Today the European Commission has put the final building blocks in place to kick-start investment in the real economy. A package of measures agreed today will ensure that the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI) is up and running by early autumn 2015, keeping the ambitious timetable set by President Jean-Claude Juncker to implement the Investment Plan for Europe. The Commission has just published a Communication on the role of National Promotional Banks (NPBs) in supporting the Investment Plan for...

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1. Recalling its conclusions of July 2011 and June 2013 and the Foreign Affairs Council discussion of January 2015 which endorsed the Climate Diplomacy Action Plan, the Council adopted the following conclusions: 2. Climate change, as underlined by the latest scientific findings by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is a decisive global challenge which, if not urgently managed, will put at risk not only the environment but also world economic prosperity, poverty reduction, sustainable development and, more broadly,...

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1. The Communication "A Framework Strategy for a Resilient Energy Union with a Forward-Looking Climate Change Policy" of 25 February 2015 and the European Council Conclusions of 19-20 March 2015 recognised the importance of the external dimension of the Energy Union. The objectives of the Energy Union can only be met if the external and the internal dimensions of energy policy, in particular a fully functioning Internal Energy Market, are mutually reinforcing. 2. EU policy objectives defined in the EU...

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The Eurogroup welcomes the successful completion of the relevant national procedures related to the decision to grant in principle a 3-year ESM stability support to Greece, and especially the recent swift legislative steps taken by the Greek parliament as a first step towards rebuilding trust.  Following a formal decision taken by the ESM Board of Governors, the institutions were entrusted with the task of swiftly negotiating a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) detailing the policy conditionality attached to the financial assistance...

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Remarks by Valdis Dombrovskis EU Commission Vice-President for the Euro and Social Dialogue |  Brussels, 17 July 2015 Good afternoon everybody, This has been a week of important decisions in terms of helping Greece to regain financial stability and to put its economy back on track. These decisions are ultimately being taken for the sake of Greek people. First, the Greek Parliament adopted, with a large majority, the first set of reforms. It was a first but crucial step towards rebuilding trust between...

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Labour market developments have been improving against the background of a gradual economic recovery in the EU. Unemployment in the EU has continued to fall and job finding rates have modestly improved. However, despite its recent fall, unemployment remains high. The number of unemployed in the first quarter of 2015 was 23.6 million in the EU. The share of long-term unemployed is on the rise, standing at 4.9% in the first quarter of 2015. EU Commissioner for Employment, Social Affairs,...

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The Eurogroup welcomes the adoption by the Greek Parliament of all the commitments specified in the Euro Summit statement of 12 July. On the basis of a positive assessment by the institutions, which concluded that the authorities have implemented the first set of four measures in a timely and overall satisfactory manner and which confirmed that the Euro Summit statement has been included in the preamble to the implementing law adopted by the Greek parliament, we reached today a decision...

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193 Countries today agreed on a series of bold measures to overhaul global finance practices and generate investments for tackling a range of economic, social and environmental challenges at the United Nations Third International Conference on Financing for Development, being held in Addis Ababa. The groundbreaking agreement, the Addis Ababa Action Agenda, provides a foundation for implementing the global sustainable development agenda that world leaders are expected to adopt this September. The agreement was reached by the 193 UN Member...

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Mario Draghi, President of the ECB, Vítor Constâncio, Vice-President of the ECB, Frankfurt am Main, 16 July 2015 Ladies and gentlemen, the Vice-President and I are very pleased to welcome you to our press conference. We will now report on the outcome of today’s meeting of the Governing Council, which was also attended by the Commission Vice-President, Mr Dombrovskis.Based on our regular economic and monetary analyses, and in line with our forward guidance, we decided to keep the key ECB interest...

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