The European Parliament's Economics Committee debated on the "six-pack" set of laws revamping economic governance proposal. Political groups differed mainly as to how much emphasis to place on fiscal austerity and on the need to devise a set of rules which also gave Member States breathing space to continue their spending on growth-promoting investments. 

The main difficulty faced by lead MEPs was to strike a balance between stepping up the "automaticity" with which Member States reluctant to reform would have actions and sanctions imposed upon them, and allowing them to continue making investments that would be beneficial to their long-term health. The text approved by the Economic Committee at European Parliament is much tougher than the Commission proposal on the "irresponsible" spending but, at the same time, it requires the Commission to take more account of "good" spending when judging a country's reform efforts.

In addition, the text step up recourse to "reversed qualified majority" voting, most notably on multilateral surveillance issues to do with evaluating Member States' stability programmes, recommending improvements to them, or deciding that they have done too little to fix fiscal policy (adjustment path).

Moreover, MEPs asks for a stronger Commission policing. Equal policing by Council and Commission should make it more difficult for Member States to decide to ignore each others' problems, and also help to achieve the balance sought between toughness and smartness. They also considers that the approved texts considerably increase the transparency and national "ownership" of the new economic governance system. Thus, Council and Commission decisions are to be made public.

There are some new elements regarding sanctions in the text but it broadly follows the Commission proposals, such as that the revenue from fines and interest from deposits should be allocated to the European Stability Mechanism, and until it is set up, to the European Investment Bank, rather than to Member States not running excessive deficits, as had been proposed by the Commission.

The package as approved also calls on the Commission to table reports by the end of this year on establishing a system of common issuance of European sovereign bonds and establishing a European Monetary Fund under EU rules. The approved text also gives a stronger legal backing to the European economic semester, some elements of the Euro Pact, and the National Reform Programme (NRP) procedures. These elements, which also constitute the broader economic governance framework. Moreover, the NRP procedures are also strengthened to improve monitoring and compliance.

In this Committe meeting, it was also taken the decision to open talks with the Hungarian Presidency on the economic governance package, before going to the Parliament plenary with the text.