The European Union must immediately prepare for radical changes needed for Ukraine and other countries to become members of the bloc, Ursula von der Leyen has said.
In her annual “state of the union” address, the European Commission president warned members states of the need to “match the determination” of Ukraine and others to get ready for an enlarged EU.
“We cannot afford to leave our fellow Europeans behind,” Von der Leyen said in her last state of the union speech before the EU election cycle starts next year.
There are concerns that while the EU has set out reform goals to Ukraine, Moldova and seven other countries queuing to join the bloc, it has yet to provide detailed proposals on changes needed in member states.
Von der Leyen said critical to EU expansion would be an increase in budget, what the bloc financed and how it was financed, along with “credible security commitments”, a reference to the debate about Ukraine’s bid to join Nato.
“These are questions we must address today if we want to be ready for tomorrow,” she said.
One of the key concerns for an enlarged EU is efficient law. Individual members can veto certain proposals and if the bloc were to grow in size, then unanimity would be harder to achieve.
Changes to those rules could need tweaks to European treaties – something that would require referendums in countries such as Ireland.
Von der Leyen said member states should not wait to have those debates at home.
“We cannot and we should not wait for treaty change to move ahead with enlargement,” she said, adding that MEPs needed to start addressing the “practical questions about how a Union of over 30 countries will work in practice”.
The 27 member bloc could expand to 36 or 37, with nine countries in the queue and one, Georgia, some way along the path towards accession. “I believe that Team Europe also works at 30-plus.” said Von der Leyen.
She pushed back at calls by the European council president, Charles Michel, to set a 2030 deadline for accession, saying that joining the EU must be merit based and would come with a deepening of political ties with eastern European and western Balkancountries.
Unless the debate about key changes start in the EU capitals, the EU could find itself in the embarrassing situation in which Ukraine has completed its reforms to join but the bloc was not ready to make the country a member.
Von der Leyen reiterated the EU’s support for Ukraine in its fight against Russia and vowed to support Kyiv “for as long as it takes”.
Her speech was a run through the highlights of the her first term as president of the European Commission but also an opportunity to lay out goals for the future, with European parliamentary elections being held next June.
China’s dominant position in many sectors including those for critical raw materials needed for electric cars, semi-conductors and solar panels, was a thread that run through the 20-page speech.
In her strongest and most specific remarks yet on the electric car sector, Von der Leyen issued a veiled warning that the EU would not tolerate China dumping cut-price electric cars on the European market.
With its control of the supply of lithium hydroxide, a key compound in electric vehicle batteries, China poses a big threat European carmakers including BMW, Volkswagen, Fiat and Peugeot.
The Chinese conglomerate BYD launched two electric cars in June and the industry forecasts suggested 800,000 cars from China could be sold in the EU by 2025.
In her speech, Von der Leyen said global markets were “flooded with cheaper Chinese electric cars” whose prices were “kept artificially low by huge state subsidies”. This was distorting “our market” and was something the EU would “not accept”, she added.
Von der Leyen announced an anti-subsidy investigation into Chinese electric cars and said: “Europe is open for competition, not for a race to the bottom.”
But she also confirmed industry fears of political tightropes. “Equally it is vital to keep open lines of communication and dialogue with China,” Von der Leyen said, referencing the EU’s formal policy of “de-risking” and not “decoupling” from Beijing.
Her warnings to China are also the strongest hint yet that the European Commission will bow to demands by UK and EU carmaker that a 10% tariff of electric vehicle exports within the the bloc is suspended to allow German, French, Italian, British and central European factories catch up with Chinese expertise.
Setting out legislative goals for the next 100 days, Von der Leyen also touched on the threat and opportunities posed by artificial intelligence, saying EU leaders had a “narrowing window of opportunity” to guide the technology responsibly.
She said getting the EU legislation on artificial intelligence, which is in its final stages, passed within the next 100 days was one of her priorities.
