8 MARGRETHE VESTAGER Executive Vice-President of the European Commission E Rethinking a greener, digital economy Faced with an unprecedented publicThe temporary framework recognises that the EU health and economic crisis, how haseconomy as a whole is facing large-scale disruption, and therefore allows Member States to make full use of the European Commission supportedthe flexibility provided by the state aid rules to support Member States, in particular on thetheir economy in such a situation. The rules make it issue of State aid, and what actionspossible to buttress the European economy, while are you planning to take to boostmaintaining the integrity of the single market the recovery from the crisis?and a level playing field. As regards larger individual aid measures, such as First of all, I would like to mention that we have recentlyexceeded 100 million vaccines administered in Europe,and the vaccination programme is continuing at a rapidpace. We are finally starting to see light at the end of thetunnel of this unprecedented crisis, but we continue toaccompany Member States in the crisis as long as it lasts,as we have been doing for over a year. In March 2020,we rapidly adopted the temporary framework for stateaid to support the economy in the context of the currentCovid-19 outbreak. The temporary framework has sincebeen modified five times to meet the changing needs ofMember States and businesses. Rrecapitalisations of major companies, the temporaryframework contains strict conditions to limit possibledistortions.These conditions include a ban on the distributionof dividends and a cap on managers’ salaries.For companies with market power, the granting ofsubsidies is also accompanied by additional conditions.preserves its compettive structour best assets because the recovery and growthe. This is one of TROPER LAUNNA 0202 – erutuf evitisop erom a gniretsoF