Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-07-03-Speech-1-063"
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"en.20000703.6.1-063"2
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"Madam President, Prime Minister, the Feira Council did not provide any new items of substance. It was even repetitive where certain fundamental policies are concerned and made no changes to weightier issues. It was a disappointment for that very reason. Predictably, the main themes, ranging from enlargement to the CIG, via the Charter of Fundamental Rights, were largely put off for the Nice Summit. This is certainly why it became necessary to come up with a last-minute agreement on timetabling the tax package which, in the end and in essence, is restricted to waiting for another agreement a few years off, which will still be dependent on its unlikely acceptance by third countries, which are precisely today’s tax havens.
It is therefore not surprising that this virtual agreement should have been particularly warmly welcomed by those who have never been keen on a greater balance between legislation on capital and labour and who have always opposed mounting any joint action against these tax havens for tax evasion, fraud or the movement of large sums of money. On the contrary and in the name of the completion of the internal market and the follow up to the Lisbon Special Summit, we have seen new pressures for speeding up the process of liberalisation and deregulation of the labour market. When the broad economic policy guidelines for 2000 were approved it was accepted that constraints resulting from the Stability Pact would have to be strengthened and provided for, which suggests that there will be further and greater problems, particularly in the social domain. The reasons for the large demonstration organised by the trade union movement at the Feira Summit are therefore understandable and the fact that tens of thousands of people took part in this demonstration definitely made it one of the most striking features of the Summit.
There are also grounds for concern in another area, however. I am referring to the revision of the Treaties. Almost the entire task has been left to the French Presidency and the most important aspect in this area has already moved beyond the normal institutional framework, into bilateral summits and various conferences and statements. Nevertheless, in this area, we cannot let pass without comment the fact that the Feira Summit did not only fail to include the revision on the agenda but that it spoke about ‘a form of closer cooperation’ in the singular. We already had deep-felt concerns about what has up until now been known as ‘closer cooperation’, given its profound and unmistakable connotations of the creation of a hard core, a vanguard or a pioneer group. This would therefore mean a multi-speed Europe, headed by a political cabinet. The adoption of this new wording, because it is undoubtedly much more indicative of such ideas, increases these doubts and makes us extremely apprehensive as to the kind of European construction which some people are advocating. The worst thing is that other people seem to be distracted…
I reserve a final word of disapproval for the obvious trend towards the militarisation of the European Union. Proof of this is the fact that we are developing our own military capabilities, clearly in tandem with NATO. We still think that the OSCE is still the most appropriate framework for developing the European Union’s security system. We also take the view that the prevention of crises and civilian crisis management should prevail over any interventionist action."@en1
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