GEF workshop with Fundacion EQUO and Fundacio Nous Horitzons
When: Friday, 10 May 2013, 15.45-17.15
Where: NH Eurobuilding Hotel, Calle Padre Damián 23, Madrid (Room Helsinki)
Language: English, Spanish
Across Europe, the dramatic social impact of austerity measures meant to reduce and repay public debt has resulted in increased civil disaffection for this way of handling the sovereign debt crisis. This led to the creation of citizens’ initiatives actively demanding for an audit of the public debt. Debt auditing aims to bring to the open the structure of public debt: How and why was the debt acquired and who are the lenders who hold the debt? What are the debt conditions and how do states repay? These initiatives aim to enable a bigger part of the population to understand the dynamics behind public debt in order to take part in the political debate around it. A Europe –wide network of these initiatives has been created in 2012.
In Spain and Portugal, the citizens audit platforms denounce austerity, and question the legitimacy of public debts that have been accumulated through socialising private deficits. The networks point to the unjust and unequal repartition of the costs of the crisis and the high social consequences this implies. Under these circumstances, they regularly call for sovereign debt rescheduling and restructuring; solutions which have been among the most controversially debated, for example, in the framework of different Greek rescue packages.
The aim of the workshop is to raise awareness of such movements and identify potential links to Green policy solutions related to the crisis.
Speakers:
- Pierre Jonckheer, Co-President Green European Foundation - Moderator
- Isabel Castro, Iniciativa por Uma Auditoria Cidadã à Dívida Pública - Introduction to the Initiative for a Citizens’ Audit of Public Debt, Portugal
- Guiomar Morales, Platforma Auditoria Ciudadana de la Deuda – Introduction to the Platform for a Citizen Audit of Debt – Spain
- Cecilia Carballo, President Fundacion EQUO - Green stances on the Spanish public debt: EQUO’s relation to the citizens’ audit
- Philippe Lamberts, Greens/EFA Member of the European Parliament - Reactions and comments from the European level
