Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-03-26-Speech-3-086"
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"en.20030326.5.3-086"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I believe the discrepancy between words and deeds to be a fundamental problem running right through this whole debate. Let me give a few examples of what I mean. The Barcelona Summit decided on a study of what are termed the Basle II effects on small and medium-sized enterprises and banks. To date, it has not been completed. I take the view that if any study is completed only after the Basle Committee has produced its resolution and after the Commission has decided on a draft directive, it amounts to the squandering of money, to a betrayal of trust and to treating with disdain the resolutions of Parliament and of the Council. No sooner do we decide on the Stability and Growth Pact, than people question it – some because of Lisbon, some because of the war in Iraq, and others because they lack the courage to reform or because it threatens their comfortable positions. Rather than ignoring resolutions, we should be implementing them and taking them seriously!
The Lisbon Council resolved unanimously to make Europe, by 2010, the most competitive and knowledge-based continent, a continent fostering social cohesion, promoting sustainability and creating new jobs. Where is the actual timetable? Where are the detailed objectives? Where is the road map? Where are the specific and verifiable programmes in all the Member States? Good and ambitious objectives need to be followed up by concrete action, or else we lose credibility.
Let me now turn to Iraq. We are working towards a common foreign, security and defence Policy, but when it comes to the crunch, each does his own thing. We want to strengthen the UN, but not even the EU's two permanent members of the Security Council are making any effort to find a common approach. As President Prodi has shown us, we make demands of the Convention, yet we fail to comply with our own codes of conduct.
We have a chance; it is called ‘more Europe’. It is also called ‘more United Nations’. We will find our opportunity if we stop setting national interests against European objectives, what nations do against what Europe resolves, the trans-Atlantic alliance against a self-confident and enlarged European Union. Let us follow up the summits with the necessary actions, and let us punish with sanctions any breaches of the Treaties for political reasons. Those who do not take themselves seriously will not be taken seriously by others, and a more serious approach to things will be worth our while."@en1
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