Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-12-17-Speech-1-034"
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"en.20011217.3.1-034"2
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"Madam President, Mr President-in-Office of the Council, President of the Commission, I have already had the opportunity to say that, in my view, the passion of any European politician should be, in the short term, to narrow the gulf of suspicion, if not distrust, which continues to grow between the citizens and the European institutions. My group therefore welcomes anything that can help to open up our respective societies to the debate on the future of Europe.
This is why we sincerely appreciate the principle of the Convention, which is a departure from the typical intergovernmental behind closed doors meeting, as it involves European and national members of parliament in the preparatory work of the IGC, and allows representatives of candidate countries to participate. It is also open to contributions from social players. Rest assured that we will urge our counterparts from civil society to work in a constructive and open manner in the new, European political forum.
Let us hope that those whose desire is to avoid tackling the disturbing issues that have surfaced in our societies will not be supported by the majority of the Convention. A problem cannot be solved by ignoring its root cause. That is why I thought the current state of affairs described in the draft declaration that Mr Verhofstadt submitted to the European Council was interesting, because it corresponds exactly with what our fellow citizens are experiencing, but the Fifteen unfortunately decided not to take it on board.
On the other hand, I regret that the Presidency-in-Office of the Council has not shown the same critical attitude when preparing the questions submitted for discussion. Of course, the European Council did not find fault with any of this. The two vice-chairs of my group, Mrs Kaufmann and Mrs Frahm, will speak again with regard to the specifically institutional aspects of the Laeken Summit. As far as I am concerned, I would like to stress one single idea in relation to this. If we genuinely wish, as the Declaration by the Fifteen stated, to use citizens’ expectations as the main theme of our imminent reflections, then, in my view, the debate cannot fail to include the institutional questions of the European project, the political guidelines that the institutions are supposed to implement.
Anyone who has taken part in citizens’ debates within the framework of the pre-Laeken consultation, or has taken the trouble to listen to the messages that came to light recently in the large demonstrations that took place in Brussels, will have in mind those urgent demands which are practically absent from the Convention’s agenda as defined by the Laeken Declaration. For example, all social issues, in the widest sense of the word, should provoke discussion on the new role that the euro and the European Central Bank will play. It should lead us to examine more closely the conflicting ideas on European services of general economic interest. It should lead us to question the dogma of rationing public spending, to re-launch the debate on the taxation of movements of capital, to stimulate the will to put an end to fiscal dumping and tax havens.
The European Union’s economic policy should no longer be limited to competition policy, nor should its monetary policy be aligned with the demands of the financial markets alone. In my view, the question of the effective rights of employees facing the might of large corporations, and that of the effective involvement of citizens in drawing up European policies and the assessment of their effects are also an unavoidable topic from this perspective.
All these questions, which we are bearing in mind, make up an institutional dimension. They have a place, therefore, in the debates of the future Convention. The same applies to enlargement. Can the institutional challenge posed by this historic event be separated from the other critical problems that we should urgently prevent? Two figures are all that are needed to illustrate what is at stake. We remain silent about these figures when we should be confronting them head on and with total responsibility. By 2004, the European Union’s population will have grown by 30%, but its GNP will only increase by 4.5%. What sort of structural reforms, and, in particular, what type of solidarity policy will be needed in order to avoid dangerous tensions, to enable us to become what the Laeken Declaration calls a big European family?
Lastly, the few lines that this framework document devotes to the CFSP can be summed up almost exclusively by – and I quote – ‘updating the Petersberg tasks’. As if Europe’s ability to wage war was a guarantee of its international authority. Having had the opportunity over recent weeks to visit several regions of the globe, I can say that this is not the most important thing we are asked to do. What people want from Europe is liberation from oppressive American imperialism, to drive back much more aggressively the rule of unilateralism, to develop a wide-ranging strategy of conflict prevention by meeting the needs of development, equality and dignity of the people of the south. In short, they want Europe to give a very different perspective on events, post-11 September, to that of George Bush. Let us have the courage to look at life as it is. Let us once again give a clear and inspired meaning to Europe, and I think that this will liberate the institutional dynamic. This, in any case, is what I believe."@en1
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