The E.E.C. and the North

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THE E..C. AND THE NORTH

When the Gritish Labour Covernment held a refarencum on continued mombership of ihe walcial cote losis am ty % Canniion voted In favour. Since then, es in the 2 Counties the E.E.C. has govere'y Coclined in neon: nan me additional money tlowing into the North from the E.E.C. Much as obvious has been the ongoing and unchecked Geciine of ihe Worth’s economy and the meseive incresse in unemploymont. A rea of the figures behind this popular view shows if to ta fufly

ADDITIONAL?

Northern irsiand foekse ennual payment to the EEC.

th h taxes collected by the Gritleh Exchequer. in 1961-82 this amounted to nearly —— — _ in recent yeare has been ri Money received from tho E. e including guarantced ren to farmers amounted to fim.

This left a balance of f22m which may be regarded 1.4 arkditlora!l funds from the £.E.S, - a vory meagre amount iIndesd. The word ‘may’ is used edvizediy because in fact it Is pratt impossibie to prove the! signiie<" icant extra funds ectustly aro liven. The real amount of acditfonal es pie Mig he = ow the a6 % igure Cc £32mM. This ar contarte tia concept of ‘additionality’. in other words, is the money trom, fo E.E.C. additional ta poset Bae the British uer or is it used as a replacement? in the end it ia a Question of whether you trust (and after ali how could you not) the word of the British Gevernment who assure us that the oxtra benefits are pig Bo coming to us.

This is becauze ‘edditionstiity’ is interpreted in a rather particular way. The €.6.C. funds are_ em ie desecsihod as addittenst because It racuess Brite!n’a net contribution Se lane) oF comaaconpante ah f of pul ture than —s moma have the ways the E.E.C. directiy effects the Nesthi

THE EUROPEAN

EAS. DEFENCE FUND

The Europsen Recionei Developuname on rata ieiroment of EEC —— for job creation end Ths fund preservation works through existing cg ie Govt. structucce *% be divided inte two acre heip for infrastructure projects and specitic Industrial projects.

Assistance fer infraztructural gevelopmcnt con anmount to 7G%of the funds resources end the lieve! of grant can be up ts 89% of toate? invest aw if portance. partionior i > af pa hate fanstoul gb 2 sort of ne'p thig mmoucied ta only punt aver ir of tele) wwestment unccrtaxen. uch cantraversial prelects oo Mirool power etation end the now Feyle orkige have reciever! particular asalstence.

308 second area of involvement is providing funding far epecific bf regassiid tad — Bi iG «= eve of ouch & fest to sh neoape ERE ill must alrendy be in reciept of grants from the trctisttericd sMTIere SaardiilG) or Local Enterprise Devalooment UnitiLEOU). Theses SiO IS ts Mel a@opiy cisecity for ald bul have fe be chooean by the Departmont of which favours seciccting lorgs ecais enterprisen. Unfortunniety big bueiness has 21 been vp to ii ment ; ‘recently and more emai ge : aided projects have had to included. to ald moi for new jobs pbut-” includes finip to keep existing ee ro Sareea! in 7282 eer and maintain 1017 existing Mos. This however is probably an overestimate of the ERDF’s s. y a impact. What must be assumed is that firm's Investment was higher because of IOB/ERDE grents than that the IDB and LEOU moncy was releseed for more because of SROF sesistance. in other words the problem of additionality is raised | This figure is misieading ini ancther respect for although half of the new jobs promoted by the 1DB wera seaisted by ihe: ERDF, and a smalier proportion :.

of ihose maintained, lt should be remembered that thie total! of 2009 to 3000 jobs were also in receipt of local grants from the fact etthayeh EROF (8. im fe : aid can orcsutt “9 20% of MVEA CUSIZ Hi IgG: iy exams it amounted to only _ over 17%. Only a proportion of these jo were created or maintained by the EROF.

CRITICISMS

Other criticisms can be made of the impect and working of the fund. Firat it has a bias towards capital grants which may be counterproductive. Capital may be used to replace iabour rather than to employ more and there ee evidence that this is Secondly Grants have attracted foreign firms which have a tendency to close down their branch plants in piaces Such as the North when there i a

recession. A fist of some of the prominent recipients of grants gives some indication of the deficiencies of the fund; it includes Courtaulds, De Lorean and Lear Fan. These criticisrns are valid not only for the ERDF but for the 1DB as well. The whole atrategy of the British government to promote jobs has been an abysmal failiure.

Unemployment in the North fs’ over 120,000 and the gap oetween » it and Britain hes wider. od. This is especially true of -: thé manufacturing sector. While in Britain manufacturing employment is 18% of employment it Is only 11% ‘ifthe North. Services by comparison, North's economy on the public sector. Manufacturing: emp'!oyment has deciinad by over 36% or by 60,000 jobs since 1975.Nor-can.-be made that . a case easily 108/ERDF: grants slowed down this deciine. In fact, assisted employment nas itself declined from 71,400 jor 42.5%o0F: pores | jobs) to 44,200 = 42%) B/ERDF assisted pe er has therefore been fall faster. Future forccasts ididicate a further widening cf the gap beiween the North and Britain. The total in employment if pradicted te dacrease 9 further 613% Yor the whole cconamy and racriv. 20% for the -“anulacturing sector. if we look at the aim of the ERDF which states the Fund is ‘intended ta correct tha principal regional imbeiances within ihe Community’, we can seo it. to have been a failure. indeeca, the same forces which create thesd imbalances (unrestricted capital accumulation and competition} are those which the EEC was sst up particularly to promote within its area. That the geo Ddetween rich and poor should widen was entirely predictable. —

THE EUROPEAN SOCIAL FUND

[he Second may wistrument oF EEC intervention js the Eurcpean Social Fund whose deciared aim is to Improve employment opportunities and iacilitate tho geographical and occupationai mobility of workers in the member states. Indeed, Marthern pcecupy 46% compared to 36% in Britain. This shows the dependence ci the ~ grant. lvoland is designated an area ot’ ‘absotuie priority’ and receives a greater per capita contribution than any other area except Greenland. in 1981-1982 a total of £25 millicn was received which compares vith an overall budget in the North of £108 million.

Oniy £2.6 million of this sum went to the private accior and again it only. operates alongside government grants. Tho lions sharo of the Funds money. was devoted to the pubii¢ sector.

So what exactly was it used for?

Some §5% .was davoted training programmes for young.

psople uncer 25 years of age and % 0 generai training schemes. Thus, most of it was given cover to the youth training programme. This s rightly notorious as a Tory ploy te hide the real unemployment figures ermong young people and has been criticised on many grounds : C}OMost of thoes whe go on a VTP course will still bs unemployed whan it is finished, OO The scheme has been used to reduce employers labour costs.

When it was first mooted only £15 @ week was going to be paid!

Trartac rninn nreasiure raised this io £25 but thia ig ati! totally inadtequmio. Unikke the Youth Gt esantnegy OuMeiNe 4) oats, there is no provision for wcreasina this amount and the Deperimsat of Econsmic Development hes even stopped projects which have tried {to pay mora. OOCenditions in the YTP esheme are sepelting and health and seiciy vegucctlons arc eften ignorcsad OCigéven tho EEC itaolf recagni2ss that young women are Cloariminated vere by the a Mitvive YTP is used to de skill) the overall workforce and is J80d 45 2 weapon by employers jet the rest of the workferce.

Young people have already given their anawer to ina British Government's and the EEC's peiey of ‘heiping’ them. imoracacei by the momo change to. pnge 13 from YO? to YTP only 60% of places had been taken by October last year, despite attempts to penalise those who refuse.

AGRICULTURE

Considering inat three-quarters of the EEC’s budget expenditure is on agriculture, it should come as no surprise that It has a reat influence on the North's arming. This has particular effe st. because of the North’s ralatively greater dependence on agriculture . than . Britain... {t.

‘employs proportional! Be ‘times more pecple than in Britain. and this total has remained relatly vely stable over the last 10 years. This contrasts with the experience in | the 26 counties which has seen a sharp fall in = agricultural, employment. The. situation is” broadly similar when we examine ~ agriculture’s | contribution to Gross Domestic Product. In 1987 it amounted to 6.1% in. the North;a smail. drop from 7.2% in 1873. In Britain over the same period, it fell from 3.1% to 2.3% and in the 26 counties. a. more dramatic: fall occurred fromm 18.9% to 11.4%. Agriculture in the North is aiso distinguished from that in Britain ‘sy @ Number of other features.

"arm sizes are small - on average about 26 hectares as opposed to 47 in Britain. Because the climate limits the. range of products which can. be produced competitively grass and grast based products predominate. The nsed to. import cereal foodstuffs has hit the pig and poultry industries. EEC intervention is dirdiGan the European Agricultural Guarantee and Guidance Fund (FEOGA).Thea Guidance Fund is the only identifiable item since the guarantee . expenditure goes through the British Government and aiso covers England, Scotiand and Wales. This item only covers 5% of: FEOGA expanditure and since joining has spent nearly £31 million. In the North. The declared purpose of this Fund is to improve agricultural siructures..in this it has totally failed. 52% of all full-time farms are classified as ‘smatier farms’ and this rises to 75% ‘'f part-time farmers are

ore a fall page 14 Sat Pa Pn included. This figure ~ has” remained almost unchanged in” 10 years of membership. More controversial has been the operation of the Guarantee section which supports markets and prices. it as been estimated that In 1983 the North received about £43 million in. guarantee paymenis.. Under the EEC a markart ehitl bar takan ntera in the .auiput..of “the Norih’s agcicutture. simulaisd by GEC Spends dbarese Gob iag) wheat weed products have risen from 45% nf output to. 65% while cereal based... products have declined from 35% to 21%. This is why the super levy is such a disaster ior the North's farmers. . A ‘surplus’ of milk production mow affecta the coramunity end a super-levy has baen Introduced to cutback output. This means a levy equal to 75% af ths target price for milk would ba paid on extra production which would be. determined by the gutput level In 1881. tesa Sempared.to Britain the North since 1981 milk production. has increased by 17% and in Britain by only 10%. It will -mean in output of eround 40% despite the 05,000 tonnes * a . North's - ineraase in ihe North’s chere of Britain's quota. Ht wiil cost the farmers .. between £20 miilion and £30 million.

» Among the 8,000 dairy farmers the small and vulnerable» will suffer the most. The jobs ec!

“, many workers In the processing vtndustries are also threatened “c.fhe North possesses. piporticnally morethan Britain. omens : 93 ‘yariable beef premium, it will - mean 6 out of 10 farmers wil . gutfer.. from i the EEC’s latest decisions.

with the reduction in the effects of

OVERALL

oS Much publicity: has ‘gurrounded sere the es The scheme however hes bes wi ~° controversy Over to jong delays ena really any extra money involved.

This question also overshadows ~wheather these is the Belfast Urban Renewal Plan in which £60 million has been promised over 3 yeare for housebuilding. There again has not besn much proof irom the Gritish that. the ernment money is at additional’. This concept is impartent fo any evaluation of the EEC's effect en.

the eccromy of the North but insefer 23 It hes had forces It nes sty intensified the economic jroblems which .cce the North The fundamental offect of the EEC hes boon to iniensify the North's depondence on foreign ant multinstione) cepite! while puiting further obstacles in the vay of eny more progressive colicy. Its ‘social’ fund has only promoted the exploitation... of youth .-as .a asdlution. to unemployment, and Rh has proved cangeraus to ths North's agriculture snd its small farmors.

With Briteins non-particlpation In Tho European Monetery System even in econcmic tems the EEC hes not reduced tits significance of the border.

POLITICS

it ig around the awesticn of the Borcer that the EEC has provided mast controversy in the Narth. lan Paisley has described membership of the GEG in. the following terms;‘A Roman Cethetie cdirrstnated Farnaa is tho sworm oneny of Protestant Uinter and Ulster seepts seed fo face set Sod 1 ec appesition and eorly promises and fiiucions that jeining the EEC would fect to a United lratand, the rea. role of the the resent Frangerup report hes enalied it out. This ehould havo come 23 rot surpriss.tn 1981 the European Parliament passed a resolution which :‘strengly eget: all forma oi vielence and exprescied} tta Getcrminatien to condemn..ects. ef terrevicm ..

ae operations’ <" and recdgnised that the Eurapean “> geheme for which Belfast has onthe dubious aiatinetion of being galecied’ along with Naples.

Community fhad] ms compctence to mako provectia fer changes In the conctitutien cf Northern The Heagerup Repori, wich was _weicomed by the SDLY repeated these poinis anc aise wont on io call for inereased security co-operation between London and. _.

Dublin. The report claimed that...

the withdrawal of Gritish troops would only lead to a deterioration.

in tha situation and supported the estting up of some sort of power " sharing. The general character of ~~: the report can be guaged from ©: the fast that the Britisn Tories *"' lesder in the European Pari- ~~ . lament congratulated Haagerup, - ' thoujh feeling bound te abstain” on the vote because lt mignthave - infringed British juriediciion. eae Now John Hume is again seeking - EEC support for the latest initiatives of the Irish bourgeoisie’ and middie class to hoid back the’ anti-imperialist struggle and make a with «British imperialism. He wants the EEC to provide ‘political. and financial support’ for this deal and there’ is. ne reason to believe that the EEC would not support such if the British agreed to it. Of course, ee imperialism, as with the Gritish, might seek its own price for such support such as the dissolution of the 26 counties neutralliy into NATO or same European Dafence Pact. ; The experience of the last. 10 ysers simply confirms what ecciatists like ourselves have been saying for a long time - only the working class can achieve the domacratic unity of the country.

An imnmeariotiet inatitutinn bike the EEG will not cet in, the way of Britain bul will wee its inierests Mihi wea voi up sipiptiay Ofilail make the whole of Ireland tres for euron/esn multinational expioitation.

ALTERNATIVE

Thus, no progress - political or eemnomics - can be made. in. the framewort: of the EEC.A bureaucracy in Brussells dominated by big business cannot Eo ellowed to make major dacisions which affect everyone dacisions which benetlt ony their business interests. This is why all the majér nationalist’ ecpitatist parties support-the EEC and collaborate with British imperialism in trying to defeat the workers and ‘anti-imperlatist ruggies. i