The European Union should not be "fixated" on budgetary consolidation at the expense of growth, German Chancellor Mr Gerhard Schroeder said today.
"It is called a stability and growth pact," Mr Schroeder said in reference to the EU pact, whose three per cent of GDP budget deficit limit Germany is set to breach for a second year running in 2003.
"We know that the European theatre is behind. If we want as Europeans as a whole to contribute to the development of the global economy we cannot just be fixated on stability alone," Mr Schroeder said, although he added that Germany was still committed to budgetary consolidation.