Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-12-17-Speech-3-007"
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"en.20031217.1.3-007"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, Mr President-in-Office of the Council, ladies and gentlemen, let me be quite frank and say that many of us feel ill at ease today. Why? If we were to take ourselves and our resolutions really seriously, then this oral question could not be put, and there would certainly be no resolution deviating from the Members’ Statute adopted on 3 June this year. Another reason why we feel ill at ease is that it seems strange that, four days after the collapse of the Intergovernmental Conference on ‘The future of Europe – a European constitution’, we find ourselves, in a request for urgent debate, calling on the Council to agree on a Members’ Statute, even though it has hitherto not done so or shown any desire to do so.
The constitution would be more important to us than the Statute, although there is no real connection between the two, but we do this nevertheless, and, all the same, the larger groups are tabling a joint motion for a resolution. Why? We do it because a statute for Members of the European Parliament is not about party-political, national, or individual interests or game-playing; on the contrary, the procedure and content should remain a matter of common concern. We do it, Mr President-in-Office of the Council, because we deeply regret the dishonesty, the tactical considerations, the individual election strategies and the false conceptions of our roles that are involved. The fact is that we are not meant to be engaging in dialogue with one another; it is for you to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’
to what we have adopted as a proposal for our Members’ Statute, and because we want to abandon this shared path. It is because we want to make it clear that it is the Council, which represents the national governments, and not this House, that must bear responsibility for this unsatisfactory state of affairs. That is our final offer; our new message to you is that you must, by 15 January, say ‘yes’ or ‘no’.
Even though many of us regard the proposal on taxation as contrary to EU law, unjust and essentially wrong, we put forward this motion as a token of goodwill and of our awareness of the problems in the Council. Taking discussions at national level on pensions into account, we are raising the pensionable age by three years. Although a statute should also govern the functions of a Member of this House, we are dividing it and removing the elements of primary law, but that is where it stops, for we too have our dignity, and those who do not respect themselves will not be respected by others."@en1
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