Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-11-18-Speech-4-298"
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"en.19991118.16.4-298"2
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"This is a very uncontentious, uncontroversial report except for just one single point, which involves everybody who is listening. The proposal is to develop a computerised image archiving system to help detect forged travel documents. I imagine that we all agree that is worth doing. So what is the single point of controversy? It is whether this decision is going to be made behind closed doors in Brussels by officials and ministers, or whether there will be parliamentary scrutiny. Fifteen national parliaments cannot do so, because it is a European proposal and this task will fall to us if to anybody.
Now the history of this proposal is that in January of this year, the Commission put forward the same proposal and said its purpose was to detect documents brought in by illegal immigrants. The proposal lapsed when the Amsterdam Treaty came into effect in May. It has now been retabled by the German Government, as a national government is entitled to do, under the Amsterdam Treaty. However, the problem is that the German Government says its purpose is to deal with I quote 'crime' and leaves out the word immigration. Why? Because under the Amsterdam Treaty, immigration questions are transferred from the third pillar to the first pillar and become the responsibility, for the first time, of Parliament. However, criminal matters remain in the third pillar and we have no area of scrutiny, no responsibility at all. Therefore, the German Government in my submission is seeking to avoid parliamentary scrutiny of its proposal.
The committee did not like that. The Committee on Citizens' Freedoms invited the Finnish Presidency and the German Government to come and answer our questions about the proposal. The Finnish Presidency replied in a letter to the committee that it would not come, it would not answer our questions. However, it did say that we could ask put questions in plenary. Well, here we are in the plenary – where is the Council of Ministers? Everybody can see that the seats are empty except for one charming lady in grey who is an official and is not allowed to speak. But I hope she will take away this message. The fact that the German Government has sought to avoid parliamentary scrutiny altogether by keeping this under the third pillar and the fact that the Finnish Presidency has not even turned up to answer our questions either in committee or in plenary is, I am sorry to say, a great stain on the reputation of the Finns, who previously had a wonderful reputation for openness and democracy. I am also very sorry that they are not here to answer my accusation.
To conclude, the committee has voted to change the legal base so that this matter comes back under the first pillar, because this proposal is primarily about detecting forged documents carried by illegal immigrants. I am asking everyone who is here to vote tomorrow morning to support the committee, to establish parliamentary control over this new area of policy, which is our remit under the Amsterdam Treaty."@en1
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"Newton Dunn (PPE-DE ),"1
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