Continuinity and consistency are needed in defining and implementing the measures in the national priorities for Bulgaria 2020 because planning and funding them depends on future governments. There was agreement on this point at a meeting today between President Rosen Plevneliev and Sergei Stanishev, leader of the Bulgarian Socialist Party and president of the Party of European Socialists.
The Head of State received the leftist leadership at 2 Dondoukov Boulevard as part of his “Month of Political Consultations”.
Topics discussed by the President and the BSP leadership included the need for economic growth and employment measures that were rapid and subject to public debate, Bulgaria’s priorities for the multi-annual financial framework after 2014, reforms in the security sector, administration and water sector and the need for debate on possible changes to electoral legislation.
Rosen Plevneliev and Sergei Stanishev emphasised the need for clear rules of operation of the security sector, which could be included in a framework law on national security as a first step, ahead of a separate law on the development of the activities of the security services. The President accepted the socialists’ idea that each meeting of the Consultative Council on National Security Council should include a progress report on work on topics from previous meetings of the consultative body. He said that in this way, topics of public importance discussed at the Consultative Council for National Security would be dealt with effectively.
The Presidency will conduct close dialogue with major political parties in preparing national priorities, and will conduct a serious public debate about the Bulgarian position on the multiannual financial framework for the next programming period 2014-2020, it became clear during the meeting.
The President said that there would be facilitated procedures for the absorption of EU funds in the next framework period. It was agreed that there was need for a more precise allocations to regions to avoid the concentration of European financial resources in the larger cities of the country at the expense of those Bulgarian regions that were lagging behind. In the next two years, the capacity of regions to use EU funds should become more effective, and this area of competence was also part of the debate on the Bulgaria 2020 national development strategy.
The strategy should clearly delineate areas leading to accelerated economic growth and employment objectives, and how this could be implemented, and this needs to happen on the basis of broad public debate, including in the National Assembly, Rosen Plevneliev and Sergei Stanishev emphasised. They were adamant that macro-economic stability is not sufficient to achieve catch-up economic growth.
At the meeting between the President and the Left, the need for urgent measures to promote SMEs in the country was highlighted, including by simplifying the rules for handling EU funds, as well as increasing domestic consumption and reducing youth unemployment. Also emphasised was that Bulgaria was lagging behind in investing in science and innovation, which are foundations of accelerated economic growth.