Belgium Hit by General Strike Over Austerity Measures

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http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/01/30


A woman holds a paper reading "It's their crisis, let's make them pay" as Belgian workers block access to the industrial area of Houdeng-Goegnies during a national 24-hour general strike January 30, 2012. (REUTERS/Sebastien Pirlet)

Unions staged a general strike in Belgium today in protest of austerity measures. The strike coincides with a summit by EU leaders in Brussels.

The Guardian reports:

The issues behind the strike are the same as those on the agenda for the summit. Greece's desperate plight hovers over the meeting, although formally there is no mention of Greece on the agenda or in the statements drafted for the meeting.

Instead the leaders of the 27 governments will discuss how to underpin an EU recovery – of which there is absolutely no sign – with "smart growth" policies, which would entail medium-term structural reforms, cutting labour costs, reshaping labour markets and redirecting surplus EU budget funds towards the eurozone periphery, where the debt crisis is hitting hardest.

The leaders are also to finalise two new treaties directly dealing with the euro crisis.

The first is the German-led "fiscal compact" which supersedes the currency's rulebook, the stability pact, by enshrining debt and deficit ceilings across the eurozone, giving Brussels greater powers to enforce compliance and penalise offenders, and making the fines imposed on delinquents more automatic and less open to political abuse.