EPP Group expects Single Market Strategy to bring new impetus to SMEs, start-ups and services

The EPP Group expects the European Commission's Single Market Strategy presented today in Brussels to bring new impetus to SMEs, start-ups and services.

"The Single Market Strategy must bring a fresh shake-up to one of the pillars of European integration which is the Single Market. Economic growth across the EU last year was just 1.4%. Unemployment over the last three years has been too high, over 10%. We have an investment gap of €400 billion compared to the levels before the crisis. We need to finally free the potential energies that our SMEs and start-ups could deploy in our economy", said Lara Comi MEP, European Parliament Rapporteur on the Single Market Strategy.

"The proposed framework is about five key concepts: simplification, reducing obstacles, facilitating company creation, access to finance, innovation. These concepts have to become reality for our businesses across Europe."

"The revolution that we need, and that Commissioner Bieńkowska is rightly designing in this document, is to motivate entrepreneurs to go pan-European with their businesses: operating in the Single Market must become normality, not the exception as it still is today for many", added Comi.

The EPP Group Spokesman in Parliament's Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee, Andreas Schwab MEP, urged the Commission to reduce barriers for service providers: "In the services market, we are dealing with a lot of untapped potential", he said. "However, we should not overhaul well-functioning structures now, but rather build on already existing high quality standards for all Member States."

Schwab highlighted the Commission's efforts to translate the rules of the 'traditional' Single Market into the digital age. "This is of the utmost importance for our innovative businesses, in particular start-ups in Europe."

"In order to achieve a boost in the European economy, we need a more competitive and efficient professional services sector. Unleashing the full potential of the Single Market could generate €615 billion per year, or a 4.4 % increase in EU GDP. Let's not ignore that. It is in the core of the European idea that only cross-border cooperation can make Europe stronger", concluded Schwab.