Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-12-05-Speech-4-022"
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"en.20021205.2.4-022"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, today, the Commission will present its second contribution to the Convention on the future institutional structure of the Union. To avoid any misunderstandings created by press reports, I would like to make it clear from the outset that, today, I am here to present, as agreed, only the text that the Commission has adopted. The document on the Constitution of the European Union, which has been reported by the press, is nothing more than a working document, a feasibility study that Commissioner Barnier, Commissioner Vitorino and I commissioned from a group of legal experts in the Commission, in order to have an initial idea of how a Treaty could be organised. The document was essentially drawn up on the basis of the structure of the preliminary draft presented to the Convention by the Praesidium. As it is simply, I repeat, a technical working tool, it was neither discussed by the College nor submitted for its approval, and the College has therefore no political responsibility for its content. Although it was formulated mainly for internal use, I thought it my duty to inform Mr Giscard d'Estaing of its existence, and, for the sake of transparency, we have decided to post it on the Internet by the end of the day in order to make it available, as others have done in the past, as a working tool for the Convention and for all those interested.
Ladies and gentlemen, the key points in the Communication form a single unit. The democratic legitimacy of our institutions, for example, is closely bound up with their functions. Our main proposals in this respect can be summed up in three points. The first point is to abolish unanimous voting, as this rule has played a part in the darkest periods of the Union's recent history. If the veto has frequently paralysed decision-making with 15 Member States, just think what could happen with 25 or more. That is why I believe majority voting should be the rule. However, the current system of weighting is extremely complex and a mystery to the citizens, and not just to them: experts find it impossible to understand too. We therefore propose that the Council should take practically all decisions by a twofold, simple-majority vote, that is, a vote which represents both a majority of the Member States and a majority of the citizens. More sensitive decisions would clearly require enhanced majorities.
The second point concerns the Presidency of the Council, an issue that has caused rivers of ink to flow. I believe that the proposal for a President of the Union, put forward by several quarters, creates more problems than it solves.
On the one hand, it enhances the continuity and visibility of the Union, but, on the other, it denies the Member States and deprives us all of the opportunity for involvement at European level. There are other concerns too. Who would elect the President of the Union? Who would this President be accountable to? And above all, as Mr Verhofstadt remarked, what would this President do for the other 360 days of the year when the Council is not in session and George Bush is not calling? It is clear that such a position would open a rift in our institutional structure. We therefore recommend maintaining the system of rotation for the Presidency of the European Council, the General Affairs Council and the Committee of Permanent Representatives. For all other Council configurations, we propose a new formula, that members of Council configurations should elect a president from one of their number, with a one-year mandate. This formula will bring greater continuity to the Council's work and put the Presidency in the hands of persons who enjoy the full confidence of their peers.
The third point concerns our external representation. The Union must act as one in the international arena in order to defend its values and promote its social model. In terms of trade, the Union is already on an equal footing with the other leading players on the world stage. Why, then, can we not be equally credible in the political arena? This requires imagination and courage because it is vital for the Union to speak with a single voice in international politics. What we propose is a new post of Secretary of the Union for Foreign Affairs. The Secretary will be appointed jointly by the European Council and the President of the Commission, and will also be a Vice-President of the Commission. It follows that the Secretary of the Union must report personally to both the European Council and the President of the Commission. As a member of the Commission, though, the Secretary will be jointly accountable along with the other Commissioners before the European Parliament.
As you can see, this is a major innovation, but, I repeat, it is unavoidable. Given the magnitude of the change – and this is important – we plan to have a transitional period, at the end of which the Secretary of the Union will take full charge of his duties. I would like to outline these briefly. The Secretary of the Union will autonomously exercise the Commission's right of initiative in foreign policy in accordance with the Council's guidelines. The Council, or a group of Member States, may, however, ask the Secretary to present suitable proposals to the Council to achieve common objectives. The Secretary of the Union for Foreign Affairs will also be responsible for implementing common decisions and, most importantly, the Secretary will be the Union's sole representative for foreign policy in relations with non-Member countries and other international bodies. Various Union activities, such as trade and development cooperation policy, are connected with foreign policy. Continuity in these areas will be ensured by collaboration between the Secretary of the Union and the President of the Commission who, in this respect, will coordinate matters. The issue of the Union's external representation is also relevant to economic affairs. Representation of the euro area
in the international arena needs to be settled. The euro's economic strength is now recognised: it also needs to become a force politically and make its presence felt in the wider world.
The third and final key point of our proposal is simplification and clarity. The current volume of directives, decisions and regulations that combine to form our body of legislation is possibly the biggest barrier citizens face in understanding the European institutions. The Commission believes it is time to put in order the instruments at our disposal. We propose, therefore, to classify legislation into just three categories: organic laws
adopted by enhanced majorities by the European Parliament and the Council; laws adopted by codecision by Parliament and the Council; implementing regulations adopted by the Commission in order to put these laws into effect.
The Constitutional Treaty must make a clear distinction between laws and implementing regulations. Moreover, it must be clear who implements European legislation in practice. We propose that the Commission should have exclusive competence for implementing – I repeat, implementing – European legislation, and, as I said, it will be accountable for this to both Parliament and the Council. The principle of transparency must also apply to what is known as comitology. We therefore feel that only advisory committees should be maintained. When the legislator decides to adopt laws at European level, I repeat, the Commission alone should have responsibility for their implementation. However, where the Commission is to perform a legislative role by delegation, then it is only right that both branches of the legislative – the Council and Parliament – should be on the same footing as regards the possibility of monitoring the Commission's activity, referred to as ‘call back’.
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, When I quoted Jean Monnet at the start, I said that, at this stage of European integration, we need to look far ahead. The debate aroused by the Convention in recent months has already widened our horizons. The national parliaments and governments have believed in it right from the start, and sent major figures to represent them. The goal of the Convention has become more ambitious. It is no longer just a question of ensuring that the institutions work well after enlargement: it must establish the overall shape of the Union for generations to come.
I am pleased to see this development. The Convention that Parliament and I too wanted so keenly is providing our fellow citizens and the whole world with an analysis of all aspects of our institutions. I am also pleased that this is taking place in the light of day. The coming months will see the emergence of a new, united Europe, and we can be proud that it will have come into being democratically and transparently.
To set the tone for my presentation and the subsequent debate, I would like to recall someone who played a leading role in laying the first foundations of the European project. This is what Jean Monnet said about his famous method: ‘I never thought we could change human nature. But by changing the context in which people live, by giving them the same rules and the same democratic institutions, we can succeed in changing the way they behave towards each other. Within the Community, Europeans are learning to live together as one and the same people. We are not merging states, we were uniting human beings.’
If we want to look ahead, far ahead into the future, we need to climb onto the shoulders of the great statesmen who have gone before us. That requires a responsible and humble approach, and it is with humility that I propose to follow Jean Monnet's intuition in order to meet the great challenges of the future. To unite all the citizens of Europe, we must create true harmony between the States and between the peoples.
The debate that has taken place in recent months since the Convention opened has already clarified many unclear areas and answered many questions. First, the debate has made it plain that citizens do not want the Union to withdraw from areas where it is present. On the contrary, people want the Union to be more prominent in foreign policy, in justice and security and in social affairs. Moreover, there is broad agreement on the Community method, which is at the heart of so many of our achievements. Relations between the main institutions certainly need to be streamlined and clarified, but even the most sceptical have realised that without a strong Community element, Europe would become less effective and less democratic too.
Our contribution to the Convention seeks to respond to these concerns. In short, it has three objectives: the Union must become more democratic, more effective and clearer. The path to these goals has not yet been marked out in detail, but we already know where the starting and finishing lines are. The reshaping of the Union must be grounded on its twofold nature as a Union of peoples and of States, together with a third source of the Union's legitimacy, the fact that it safeguards the common interest. Our path must lead us to build the world's first true supranational democracy.
To give more democratic substance to our structure, we need to establish the roles and responsibilities of the main institutions more clearly. We therefore have two proposals for reform. The first
concerns the appointment of the Commission. The President of the Commission should be elected by the European Parliament by at least two-thirds of the votes cast in a secret ballot. Once it has confirmed the appointment of the President of the Commission, the Council, by common agreement with him or her, will designate the other members of the Commission. The European Parliament will then approve the whole Commission, as appointed by the Council.
The second innovation concerns the Commission's dual accountability to the European Parliament and the Council. We propose that both institutions should have the right to pass a motion of censure on the Commission. This will give the institutional triangle more balance and will strengthen the Commission's position as guarantor of the general interest.
Clearly, this is a particularly delicate and bold proposal, but, in my view, the proposed arrangement divides decision-making power more fairly between the representatives of the national governments and the representatives of the people, that is, between the Council and Parliament. For the same reason, we propose to make codecision the rule. All European legislation must be put forward by a Commission proposal, adopted by a majority vote in the Council and codecided by the European Parliament.
Lastly, as I have often said in this House, the time has come to put Parliament on the same footing as every other democratically elected parliament, by reforming the way the Union is financed. Its responsibilities are typical of those of all the world’s parliaments. We want to give the European Parliament more power to make decisions on resources. The Union's budget must therefore be adopted by the European Parliament and the Council by a procedure derived from codecision, as I mentioned a moment ago. As the Praesidium also acknowledges in its draft Constitutional Treaty, the Union must have its own resources. This would remove the distinction between compulsory and non-compulsory expenditure."@en1
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