The huge gap in living standards between EU member-states and those applying to join could turn public opinion against enlargement, Austria's Minister for European Affairs warned in Dublin yesterday.
Speaking to a seminar at the Institute for European Affairs on Austria's forthcoming EU presidency, Dr Peter Wittmann said enlargement must not create a situation where "certain countries and regions have disadvantages for the benefit of other parts".
Afterwards he said that people living near the EU borders had real fears about the social gap between them. "In some cases salaries across the border from Austria are one tenth of the salaries within Austria," he said, and there was a fear that people would work in Austria but live across the border.
Austria has asked that a transitional period be agreed for the introduction of certain privileges of EU membership, such as the free movement of people and services. Such transitional periods have been used in past enlargements, according to Dr Wittmann.
Austria begins its first presidency on July 1st, he said, at a time when the EU faced a number of important challenges. "The creation of employment, the countdown to the third stage of EMU, the enlargement process and the Agenda 2000 reform package are the most prominent tasks that feature on Austria's presidency agenda."
Each member has to draw up an "action plan" on employment, and the Vienna European Council next December would undertake the "first comprehensive evaluation of the measures undertaken by the member-states in the context of their national action plans".
Austria also intended to produce proposals on how to implement equality of opportunity; foster the role of small and medium-sized enterprises; and encourage vocational training, research and technological development.
Finally, he said Austria was keen to restrict competition among member-states for mobile capital based on special tax advantages or low environmental standards.