Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-06-07-Speech-2-180"
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"en.20050607.25.2-180"2
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".
Mr President, the Financial Perspective the rapporteur has presented is close to the limits of what we can achieve at this point in time. We are currently in an extremely difficult situation. Not only has the Council been unable to reach a common position on the ceiling for commitments and payments, but a majority of voters in France and the Netherlands have rejected the Constitutional Treaty.
The moment of truth has therefore arrived for the incomprehensible Treaty, which fails to make a distinction between legislation and what are sometimes foolish hopes and dreams. A variety of grudges against the EU have been heard from certain quarters. According to some of the old Member States, the EU is not doing enough to protect their jobs. Others say that it is depriving them of their sovereignty and giving them nothing back in return. Certain Member States believe that the EU is over-regulating the economy and that it costs too much. Others do not wish to give up the privileges they were granted earlier. It is the proverbial Polish plumber, whose work is reliable and cheap, who is blamed for the failure of these various approaches. Instead of making serious attempts to carry out economic reforms, certain people prefer to use the Polish plumber as a bogeyman to scare children and young people looking for work.
In reality, what is happening is that some net contributors to the EU budget are applying the old utopian principle of ‘give what you can and take what you need’. The result is that there is never enough EU money to go round. We are thus debating the Financial Perspective without knowing whether the Council will reach an agreement or whether the largest Member States will take up even less flexible positions. Be that as it may, we still have to take some kind of decision.
We are proposing to vote in favour of the Böge report, albeit in a slightly amended version. Firstly, we are opposed to any link between the level of payments and the reform of the own resources system, as the latter shows every sign of turning into an attempt to move even further away from a correlation of Member States’ payments with their revenue. Secondly, we do not agree that agriculture should be cofinanced, as this would be the first step along the path towards renationalising agricultural policy. Thirdly, it is our belief that it would be more reasonable to continue with current plans for a Financial Perspective covering the period from 2007 to 2013, as this tallies better with the multiannual programmes and the common agricultural policy.
The EU has functioned and will continue to function without the thousands of Byzantine provisions in the late Constitution. In a large number of countries, the public is losing faith in the EU. We must ask ourselves whether this does not stem from the fact that the political elite has ignored the very illusions it created. After all, is it not an illusion to repeat endlessly the catchphrase of subsidiarity while the welfare state, which is often unnecessarily over-bloated, is close to bankruptcy? Is it not absurd that the very countries that wish to integrate rapidly are attempting to reduce their contributions to the EU? Is the Lisbon strategy not an illusion, and one that is currently being eclipsed by a rabble-rousing war against the free market? Should the blame be placed on the peoples of those countries that have carried out the necessary reforms and, as a result, begun to develop more rapidly and become more competitive?
Parliament will do its duty by voting in favour of the Böge report. It is now the Council’s turn to adopt a more constructive stance."@en1
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