In her address to the European Economic & Social Committee hearing in Dublin on June 7, Congress General Secretary Patricia KIng observed:
"Over the past decade there has been a growing dissatisfaction with the policy direction of the Union. The diminution of the European Social model, we believe, has undermined the progress of European integration and given rise to a level of mistrust between the institutions of the EU and its citizens. Ireland along with certain other Member States suffered an unnecessarily severe and imbalanced fiscal adjustment in the years from 2008 to 2013 and such policy errors must never be repeated. The crisis and the insufficient responses to it have deepened divergences and have particularly affected people on the most modest incomes."
