Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-07-21-Speech-3-132"
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"en.20040721.6.3-132"2
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"Mr Prime Minister, no one has called you that yet! It is not easy to know how to address you: candidate, President-designate, Mr Barroso... your designation makes the status of your presence itself something of a problem and a cause of some embarrassment.
You said to us: ‘appoint me this week and you will have my programme next year.’ It is always difficult for a Member of Parliament to adjust. However, I appreciated your reference to voters who did not go to the ballot box. You in fact told us that although we represent 450 million people, we were elected by 150 million voters, while another 200 million stayed at home. What can they be thinking of today, after 50 years – although they have not all lived 50 years? What does Europe mean to them? It is a promise kept: we have created peace and democracy; the market has been achieved; some of them have the euro in their pockets.
Your problem and ours today is to give meaning to the future. I believe – as do others too – that the social issue is central. You mentioned it among many others. But if you do not give that question priority by feeding into it all the matters we have raised in our groups: public services, tax harmonisation, social rights, etc., there will not only be injustice, inequality and unemployment, but, more than that, our fellow citizens who have benefited from the achievements of the last 50 years will abandon the very idea of Europe. You have the duty to write a new page of our history. I confess I am still unsatisfied."@en1
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