Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-12-18-Speech-3-048"
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"en.20021218.3.3-048"2
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"Mr President, I wish, on behalf of my group, to make a number of short points on institutional questions that have arisen from the historic Copenhagen Summit.
Firstly, the agreement that the new Commission should take office on 1 November. I welcome that agreement, but it must be clear – which it is – that the new Parliament must be the one to approve the new President and Commission. The details of this must be worked out, as Mr Barón Crespo said earlier, in an interinstitutional agreement between our institutions. I would like to see November become the permanent changeover date. Why should we, every five years, have a half-year period where the EU's work comes almost to a halt, while we first have the European elections and then an outgoing Commission that needs to be replaced by a new one that can only start work the following year in January? It would be good to introduce this on a permanent basis and not just on this one-off occasion.
Secondly, the issue of the signing of the new Treaty that emerges from the Convention, containing a constitution. It is fair enough that this has been set for May, when the new Member States will legally be members and can sign that new Treaty. However, I would not like to see the new date being used as an excuse for having a long, drawn-out IGC from autumn 2003 to May 2004. We must keep to the idea of having a short, sharp IGC in autumn 2003, with the participation of the new Member States, to approve the results of the Convention, which we hope will not need to be changed.
My third and final point is the question of the number of seats in this Parliament for Hungary and the Czech Republic. Under the Nice plans they are allocated two seats fewer than Belgium, Portugal and Greece – although those countries have a comparable population with Hungary and the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic and Hungary are right to ask for equality. Whether that is achieved by cutting the number of seats for the three current states – which may be difficult – or by raising the number for Hungary and the Czech Republic, the issue must be addressed in the Accession Treaty."@en1
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