the European political class. She was European commissioner for finance and budget issues and will “receive the Charlemagne Prize, one of Europe’s most prestigious awards, in May 2013, in honor of her contribution to EU integration.” Needless to say there will be no referendum on Lithuania’s entrance to the eurozone. But that’s OK because, as she claims in the cited interview, ” . . . 70 percent of our people are pro-European”.
Lithuania: straight out of the USSR and (almost) seamlessly into the USE – seems certain countries have all the luck.
The key point was cutting public sector salaries and pensions drastically. If we did that we’d be back on course without a single job loss.
‘The BBC will be rejoicing…Lithuania wants to join the Euro.’
If by ‘the BBC’ you mean the people who work for it, I’d say the great majority wouldn’t know, or care. I’d say that would probably be representative of the population as a whole.
Just how ARE Von Smallhausen and Helga?
Or should that read Von Schithausen?
make you wonder how they will spin or just ignore Iceland. It is looking certain that the new Icelandic government is going to stop talks about joining the EU and hence the euro. The EU is so good the Icelanders don’t want any off it.
I wonder why EU-adoring Al-Beeb doesn’t rejoice about Norway’s and Switzerland’s unemployment rate being nearly a third of what the UK’s is…?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_unemployment_rate
Couldn’t give a toss what the likes of Al-Beeb and certain scaredy cat politicians pathetically attempt to try thwarting UKIP. I’ll be sticking to my convictions in the locals on Thursday and voting UKIP, then vote UKIP again next year in the Euro elections and the following year vote Conservative (two anti-EU kicks up their arse from me will suffice. lol) in the general election.