Henrike Hahn, Bavarian member of the European Parliament (The Greens/EFA), deputy member of the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee and deputy speaker of the German delegation of the Greens, comments on today's mandate of the European Parliament for the reform of the Stability and Growth Pact:

"The EU Parliament is missing the opportunity to clearly focus on future investments. With the negotiating mandate passed today to revise the debt rules, Europe will continue to lag behind in the competitiveness of the green industry instead of building on its strengths.

This means that investment backlogs are not combated efficiently while cuts on social and public spending play particularly into the hands of right-wing extremist parties in Europe, since this means that people's wallets are becoming more and more tight every day. This is particularly dramatic given a possible far right wing shift in Europe in the coming European elections.

Support for Ukraine and investments in social and green infrastructure will also suffer if the current positions of the Council and Parliament on debt rules remain unchanged.

Neither throwing money out of the window nor destroying our economy with inefficient saving is a sustainable strategy. We need strong investments in shared modern European infrastructure and strategically relevant sectors for the green transformation. This benefits people, the economy and the climate.

If we refuse to invest money in a timely manner to combat climate change with sufficient investments, the costs will explode in the long term and the consequences of climate change will be irreversible."

I would be happy to answer any further questions.