SME Europe of the EPP, in cooperation with Dr. Paul Rübig MEP, organized the presentation of the book “Freedom for entrepreneurs” on Tuesday 9th of July 2013. Iuliu Winkler MEP was invited to introduce the event and share his opinion on the topic of the book.
In his speech, Iuliu Winkler expressed his appreciation for the work of his colleague Paul Rübig in the field of European SMEs. He also expressed his disappointment regarding the fact that not enough improvements were made in supporting the small and medium size enterprises at the European level during the last years.
“I am coming from an Eastern European country to the EP. In 2008, one of my first findings was that the EPP runs an SME association, and one of the first men I met there was colleague Paul Rübig. This afternoon, during the SME Europe board meeting, we affectionately heard him called the “SME MEP”. I would like to explain a little why I believe this is really a good characterization for the author of the book presented this evening. Working in the Crisis temporary committee of the EP, one of our findings was summarized under the “One SME, one job” slogan. There were 23 million SME’s registered in the EU at that time, and 23 million jobs missing.
Almost five years have gone by, now we have 26, 4 million jobless persons in the EU. What about the new jobs created? Their number falls far behind the goal entitled “One SME, one job”. And why is that? Because we have far too many declarations, and far too little action. SME’s across Europe still fight against regulatory burden; difficult access to finance; fragmentation of the common market; unfriendly taxation; reduced cross-border activity. Declarations and statements have their own importance, but still more important is the real, concrete action. My personal experience shows that entrepreneurs need freedom in order to succeed. The author of “Entrepreneurs need freedom”, the book presented this evening here in the EP is one of the MEP´s who is more inclined to action that to declarations. Congratulations, Paul Rübig!” Iuliu Winkler said.
The book “Freedom for entrepreneurs” describes the initiatives of the European Parliament in terms of small and medium-sized enterprises placed in the overall context of the legislative instruments of the European Union and its historical development.