Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-03-12-Speech-1-102"
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"en.20010312.7.1-102"2
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"Mr President, Mr Schwaiger’s report on the negotiations conducted within the WTO framework on the Built-In Agenda, in our view, raises three questions to which, I hope, our debate is going to provide answers.
Firstly, surely it is dangerous to negotiate separately on the Built-In Agenda? Admittedly, the negotiations on agriculture, services and certain aspects of intellectual property, as they are termed in the Built-In Agenda, were already programmed by the Uruguay Round and may, therefore, be considered as not having been legally affected by the failure of the general negotiations in Seattle. It seems to have been implicitly accepted that discussions on these areas will continue separately, but is that actually reasonable, given that all these subjects are effectively interdependent? Moreover, as I understood it, the European Union’s previous position has always been that there should be nothing but comprehensive negotiation. Should the failure at Seattle not lead us to rethink the entire emphasis of negotiations?
My second question is as follows: Paragraph 1 of the motion for a resolution we have before us calls on the Commission to conduct the negotiations on the Built-In Agenda on the basis of the guidelines given by the Council from before Seattle. Yet is the situation really still the same? There have been great strides forward in public opinion regarding the regulation of international trade. The failure of Seattle was an initial indicator of this, but opinion has developed apace since then, particularly under the impetus of a number of agricultural crises. Admittedly, the 1999 negotiating mandate already took into consideration the requirement for a multifunctional agriculture and an agricultural policy incorporating concerns unrelated to trade. At the same time, however, it expressed the necessity of pursuing the liberalisation of trade as a priority. Is that still compatible with developments? Do we not need further deliberation on the subject?
For instance, I am struck to note that, among the new concerns to be taken into account, people always cite product safety, environmental protection, food quality, animal welfare, justifiably so, but never independence in terms of food supply. Yet, Europe’s self-sufficiency in terms of food is absolutely crucial, and is very closely associated with all the other objectives we deem necessary. This has been demonstrated by means of a negative example of our dependence in terms of vegetable proteins, which we unfortunately had to accept at Blair House and which has led us to overuse animal meal. In the light of these events, do you not consider that the Blair House agreements need to be renegotiated?
My third question is this: How are the future talks to be monitored by the Council and the interested Parliaments? This point was clarified in some of the drafts for the Treaty of Nice by, either, a rewording of Article 133, or, a new protocol stipulating very precisely how the Council should supervise the Commission during the WTO negotiations to ensure that it does not deviate from the common position. All these excellent provisions, however, have disappeared from the final version. Similarly notable by their absence are any provisions on parliamentary scrutiny. Hence our proposal – I am coming to my conclusion, Mr President – before opening further negotiations, should we not first reopen the issue of increasing our control of the negotiators? We think this an essential precondition in order to properly safeguard the interests of the citizens of Europe."@en1
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