European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso has called for renewed political commitment to revive the European Union's languishing economic reform drive.
An ambitious plan was agreed in Lisbon five years ago aimed at turning the EU into the world's most vibrant economic bloc within a decade, but Mr Barroso acknowledged that halfway through the timetable, little progress has been made.
Jose Manuel Barroso
"The Lisbon Agenda remains our flagship. But ... we have barely sailed out of the harbour," he said in a speech prepared for a conference in Warsaw, Poland.
"We need a common effort. After all, the lack of progress over the last five years is not the result of a lack of good ideas. What has been missing is a lack of sufficient political drive and commitment in many of our Member States."
Mr Barroso said he was optimistic EU leaders would agree on a revamped reform plan at a summit in Brussels on March 22 ndand 23 rd, giving new momentum to efforts.
"I believe this time we are going to succeed because there is greater awareness about the challenges we face than there was 5 years ago."
The reform plan calls for an array of policies to boost employment, investment and growth. Its most controversial part is a proposal to liberalise the market for services in the way the bloc has already freed up trade in goods.
The plan has met has met stiff opposition in France and Germany where unions and politicians fear it could undercut workers' rights and consumer protection by allowing service firms to operate across the 25-nation bloc according to their home country laws.
Mr Barroso said the Commission was ready to work on the details of its proposals in order to ensure a broad consensus and was optimistic an agreement next week was possible, but stressed Brussels would not back down.
"Free movement, including of services, is a fundamental principle of the internal market. While we are ready to look at the detail of our proposal ... we cannot abandon such a Treaty-based principle," he said.