MBR_ISSUE 51_MAY_low res-compressed (1)

Malta Business Review
ONE-ON-ONE
FRANS
TIMMERMANS
First Vice President of the
European Commission
Can a candidate really get momentum
in a 28-country European election
often dominated by national and
local issues? To the extent that it’s
possible, Frans Timmermans, the Socialist
candidate for European Commission
president, has that momentum. In the
last month he’s seen socialist leaders win
national elections in Finland and Spain,
and been boosted by the U.K. taking part
in the European election (Labour is on
track to send 20 MEPs to Brussels). Last
week he won the audience vote in the
Maastricht presidential debate, and now
Hungary’s prime minister is refusing to
back his Conservative rival Manfred Weber.
All of that means that Timmermans is now
within striking distance of Weber.
Asked what he’d do differently to current
Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker,
Timmermans focused on tax and
communication. EU governments are “not
capable anymore, individually, to tax big
companies. These big companies have
become so big they can arm-twist states
into allowing them to make billion in profits
and pay no tax. Only Europe can fix this,” he
said. What’s his plan? Timmermans would
like the EU to set a minimum corporate
tax rate of 18 percent, and allow tax
competition only above this rate. He also
wants to be on tour: not to government
buildings, but to workplaces and homes
and town squares across Europe.
Timmermans likes to disarm election
crowds and interviewers with surprising
turns of phrase. “I have no problems with
Euroskeptics,” he said. Having grabbed
EU Confidential’s attention, he added: “I
have problems with the Europhobes, the
people who will say they will save Europe
by destroying the European Union.”
It’s a similar story on migration. “We can
only have an open Europe if we have
control over who comes in. An open
Europe doesn’t mean open to everyone,”
he said, before complaining about the lack
of solidarity between EU governments in
2015 and 2016 when the “situation was
out of control.”
His other big goals are global: “I would make
every single commissioner responsible for
a part of the 17 Sustainable Development
Goals” of the United Nations. How will he
fund all that sustainability? Not through
fuel taxes in the style proposed (and
quickly dropped) by France’s Emmanuel
Macron, but via increased corporate taxes
which he would put “directly into the
climate transition.” MBR
Courtesy: POLITICO SPRL
I have no problems
with Euroskeptics.
“I have problems with
the Europhobes, the
people who will say
they will save Europe
by destroying the
European Union.
Franciscus Cornelis Gerardus
Maria Timmermans is a Dutch
politician and diplomat serving as
First Vice-President of the European
Commission and European
Commissioner for Better Regulation,
Interinstitutional Relations, the
Rule of Law and the Charter of
Fundamental Rights since 2014.
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