Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-11-20-Speech-3-291"
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"en.20021120.8.3-291"2
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"Mr President, to outside observers, this afternoon’s two issues could seem too esoteric and technical, but, as various speakers have pointed out, these are issues which are affecting the lives of the citizens and, at the moment, as a result of the great international scandals, they are affecting consumers.
The Enron case in the United States has been mentioned, but, in my country, Spain, for example, we have a great financial scandal going on, the
case, which has led to the resignation of several top government figures and which could threaten others – the Spanish Parliament is investigating the situation at the moment. When we talk about financial services, we are talking about something which affects the lives of ordinary citizens. It affects their pensions and the future of their savings.
We are currently trying to create pan-European financial services, which transcend the borders of Europe. We are concerned to guarantee our companies the greatest possible freedom and the greatest possible opportunity to act within Europe, but, unless we establish a pan-European system of monitoring, so that the operation of these companies is controlled, we run the risk of the kind of frauds and scandals currently taking place on an exclusively national level taking place throughout the European Union. I believe that a system of liberalising financial services throughout the Community is inconceivable unless it is accompanied by a system of monitoring financial activities throughout the Community.
We all agree that this issue requires democracy. Democracy means ‘people’s government’, and this is only possible by means of parliamentary representation – in Greece direct democracy was possible because all the citizens met in a public square. The attempt to replace democracy with a system of public consultation, without recourse to the ballot box, by means of computers or public consultations for example – as Commissioner Bolkestein said – is deceitful. The only consultation there is room for today is a public consultation by means of the ballot box and by means of legally elected representatives.
At the moment, for example, there is talk of a procedure according to which the Commission’s proposals could be blocked by a simple consultation with business sectors. I believe that nothing could be less democratic than to name the interlocutors who would represent that democracy.
We therefore move on to the final point: the proposals of Mrs Randzio-Plath. Co-decision is not something arbitrary, it is a procedure that has meant the participation of Parliament and is the result of a political process. It is true that there is an execution phase and a delegation phase, and that it could be argued that, since the execution falls to the Governments of the Member States, Parliament should get involved in this phase, which is outside the actual activity of control. But, in the legislative field, if we speak for example of delegated rules, I cannot see that it is possible to follow the Lamfalussy procedure unless we establish clear participation by Parliament, by means of the so-called call-back measures. In other words, Parliament, as the legally elected representative of the people, has the right and the obligation to participate in the monitoring of legislative development.
As Mrs Randzio-Plath has pointed out, we have just adopted the Lamfalussy procedure, we do not yet have any experience of how it is working and we want to continue to restrict the possible participation of Parliament without verifying whether this procedure is working effectively. Let us see how it is working first, let us see that democratic guarantees are really maintained and, if they are, you may rest assured, Commissioner and Mr President-in-Office of the Council, that this Parliament will be prepared to participate to the full.
But democracy cannot consist of participation - for example – by companies, in arbitrary fora, in consultations of a particular nature. No committee can replace the will of the people and that will is only expressed by means of elections, Parliaments and parliamentary representation. This Parliament’s operating system can be improved, the parliamentary structures can be changed in the new constitution, but anything other than the adoption of legislation by means of an instrument elected by the people, with a normal electoral procedure, would be deceitful and would be a way to put decisions into the hands, perhaps, of the very people who would then act as predators to the detriment of the consumers.
I believe that we must strengthen our monitoring procedure, strengthen our mechanisms and make them as flexible as possible, and this should be done by means of parliamentary participation throughout the legislative process, from top to bottom."@en1
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