Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-02-28-Speech-3-025"
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"en.20010228.4.3-025"2
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".
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, exactly a year has passed – or rather, it will be exactly a year tomorrow – since the Commission adopted the Reform Strategy White Paper. Over the course of this year, the Commission has already discharged two key aspects of the White Paper, the reform of financial management and the new planning and programming cycle for the Commission's work. Within the allotted time frame, the Commission completed the third and most substantial and complex stage of the work announced by the White Paper this morning, with the adoption of guidelines on personnel
policy and management, which is, as you are aware, one of the most sensitive points of our administrative reform.
This very afternoon sees the beginning – the first meeting with the trade unions and the staff will take place today at 4 o'clock – of a further stage of consultation and conciliation, which is just as important and just as exacting
involving all the staff and all the representatives. Only when this process, which will take several months, is completed will the Commission define its position. Within the space of a few months, we will have to achieve the fundamental goal we have set ourselves of being a good employer in the years to come, offering competitive conditions to attract the most highly-skilled people for the European institutions and allowing its staff to reach the highest levels of efficiency, professionalism and responsibility.
A great deal of work has been necessary for us to reach this point, and so, before I say anything else, I would like to thank Neil Kinnock and his staff for the huge amount of work they have put into the laborious preparation of these documents. Allow me once again to pay tribute to the staff of the Commission and all the institutions for their hard work this year. It has been a difficult year and I am aware that some sections of our staff are concerned at these rapid, far-reaching changes, which have come on top of an already heavy daily work schedule. However, a thorough review of the Commission's organisational model could not be put off: we had committed ourselves to the task before Parliament and the work was most urgent and absolutely essential. There had not been a complete reorganisation for decades. Therefore, we intend to make every endeavour to secure a broad, intense debate on the guidelines and details of the reform, so that it becomes the common legacy of all and all commit themselves to furthering its progress.
I would, nevertheless, like to take this opportunity to stress a fundamental concept: the reform is not and never has been a political end in itself, to be taken out of its wide institutional and political context, that is. It is part of a clearly-defined project which has furthered peace and democracy in Europe, creating a model of cooperation and development based on the principle of the rule of law and on respect for fundamental values. The institutions of this unique model, the institutions of the European Union, have played a fundamental role in this process and it is amazing to see – and this is one of the things which has made the greatest impression on me since I have been here in Brussels – the extent to which the people who work in the institutions view their jobs as completely different from any other job; there is an unmistakable atmosphere of being part of the historic project of European integration.
This widespread motivation is evidence of the unique nature of the administrations of the Community institutions and a guarantee of their strength, and it is on this new basis that we are building the new European civil service, which will be different from the civil services of the national States but will complement them. It is awareness of this uniqueness which underlies the guidelines we have adopted today: to reform outdated rules and customs in order to make it possible for the institutions to deal with the challenges of future years, keeping the European project clearly in their sights.
There are three points on which the guidelines for the reform of personnel policy and management are based: firstly, we intend to guarantee the pay and pension levels necessary for an independent, high-level European civil service; secondly, we want to improve working conditions to enable our staff to work to the best of their abilities, progressing professionally and having their rights recognised, with the aim of ensuring the right balance between job satisfaction and private commitments; thirdly and lastly, we want to introduce a more modern career structure to allow our staff to adapt to new tasks, removing the rigidities which have become established over the years and increasing responsibility and rewarding merit at all levels.
A large-scale programme of investment in training activities will be an essential complement to the achievement of these objectives. I have to say, in this regard, that training has always been overlooked. It is true that the new staff were high-calibre but, with the changes taking place nowadays, even high-calibre staff need ongoing training.
Basically, the aim of this package of reform initiatives is to enhance the capacities and skills of our staff. It is the political duty of us all to make this reform a success if we want the institutions – particularly the Commission – to be able play their full role as the driving force of integration in the coming years. This is an ongoing task and it is called “The Future of Europe”. The guidelines which we have adopted today and which we will submit for open, thorough consultation with all the staff, are a substantial step forward in this direction."@en1
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