mr president i am happy to support this resolution but of course one of the main problems faced by smes is access to credit
this is a major impediment to job creation and indeed growth
in countries undergoing severe austerity measures like my own country ireland this issue is particularly severe and i believe it needs to be dealt with immediately
we need to act at eu level to ensure that banks are willing and able to finance smes
recapitalisation of banks is important but recapitalised banks with the sme sector on its knees is a recipe for disaster
my real fear is that we are going to end up with a highly capitalised banking system while the real economy is on floor
we all talk about growth and that is the only way that many of the peripheral economies can climb out of the abyss that they are already in
yes it is a balancing act but we have a situation where the health of our financial institutions is improving day by day but smes still remain in intensive care
