Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-10-24-Speech-2-134"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20001024.5.2-134"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:translated text |
".
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, two dangers threaten the health of MEPs: heart attacks and attacks of modesty. I hope, therefore, that you will forgive me if I avoid the latter and describe my short report as extremely important, and express my pleasure at its almost unexpected success with the Commission and the Council.
The report was unanimously approved by the Committee on Budgets a few weeks ago and, to date, no amendments have been tabled. It is to be hoped, therefore, that on Thursday it should in principle be approved without any difficulty. Nonetheless, allow me to explain some of its basic elements.
The proposal I am asking you to support by voting in favour of the report is the result of a long process and fulfils an aspiration that has been held by Parliament almost since its inception. Since 1985 – and I did say 1985 – the Parliamentary Committee on Budgets has been trying to ensure that European Parliament procedures take account of the financial impact of the resolutions voted upon in plenary. And then, a long time ago, 15 years ago, a working party was set up for that purpose. We also asked the Council – with what success we do not know – to adopt a similar approach. Although in the Decision of 24 June 1988 on budgetary discipline, the Council established a link between legislation and finance that was subsequently incorporated into the EC Treaty as Article 270, you will grant me that even the Council itself has not taken great pains to comply with this Decision.
What is the problem, ladies and gentlemen? I think I can say that, essentially, the problem is the tremendous increase in legislative work in the European Union as a whole, in particular the exponential growth of legislative codecision, the huge range of legislative decisions taken in parallel. In accordance with current legislation, the Commission currently sends us, together with its drafts, a balance sheet that includes what is basically a multiannual proposal for budgetary programming corresponding to the draft. Nonetheless, as everyone knows, the human race can be divided into two classes: those who adhere to the budget and those who do not. That is why, when the Ministers for Foreign Affairs meet and take some commendable decision or other, such as helping Kosovo or Serbia, the least of their concerns is whether there is enough money to finance the decision and whether it has to be taken from elsewhere, such as aid to development in Africa, the MEDA programme or the promotion of human rights in the former Soviet Union. This is the trouble with the Cars proposal, for example, which is currently under discussion.
When a legislative conciliation takes place on social, cultural or environmental issues – and the Commissioner will recognise that I am right – the Commissioner for Budgets, the Ministers for Finance and the members of the Committee on Budgets all pray that a financial blunder will not occur.
The agreement reached in July involves an increase in the information contained in the financial statement. In future, all new proposals must be accompanied by an assessment of their compatibility with the financial perspective and its needs with regard to lists of budgetary posts. The Commission is implicitly required to consider at the beginning of the legislative procedure whether it has the necessary human resources and whether the proposal might require a revision of the financial perspective or a redeployment of previously approved programmes. In short, an opportunity cost analysis.
Many of the problems explained to us by Mrs Haug arise from the fact that the total cost of the programmes exceeds the total amount of the corresponding heading in the financial perspective. The poor implementation of some programmes can also be explained or justified by a lack of staff. Commissioner Patten thus proposes reducing the cost of the MEDA programme and simultaneously increasing its staff by 25 posts. This is a prime example of what we are trying to avoid
. We are therefore also going to change our internal Rules of Procedure in order to take account of this agreement.
We believe that this declaration should be included in the Interinstitutional Agreement, but in any case, I would like to say to you that it only makes sense within the context of an Interinstitutional Agreement with a financial perspective.
I shall end, Mr President, by thanking the other institutions for their diligence in the handling of this joint declaration. Parliament reiterated its suggestion during a three-way dialogue that took place halfway through the Portuguese Presidency and concluded with an agreement at the first conciliation presided over by France in July. This is a real record, which I hope will now lead to greater consideration of the financial constraints in our legislative activities."@en1
|
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples