It concerns Member States that have been most affected by the crisis and have received financial support under a programme from the Balance of Payments mechanism for countries not in the Euro area (Romania, Latvia and Hungary) or from the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism for countries in the Euro area (Greece, Ireland and Portugal).

We have, in principle, two options: either we insist on adherence to what is valid and what is in the treaties and take the full consequences of this, or we understand that the Stability Pact, just like anything else, is subject to a certain amount of development and must therefore also undergo certain changes, and we draw up these changes and carry them through in such a way that not only do we maintain growth and economic stability directly in those states that are members of the euro area, but we also prepare other EU Member States, which are not yet in the euro area, to join, without us having to make dramatic use of the structural f ...[+++]unds, for example, in these countries.

We have, in principle, two options: either we insist on adherence to what is valid and what is in the treaties and take the full consequences of this, or we understand that the Stability Pact, just like anything else, is subject to a certain amount of development and must therefore also undergo certain changes, and we draw up these changes and carry them through in such a way that not only do we maintain growth and economic stability directly in those states that are members of the euro area, but we also prepare other EU Member States, which are not yet in the euro area, to join, without us having to make dramatic use of the structural f ...[+++]unds, for example, in these countries.

Euro area Member States are committed to make every possible effort to approach the close-to-balance medium-term budgetary objective and the 2003-5 BEPGs recommend an annual improvement in the cyclically-adjusted budget position of at least 0.5% of GDP in those countries that have not yet achieved a position close to balance.

In practice, we can already see Euro countries and non-Euro countries emerging within the EU.

Hence, we truly believe that people should feel they belong to their region and that ridings should be defined according to common interests shared by municipalities. That basically explains our position on Bill C-18 (1640) Second, in any forward looking approach, it is primarily at the local level that development policy can be defined based on natural and cultural assets of the RCMs and on environmental protection.