Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-11-28-Speech-3-074"
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Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, I initially wanted to respond to the points made by each speaker, but unfortunately, I do not think that I will have time to go into details. I shall, however, try to answer as accurately as I can.
I think that Mr Barón Crespo mentioned the presidium and wanted the forthcoming presidencies to be a part of that. I am not against this at all, but we must keep a sense of balance. A compromise might be for the next presidencies to take part as observers. The Convention can take up any issue, including European security and defence policy. As we know, these are the four themes from Nice relating to the Convention. However, as soon as you say that the Convention was not an Intergovernmental Conference, and was not going to take certain decisions, and I do not really understand why, some people appear to want to limit the scope of the Nice themes at all costs. If, having considered every aspect of the themes from Nice, other issues are tackled, it would be quite worrying for an exercise, which will widely involve civil society in the debate, to say ‘you are going to be restricted to very specific topics and you can only discuss the issues that we want you to discuss. That is a bit mean. Instead, we are in favour of a more optimistic view, where the four themes from Nice are more widely interpreted. I hope that I can count on the European Parliament, at least the more optimistic of its Members, to help us to convince others of this point of view and of this direction.
With regard to Mr Cox’s comments, I share the point of view that Mr Poettering also expressed, that the Commission must remain at the centre of the Community system. The question of timing is also important. There are a number of constraints and there are many elections. I believe that the time period between the Convention and the Intergovernmental Conference must be six months. If it is any longer, I feel that we will be in danger of undoing all the good work of the Convention and the debates, and the worst scenario would be for everyone to arrive at the IGC having forgotten the options in the meantime, or for some to have had the time to pretend they have forgotten them, or having completely stripped the options of all substance. Thus, all the worthwhile work of the Convention will also have been for nothing.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is largely what I wanted to say. I have almost certainly forgotten to say something, but it is time now to answer the last speaker, who asked me if I was in favour of transparency in the Council’s work. Of course, I am in favour of transparency in the Council’s work. Unfortunately, I have many more reservations about carrying out a public relations exercise that would weaken the quality of debate within the Council.
Mrs Maij-Weggen, I am a seasoned parliamentarian, having spent more than 20 years in Parliament. I was also head of opposition in my country for a long time, too long for my liking. Even in Parliament, if we really want to take the general interests of our citizens into account on specific subjects and specific dossiers, it is sometimes better to hold the debate behind closed doors, and not only when naming names or individuals. I think that it would be unwise to turn essential debates on extremely delicate issues into media fodder, debates where 15 Heads of State or Government are trying to reach agreement. I am not totally against holding public debates on a number of issues, but if all the Council formations had to be organised and carried out publicly, I am not sure that that would yield the results that you want, and that I want as well. Therefore, I say yes to transparency, but I have much greater reservations as to propaganda.
There were two suggestions as to how to involve civil society in the work of this Convention. The first suggestion was to create a second forum, a second institution and a second assembly. The major difficulty in doing this is to determine how to select the members of this second assembly, which would bear the huge responsibility of representing European civil society as a whole. It is extremely difficult to select who is the best spokesperson for a specific subject. We would have therefore created a competing institution, existing beside the Convention, made up of representatives of the institutions. This was one choice, this was the first suggestion. The second suggestion that we considered was to work with what I will call a structured network whose origins are found in civil society. We must ensure that this structured network is not at all limiting, ensure that all those involved, all those representing one aspect of public opinion can submit their thoughts, their expectations, their criticisms, their proposals to the Convention, and that the Convention can, if necessary, call upon them to interview them. In other words, this approach is a dynamic exchange of views between the Convention and everyone in European society, be it the academic world, schools, NGOs, or associations. It is important to give everyone the channels through which they can express their views.
We have chosen a structured network, on the understanding that everything produced will be included in the Convention’s official documentation, and that all those who contact the Convention will receive an answer, not just an acknowledgement. I think that the most representative forces of our society will emerge in time. I am clarifying this so that there are no misunderstandings.
First of all, I would like to give my very sincere thanks to the European Parliament and to the majority of the speakers for the quality of their comments, and for the overwhelming European voluntarism that I have heard in this House. I must say that I do not always hear the same voluntarism in the other European institutions where I work. I have therefore found a great deal of optimism here, which I was not expecting. The ambitious goals that you are setting for European integration are very much in line with the ideas and the ambitions that I share, that we share. So, with only a few days to go before Laeken, it is most certainly a welcome commitment, one that I heard voiced by almost all Members. One of the speakers said that the Laeken Summit would be a difficult exercise. I am sure that it will be, because the EU candidate countries, particularly during the debate on the future of Europe, will be faced with a number of choices which are virtually breaking points, and which are so important for the future of Europe that some of us will just have to demonstrate a virtue that is extremely difficult in politics, in other words, that of the ability to make sacrifices.
Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to focus briefly on the Convention, and I would first of all like to explain to you what the Convention is not. I may thus be able to reassure those of you who already see a thousand and one reasons in the Convention for sacrificing some things that they have always believed in, and which are, in fact, crippling Europe. The Convention is not and no one has ever thought that it was the Intergovernmental Conference. The Convention cannot, and I think that it was Mr Méndez de Vigo who said this, act as an alibi either. To my mind, it should, first and foremost, be a worthwhile sounding board. I could also put that another way. It can also be a challenge upon the political responsibility of the IGC members, who will have to take up this challenge, because the Convention will, at any rate, make all Council members face their political responsibility. Let us imagine, for example, that the Convention is proposing three or four options on a specific subject related to an issue that is fundamental for the future of Europe. One of these options receives unanimous support or consensus, another receives the support of 80% of Members, and the third is given 50-50. We are well aware that the Intergovernmental Conference is not going to be forced to choose between these options and that it could very well decide to choose another option, to come up with something else, to give these options a different response to the one that the Convention would have given.
In this case, all IGC members, when shouldering their responsibilities, when adopting one option or another, or when selecting from the options which are presented by the Convention, will, at the same time, risk being at odds, not only with the Convention, but with civil society which must, at some point, make known its intentions, its expectations and its aspirations for this Convention. Therefore, do not underestimate the Convention due to the fact that it is not a decision-making body; do not underestimate its political weight or its political force.
I make no secret of the fact that I have several reservations as to the composition, even though I do not believe that we should no longer consider the request to increase the number of MEPs. I think that this is quite a legitimate question, even if I must reiterate that, in our proposal, we took up the proportions that were used in the Charter of Fundamental Rights. The difference compared to the Charter is that we agreed the candidate countries would take part. We must take this difference into account. I shall reiterate that, at the Ghent European Council, we received requests that ran counter to the requests made by the European Parliament. Several countries demanded an increase in the number of members from the national parliaments, perhaps so that the ruling coalition could have better representation, perhaps to take into account sub-national entities or perhaps because of the bi-cameral system. Essentially, it is quality, rather than quantity, that counts, and I think that the MEPs will always have an advantage because of the fact that they are in control of this dossier and of procedures.
I would still like to add a brief comment regarding the composition, namely that it would be regrettable if latent rivalries between political groups or specific components rise to the surface. I think that the debate must be open; we must not consider ourselves according to the grouping to which we belong. I think we must consider ourselves on our intellectual strength, our intellectual objectivity, on our intellectual, philosophical, cultural and political freedom of thought. This must be done in an objective manner and I am sure that we are all capable of doing this.
Therefore, as far as I am concerned, I am willing to see whether an increase in the European Parliament’s representation will cause too many difficulties, such as, for example, too many Members taking part in the Convention, and whether we will encounter similar requests. This could mean that the number of representatives might prevent the Convention from working smoothly.
In my opening remarks, I gave my thoughts on the outcome of the Convention and how worthwhile it is. I think that our work is moving in the direction proposed by Parliament. We use the consensus method where possible, and have the possibility, where necessary, of presenting options in preferential order, for example. However, we must avoid imposing the consensus method from the outset, because I think that this would weaken the Convention, which would then only be adopted by the smallest common denominator. The possibility for the Convention to present various options must enable us to hold a debate with conflicting views.
I would like to go over the various questions that were put to me concerning enlargement. I would like to respond to the speakers who are not sceptical, but who are obviously concerned. Everyone says that they are in favour of enlargement; everyone says that it is an important political and historical step. At the same time, however, a number of people seem to put forward arguments as if they have not heard what has been said, to express their reservations over enlargement. I would like to make something clear. We have always said that we would, first of all, try to keep up the pace of negotiations with the exceptionally rapid pace set by the Swedish Presidency, and that, secondly, we would do this by judging every country on its own merits. The fact that we can today give a particularly positive progress report on the negotiations does not mean, of course, as some speakers have suggested, that we are being almost politically negligent and would be willing to accept 10 countries before 2004 without any further verification, further judgment or criteria. Of course we would not, and therefore we continue to say, with regard to enlargement, that yes, it is irreversible, but also, yes, each country must be judged on its own merits. These are my comments on enlargement."@en1
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