Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-06-15-Speech-4-031"
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"en.20000615.2.4-031"2
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"Madam President, President-in-Office, ladies and gentlemen, the Feira European Council represents a fresh opportunity for this House to express its opinion on the various political issues forming the EU agenda. I wish to highlight four of these, not all of which were referred to by Mr Gama. Firstly, on Austria, clearly we do not harbour any sympathies for political extremism but we must condemn the ill-timed reaction of 14 Member States to the formation of a democratically elected government before this had even had the chance to start governing. This decision did not respect the sovereign choice of the Austrian people and has also been ineffective. The fight against racism and xenophobia must be conducted intelligently and forcefully, not with inflammatory measures which in the end simply produce the totally unwanted effect of promoting what they are trying to fight, in addition to spreading anti-European feeling.
The Portuguese Presidency was willing to take on the role of spokesperson for the Member States last February, wrongly in our opinion, despite the issue always having been a bilateral issue, as was clearly agreed between the 14 Member States. Although this Presidency is not formally required to solve the problem, each of the governments should be required to assume its responsibilities. In this way we would find out who wants to continue isolating Austria and who, recognising the error, wants to re-establish normal relations with this country, thus avoiding the ‘misunderstandings’ mentioned by the Secretary of State, Mr Seixas da Costa, between the Member States.
The second issue is the Intergovernmental Conference. The distinctive act of the Portuguese Presidency should be to recognise and defend political equality between the Member States as a corollary to maintaining the balance between the large and small countries and between these and the European Union itself. The participation of national parliaments in the institutional reform and in the conduct of European affairs should therefore be encouraged. In this way the people of each country can become involved more democratically and more directly in the process of building their Europe and in defining the Community decision-making methods.
With regard to closer cooperation, it must be emphasised that the principle of flexibility on which this is based and which we support should not prevent the guarantee that no Member State can be excluded from participating in this cooperation, except on its own initiative.
On the issues left unresolved by the Treaty of Amsterdam, the rule of one commissioner for each Member State should be enshrined, bearing in mind that the Commission has the monopoly on legislative initiative. It should be pointed out that codecision now involves a dual weighting of votes, one in the Council and the other in the European Parliament. Instead of the intended generalisation of qualified majority voting, the retention of the unanimity rule must be defended in order to preserve the factors of political balance between the Member States regardless of their population or economic weight. These factors have been the key to the success of the cooperative, peaceful and developed Europe which we have come to know in the last fifty years.
The third issue is the Charter of Fundamental Rights. Its content is not in question. The point is that the European Union does not need a Charter of Fundamental Rights and this is for the simplest reason of all. The European Union does not have any significant problems with fundamental rights. As we have said before, if there is no problem, the Charter is not a solution and if it is not the solution, then the Charter is a problem. We hope that the Feira summit can come to the obvious conclusion. There are no differences of opinion about the definition or application of fundamental rights in the European Union which cannot be solved by the various Member States in their constitutions and in the Human Rights Convention to which all countries, and the European Union, both before and after enlargement, are bound.
The fourth and final issue is enlargement. Despite the progress announced here today, we feel that more than ten years after the fall of the Berlin wall the European Union should be showing a more consistent political will in terms of welcoming into the European fold the people of Central and Eastern Europe who legitimately aspire to share a common future with us. This would prevent them from feeling any disappointment or even frustration. This will should be shown through three essential aspects: firstly the defence of the major European causes of peace, freedom and economic and social development which must underlie the negotiations with the applicant countries; secondly the promotion of the merit of each country as the only condition to be imposed on accession, and thirdly the maintenance of the economic and social cohesion of the current 15 Member States. Austria, the Intergovernmental Conference, the Charter of Fundamental Rights and enlargement are four issues requiring four different responses. This is what we expect from the meeting at Feira of the Heads of State and Government on the Portuguese Presidency."@en1
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