Yesterday the parliamentary European Committee on Civil Liberties and Justice (LIBE) voted in favor of the latest digital euro report. It proposes amendments to the draft legislation that would make the digital currency legal tender. An overwhelming majority voted in favor (48), with just six votes opposing the central bank digital currency (CBDC). There were seven abstentions.
As reported earlier this week, the proposed amendments to the draft digital euro legislation include support for permissionless blockchains and address most of the demands of banks.
Yesterday’s vote was along party lines, with liberal and left-leaning parties voting in favor. The center-right PPE party, the largest group of MEPs, joined them.
Hence, if one extrapolates to a broader parliamentary vote, it will likely support a digital euro. The parties that voted in favor were the PPE, S&D, Renew, Greens and The Left. In total they control 531 of the 705 parliamentary seats.
The overwhelming support is a turnaround from last year’s first parliamentary debates, which highlighted many reservations.
Conservative pushback
Unsurprisingly, some conservative MEPs were not happy. MEP Cristian Terheș of the ECR group was one of them.
“Cash is a form of property, over which the person disposes as he wishes, without the state being able to control, supervise or approve the commercial exchange between the buyer and the seller,” he said.
“In the case of digital money, however, in order to receive, hold and transact it, the person needs digital instruments of the state, as in the case of the Digital Wallet, so that the state is in full control of the transaction between the buyer and the seller.”
However, the latest iteration of the draft legislation states that payment providers can use their own wallets. However, the European Central Bank will prescribe digital euro standards.
MEP Terheș continued, “Regardless of the pretext that it is the prevention of money laundering or tax evasion, the implementation of the digital currency will lead to the total control of the state over the population. All the more serious is the fact that all the vices leading to the violation of citizens’ rights could be corrected in the LIBE Committee, which was not done.”
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