Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-11-17-Speech-5-030"
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"en.20001117.3.5-030"2
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"Mr President, listening to the last speaker, I have not heard mention of the common market in almost 20 years in this House. If he reads the records of some of the representatives from his own Member State, the United Kingdom, in those days they were extreme left-wing socialists who forecast everything which seems to scare him with the same hysterical sort of attitude to European Union. They forecast all the things which seem to frighten him today.
Coming from a different part of the political spectrum, it is very interesting to hear him repeat, with the same hysteria, the same concerns. Their capital in those days was Moscow or Budapest. Those were the ideals that they proposed to us and that was the sort of state that they worked for. However, I am glad to say that attitudes in the Labour party in Britain have changed.
I want to thank Mr Posselt for his report. The work we do on a Friday morning in Parliament has the same legitimacy as the work we do on a Monday or any other day. Indeed it was commented that on Wednesday evening when the Commissioner spoke about BSE, somebody drew attention to the fact that there were only 17 people in the House. There are a lot more people here this morning and I will regret the passing of Friday when we can carry on a real debate and respond to each other and take the time to listen to each other. Parliament and democracy in Europe will be the poorer for the shortening of the Strasbourg week.
Having said that, I welcome this proposal. Parliament can be proud that the proposal to set up this academy originated here, and we are grateful to the Portuguese presidency for taking it up and the Commission and Council for their support. It is a good idea and in the European Union where people have freedom of movement, freedom of trade and the right of establishment, where travellers from Scotland can go to Sicily or Greece, it is only logical to expect to develop a common system of maintaining the rule of law.
That common approach is not there at the moment. I come from a state where the police developed out of a chaotic situation – a civil war. But the people at that time established, very wisely, an unarmed police force that is very socially engaged with the communities in which they live and work. You might call them a soft police force but they did succeed in healing the wounds of a civil war and in bringing credibility to the idea of law and order. When I come to continental Europe I am a bit surprised at the way police distance themselves and adopt what appears to be a harder attitude. I will welcome a levelling-out of standards in some Member States in the European Union. All of us have experienced abuses in our own countries. I hope that this academy will help us to have a better understanding of the whole system."@en1
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