Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-07-03-Speech-1-081"
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"en.20000703.6.1-081"2
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"Mr President, ever since 1989 I have been trying from within this Parliament to create more favourable conditions for small and medium-sized enterprises. Early on, I, together with various organisations, approached each new presidency with an explicit demand for a Council programme for SMEs. We were always rewarded with fine pronouncements but rarely with deeds. Now the Council, under Portuguese Presidency, has come up with a charter. I am pleased about that but, Mr President-in-Office of the Council, I want you, with your last breath as President, to guarantee me the following.
Take for example the difficulties that contractors encounter if they want to work over the border. Parliament intends to keep a critical eye on the Council when it comes to the implementation of the charter in the Member States. We are holding you to your word and want to see the deed that follows the word. All that remains is for me to convey to you my best wishes for our former colleague Mr Cravinho, who I hear is seriously ill.
Firstly, that the implementation of the charter is and remains a matter for the Council itself. Education and training are matters for subsidiarity, a message your Council never tires of drumming into Parliament. As I see it, looking after fledgling firms has never been one of Europe’s tasks, whereas the general climate is, as is keeping complex legislation to a minimum. But making European legislation correspond with national legislation for example, including the legal hotchpotch that usually results, that is your concern.
Benchmarking is all well and good but a European Union that bases its entire policy on such a fad is suffering from a dearth of policy. Follow the example of the United States for once.
Lifelong learning is the responsibility of the Member States. And woe betide you if you fail to get this off the ground quickly given current demographic trends. On-line access for companies. You must ensure that companies in your own country enter the digital age, including the section of the business community that still do not have computers on their premises.
The internal market and gaining access to it, that is the stuff that European issues are made of. But it is for Member States to ensure that they have sufficient easily accessible complaint procedures. Mr President-in-Office of the Council, more often than not it is the Member States themselves that institute measures which impede the market. This is a scandal."@en1
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