| The EU is embracing an industrial competitiveness deal for the rest of the decade, with key actors floating proposals like deeper European integration or just wholesale deregulation, while key conflicts are resurfacing. European industry is in bad shape. The European Roundtable for Industry (ERT) finds that the bloc’s share in global aluminium production has fallen from 30% in 2020 to 5% in 2022. Europe went from net steel exporter to net steel importer in the past ten years. Net chemical industry exports have dropped to a fraction of their erstwhile heights. At this point, boosting industry will certainly be at the heart of the next European Commission’s agenda. The question on everybody’s mind is: what will the industrial competitiveness deal look like? And will EU countries decide it all next week? Some aspects of the programme are mostly universally agreed upon: Red tape must be cut, the European single market deepened, a capital markets union created—like by harmonising tax law and integrating financial markets—and energy prices brought down. But beyond the headlines, plans for the rest of the decade are not so straightforward. For EU countries, the bigwigs – France, Germany and Italy – have banded together to set the agenda with a declaration near Paris on Monday (8 April). But they are being quietly opposed by a loose alliance of smaller countries. Their main bone of contention? State aid. | 