Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-12-17-Speech-3-015"
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"en.20031217.1.3-015"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner de Palacio, let me start with a word of thanks to the Commission for the support we have always received from it, and also, many times over, to the Italian Presidency of the Council. I found what it had to say clear and precise. Let me say that the resolution we have produced, and the Italian Presidency’s statements today, make it possible for us to come to an agreement, but please let us do so quickly, for we cannot allow this issue to overshadow the elections.
So what is this about? After almost a quarter-century of direct elections to the European Parliament, we still have the structure of a parliamentary assembly, but we have to develop into a real parliament, and that is what this Statute is for. Of course, it is only an initial step, which has, of course, to be followed by what has already been laid down in the 1965 Protocol. Only then will we have a real statute for MEPs, and so I appeal to the governments to take this issue up and take it forward.
The second point I want to make is that we all know that the current position, with differing salary-related payments and this wretched system for reimbursing travelling expenses, is unsustainable, but let me remind you of a simple truth: these things can only be sorted out together. There will be no Statute unless the way in which travel costs are reimbursed is reformed, but that will not be reformed without a Statute. If you want to detach the one from the other, then you will end up proposing a solution that lacks both fairness and solidarity.
This is where we need clarity and transparency; that is how we treat with respect those who elect us and by whose money we are paid.
I would like, at this point, to thank all the group chairmen for making it possible to submit a joint resolution, but there are three persons whom I would like to name, without whom we would not have got to where we are, namely the chairman of my group, Mr Barón Crespo, the Chairman of the Committee on Legal Affairs and the Internal Market, Mr Gargani, and, of course, the President of the European Parliament, Mr Cox. Following what I hope is the merely temporary collapse of the new constitution, let us, today, send out a very quiet message to the effect that there is perhaps such a thing as progress in Europe after all."@en1
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