Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-02-06-Speech-3-161"
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"en.20020206.8.3-161"2
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"Mr President, the Napolitano report on relations between the European Parliament and the national parliaments is based on the fair observation that there is a serious imbalance in the European Union between the executive bodies that have extensive jurisdiction and a parliamentary power that is still too weak. The report concludes, again quite rightly, that there is a risk of a growing democratic deficit.
What can we do, therefore, to correct this deficit? Although Mr Napolitano has shown some openness in relation to the traditional positions of the European Parliament, I do not think that his report has yet reached the correct balance in its demands for the extension of the powers of the House, and that it confines the national parliaments to an indirect and, in most cases, illusory role, by placing everything under the vague term of ‘parliamentarisation’.
In our view, this lack of balance is a result of an omission. The report does not mention that the European Parliament is merely an assembly with implementing powers and that the national parliaments alone have full sovereignty. On a more serious note, it does not mention that this legal inequality is increased two-fold by unequal political legitimacy in the eyes of the citizens. We cannot undertake any worthwhile reforms in the European Union if we hide from such huge realities.
That is why I added a minority opinion to the Napolitano report in order to explain that there will not be any true democratisation of the Union unless we reassess the value of the national parliaments, and unless they acquire direct power in the European decision-making process. I described how this could be done in a report submitted to the Intergroup SOS Democracy, which will be assessed at the next Convention."@en1
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