Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-10-28-Speech-4-152"
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"en.19991028.4.4-152"2
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"Mr President, today’s sitting has been dominated by talks about the Budget 2000. The fisheries agreement with Morocco has also been on the agenda this morning in this context, when we talked about external action expenditure. The majority of this Parliament was then of the opinion that this agreement would feature as one of its new priorities and that it belonged on the list comprising the reconstruction of Kosovo, East Timor and Turkey.
Whatever the opinion may be concerning the fisheries agreement with regard to the impact on the local population or the European fishing fleet, there will be very few people who will be prepared to put the humanitarian disasters of Kosovo, East Timor and the earthquake in Turkey on a par with this fishing deal.
Also, from a budgetary point of view, I find it completely irresponsible to agree on an amount whilst negotiations have not even reached the halfway stage. In fact, we do not know if an agreement will be reached. We do not know what the situation will be like then and we cannot gauge the financial implications. But the funds are already available. I would have thought it was acceptable to place an amount in reserve. Then, at least Parliament would be able to vote again on the allocation of these funds after having read the content of this agreement more carefully.
Because how will this pan out? Is the integrity of Parliament’s decision not seriously prejudiced if we have the funds available at this stage? What happens now if you do not like the agreement? Or would any agreement be acceptable a priori? You will get another chance during the second reading of the budget in December. It is therefore important that you grant more importance to the opinion of the Committee on Fisheries and not to consider it as a little added extra to a fait accompli.
What input will Parliament have? There is no guarantee whatsoever that the agreement will be submitted to the European Parliament for approval. The agreement with Mauritius was subject to a simple, consultative procedure. Parliament objected to this and took the matter to the Court. The Court ruled that it was unnecessary for Parliament to approve agreements. As a result, we now have a situation where it is completely unclear what agreements have to be submitted to Parliament for approval and what agreements only require comments. In this light, the agreement with Morocco might well bypass the European Parliament in terms of content on account of the consultative procedure and in financial terms on account of the blank cheque we provided this morning. Parliament’s power should not only be fought for by government leaders at intergovernmental conferences but must also be asserted by ourselves in our daily work."@en1
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