In an extraordinary briefing to trade union chiefs last week, Barroso set out an “apocalyptic” vision in which crisis-hit countries in southern Europe could fall victim to military coups or popular uprisings as interest rates soar and public services collapse because their governments run out of money, the Daily Mail reported. The stark warning came as word emerged that EU chiefs have begun work on an emergency bailout package for Spain that is likely to run to hundreds of billions of euros.John Monks, former head of Britain’s Trade Union Congress (TUC), said he had been “shocked” by the severity of the warning from Barroso, who is a former prime minister of Portugal. Monks, now head of the European TUC, said: “I had a discussion with Barroso last Friday about what can be done for Greece, Spain, Portugal and the rest and his message was blunt: Look, if they do not carry out these austerity packages, these countries could virtually disappear in the way that we know them as democracies. They’ve got no choice, this is it. He’s very, very worried. He shocked us with an apocalyptic vision of democracies in Europe collapsing because of the state of indebtedness.”
Greece, Spain and Portugal, which only became democracies in the 1970s, are all facing dire problems with their public finances. All three countries have a history of military coups.
