Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-12-18-Speech-3-057"
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"en.20021218.3.3-057"2
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"Mr President, I, too, would like to congratulate Mr Rasmussen, Mr Haarder, Mr Prodi and Mr Verheugen on this excellent outcome. I would also like to join our group chairman, Mr Poettering, in emphasising that this small country has produced a great achievement. This really means that we will not have to change this rotation system in the future. Experience teaches us that big countries sometimes do not do things very well, and that small countries sometimes do things very well indeed. I say to Denmark that you can be proud of the outcome.
Secondly I would like to make some comments on enlargement. I am delighted that Poland has made it to the first group of accession countries. This was of course not without problems. It would also probably be a good idea – and I am addressing this to Mr Verheugen – to give the Member States an even better explanation of what enlargement is really going to cost us. If we are aware that there is still a leeway of some EUR 25 billion before we reach the EU expenditure ceiling, and if we know that we will only be incurring costs of EUR 12 billion in the first year of enlargement, EUR 12.6 billion in the second year and EUR 14.9 billion in the third year, we will know that despite enlargement we will still have money left over in 2006. We must therefore make it clearer that this enlargement is not expensive; in fact it is cheaper than all the enlargements that have gone before.
Thirdly , I would like to mention Cyprus and Turkey. It is a pity that Cyprus has not been included in its entirety, but it is a good thing that we have made sensible arrangements with regard to Turkey, which does not yet have a date for accession, but will have to adhere explicitly to the arrangements agreed at Copenhagen and will be tested against them. I think that this is very important. Actually I wonder whether Turkey ever ought to accede, as we will then have to tackle the debate about Europe’s borders at some stage.
My last comment is this: you had a visit from Mr Giscard d’Estaing, and I have the honour of being a member of the Convention. Mr Giscard d’Estaing once again spoke about the president of the European Union and the congress that would have to be set up. Those are his ideas. I can tell you that there is really very little support for this in the Convention. If we ever need a president of the European Union, it should be the president of the European Commission, and we do not need a European congress at all. It is this European Parliament that needs more powers. That is also what it says in the Benelux statement. If all small countries endorse this, we will fortunately be able to consign this nonsense of Mr Giscard d’Estaing’s to the scrap heap. I hope, therefore, that Denmark will back this."@en1
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