Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-12-01-Speech-3-164"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.19991201.13.3-164"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
"Mr President, I am a great believer in health and safety, but I am also a great believer that we are not going to change everything by legislation. If we could legislate away things like poverty, accidents, illness and death, then we should have done it yesterday, but we are not going to do that.
That being said, there are things we can do at European level, which include changing the culture, the culture where we work, the culture we live in. This report by Mr Pronk goes some way towards doing that and doing it very well. He should be congratulated on all that, because he has brought excellent conclusions into this report. He has made history as well, by having the first report to go through under codecision and the first report on health and safety. It augurs very well for the future of what we should hope to achieve through this process, because Parliament has been very responsible in its approach to using codecision. Parliament is not always pointed to as being responsible or informed, but in this particular area we were better informed and, in some respects, I feel, more responsible.
It has made spectacular progress in the area of small to medium-sized enterprises, by far the biggest sector we could ever hope to address. This is where most accidents occur in the workplace and yet there is undisguised dismay amongst myself and other colleagues at the fact that we take very little account of this. You are 50% more likely to have an accident at work if you work for a small to medium-sized business. The information which will be provided, which was a vade mecum in this report, to small businesses and which they now have a right to be informed about, will go a long way in helping to change the culture in the workplace. It should be used in other reports in other areas, and we should learn from that.
On the other hand, as a participant in the conciliation process, I was pleased at the very real response of the Council to Parliament’s amendments and take note for future reference about how we can achieve the various amendments and positions we wish. Under the former procedure of cooperation of course we had our successes and the Commission was very much a part of that, and we still enjoy that acceptable relationship. Safety is one of those areas where we can always find middle ground to achieve what we really want.
It is time now for governments to listen to what this Parliament has to say 100% of the time and for those governments to act. Parliament is not in opposition to other institutions, it is a balance and it is a brake. It is unfortunately precisely because ministers were too close together, too keen to have cosy relationships away from scrutiny at European level, that we now have this process. It introduces transparency and clarity, and that can only be good for the trust of the people of Europe.
Many lives will be affected by this report and the work that has gone into it, many businesses will be pleasantly surprised by the balanced outcome, and if there was more work like this, perhaps even Europe would become popular in places like Britain, who knows?"@en1
|
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples