What does the EU do?

A lot of what the EU does is about bringing people in Europe closer together.  It tries to make it easier for Europeans to buy and sell things to each other.  This is done by changing the rules that control trade.

1. Promote economic and social progress.
Help people earn enough money and get treated fairly.

2. Speak for the European Union on the international scene.
By working as a group the EU hopes that Europe will be listened to more by other countries.

3. Introduce European citizenship.
Anyone from a member state is a citizen of the EU and gets four special rights.

4. Develop Europe as an area of freedom, security and justice.
Help Europeans to live in safety, without the threat of war.

5. Maintain and build on established EU law.
Make laws that protect people’s rights in the member countries.

Europe’s mission in the 21st century is to:

• provide peace, prosperity and stability for its peoples;
• overcome the divisions on the continent;
• ensure that its people can live in safety;
• promote balanced economic and social development;
• meet the challenges of globalisation and preserve the diversity of the peoples of Europe;
• uphold the values that Europeans share, such as sustainable development and a sound environment, respect for human rights and the social market economy.

You can shop in another country where goods are cheaper without restrictions or additional taxes, as long as what you buy is for your own use.  The single currency, the euro, allows you to compare prices directly in all the countries that use it.  Travel between euro countries is easier because the costs and inconvenience of changing money have disappeared.

Competition introduced by the frontier-free single market has driven quality up and prices down.  Phone calls, Internet access and air travel are cheaper.  As consumers, EU rules protect you from faulty or substandard products whether you buy locally or in another country.  The EU also sets the highest standards for food safety.

So, the European Union acts in a wide range of policy areas - economic, social, regulatory and financial - where its action is beneficial to the member states.  These include:

• solidarity policies (also known as cohesion policies) in regional, agricultural and social affairs;
• innovation policies, which bring state-of-the-art technologies to fields such as environmental protection, research and development (R & D) and energy.

The Union funds these policies through an annual budget of more than €120 billion, which is largely paid for by the member states.  It represents a small proportion of the EU’s collective wealth (a maximum of 1.24 % of the combined gross national income of all member states).

I. Solidarity policies

The main purpose of the solidarity policies is to support the completion of the single market (see Chapter 6, ‘The single market’), and to correct any imbalances by means of structural measures to help regions lagging behind or industrial sectors encountering difficulties.  The need for solidarity between EU countries and between regions became even more acute following the recent entry of 12 newcomers with incomes well below the EU average.  The EU must also play its part in helping to restructure sectors of the economy which have been badly affected by fast-growing international competition.

(a) Regional aid

The EU’s regional policy is based on transfers of funds from rich to poor countries.  The money is used to boost development in regions lagging behind, to rejuvenate industrial regions in decline, to help young people and the long-term unemployed find work, to modernise farming and to help less-favoured rural areas.  The Committee of the Regions (CoR) is the political assembly that provides the regional and local levels with a voice in EU policy development and EU legislation.  The UK Delegation of members are on the Europa website.  Europe Direct Cumbria provides policy support to one of the four NW UK CoR Representatives: Councillor Mary Robinson.

(b) The common agricultural policy (CAP)

Some of the aims of the CAP, as set out in the original Treaty of Rome from 1957, have largely been achieved.  However, the CAP has been a victim of its own success.  Production grew far faster than consumption, placing a heavy burden on the EU budget.  In order to resolve this problem, agriculture policy had to be redefined.  This reform is beginning to show results.  Production has been curbed.  Farmers are being encouraged to use sustainable farming practices that safeguard the environment, preserve the countryside and contribute to improving food quality and safety.  The new role of the farming community is to ensure a certain amount of economic activity in every rural area and to protect the diversity of Europe’s countryside.  This diversity and the recognition of a ‘rural way of life’ - people living in harmony with the land - are an important part of Europe’s identity.  This is particularly relevant to Cumbria – see the Rural Development Programme.

(c) The social dimension

The aim of the EU’s social policy is to correct the most glaring inequalities in European society.  The European Social Fund (ESF) was established in 1961 to promote job creation and help workers move from one type of work and/or one geographical area to another.

Financial aid is not the only way in which the EU seeks to improve social conditions in Europe.  Aid alone could never solve all the problems caused by economic recession or by regional under-development.  The dynamic effects of growth must, above all, encourage social progress.  This goes hand in hand with legislation that guarantees a solid set of minimum rights.

II. Innovation policies

The European Union’s activities impact on the day-to-day life of its citizens by addressing the real challenges facing society: environmental protection, health, technological innovation, energy, etc.

(a) The environment and sustainable development

The cornerstone of EU environmental activity is an action programme entitled 'Environment 2010: our future, our choice' and emphasises the need to:

• mitigate and slow down climate change and global warming;
• protect natural habitats and wild fauna and flora;
• deal with problems linked to environment and health;
• preserve natural resources and manage waste efficiently.

Throughout the period covered by this programme and the five programmes preceding it, and in more than 30 years of setting standards, the EU has put in place a comprehensive system of environmental protection.

The problems being tackled are extremely varied: noise, waste, the protection of natural habitats, exhaust gases, chemicals, industrial accidents, the cleanliness of bathing water and the creation of a European information and assistance network for emergencies, which would take action in the event of environmental disasters such as oil spills or forest fires.

(b) Technological innovation

The founders of the European Union rightly saw that Europe’s future prosperity would depend on its ability to remain a world leader in technology.  They saw the advantages to be gained from joint European research.  So, in 1958, alongside the EEC, they established Euratom - the European Atomic Energy Community.  Its aim was for EU countries together to exploit nuclear energy for peaceful purposes.  As part of this, the Joint Research Centre (JRC) was created consisting of nine institutes at four locations: Ispra (Italy), Karlsruhe (Germany), Petten (the Netherlands) and Geel (Belgium).

However, as innovation gathered pace, European research had to diversify, bringing together as wide a variety of scientists and research workers as possible.  The EU had to find new ways of funding their work and new industrial applications for their discoveries.

Joint research at EU level is designed to complement national research programmes.  It focuses on projects that bring together a number of laboratories in several EU countries.  It also supports fundamental research in fields such as controlled thermonuclear fusion (a potentially inexhaustible source of energy for the 21st century).  Moreover, it encourages research and technological development in key industries such as electronics and computers, which face stiff competition from outside Europe.

(c) Energy

Fossil fuels - oil, natural gas and coal - account for 80 % of energy consumption in the EU.  A large and growing proportion of these fossil fuels are imported from outside the EU.  At present, 50 % of gas and oil is imported, and this dependence could grow to 70 % by 2030.  The EU will thus be more vulnerable to cuts in supply or price hikes caused by international crises.  Another reason to reduce its consumption of fossil fuels is to reverse the process of global warming.

Various steps will have to be taken in future, such as saving energy by using it more intelligently, developing alternative energy sources(particularly renewable energy sources in Europe), and increasing international cooperation.  Energy consumption could fall by one fifth by 2020 if consumers changed their behaviour and if technologies that improve energy efficiency were fully used.

III. Paying for Europe: the EU budget

To fund its policies, the European Union has an annual budget of more than €120 billion.  This budget is financed by what is called the EU’s ‘own resources’, which cannot exceed an amount equivalent to 1.24 % of the total gross national income of all the member states.