Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-05-18-Speech-4-310"
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"en.20000518.14.4-310"2
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"Mr President, I would first like to thank the rapporteur and the draftsperson for their report and opinion. I would also like to say on behalf of my Group that we fully support the proposal to refer this initiative back. We did not come to this conclusion because we wanted to make things easy for ourselves and not table any amendments, but because – as emerges from the explanatory statement, which is very comprehensive and convincing – too many fundamental requirements have simply not been met. We have heard about these shortcomings in the debate as well as reading about them in the reports.
However, it is not because of these shortcomings that we are recommending that this specific initiative should be rejected. What is at stake here is whether it makes sense for the Member States to have the right of initiative in these areas of competence.
The proposals on which Parliament has been consulted up to now under this right of initiative have not, on the whole, been very convincing – including an Austrian proposal that had both technical shortcomings and problems in terms of content. What these proposals have had in common has been a failure to fit in with a coherent set of measures. Something else they had in common was that they either conflicted with existing legal instruments or duplicated them. The advantage of the Commission alone having the right of initiative is surely that this ensures a systematic approach and guarantees that we have documents that are more precise and free from technical and legal contradictions. This applies in particular to matters for which Commissioner Vitorino is responsible.
Another clear indication of the shortcomings of Member States’ right of initiative is that they are seldom received with very much enthusiasm, even by other Member States. This also applies to the initiative before us today, which the Portuguese Presidency is no longer treating as a priority. So, as a Parliament, we have more reason than ever before to be sceptical about this right of initiative on the part of Member States. This is not only because this right skews the balance between the institutions but also because, up to now, it has never really been convincingly exercised.
I would also like to touch upon another problem connected with this, which might perhaps warrant a joint initiative by the Member States. Officials working at the Schengen external borders are constantly telling us that the residence permits presented by third country nationals and issued by other EU Member States still vary widely and are often difficult to identify as such. This does not seem to fit in with the Joint Action concerning a uniform format for residence permits. The Member States should take the initiative here and act in compliance with the EU format in their own administrative area."@en1
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