Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-10-27-Speech-4-026"
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"en.20051027.3.4-026"2
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"Mr President, first of all, please allow me to congratulate my colleague, the rapporteur Manolis Mavrommatis, who has reviewed with great care the anniversary report of the European Ombudsman on his activities in 2004, submitted to the European Parliament. I, too, support the close cooperation of the Ombudsman with the Committee on Petitions of the European Parliament, because this enables citizens’ petitions to reach the decision-makers of the European Parliament directly, providing a direct feedback on the efficiency of EU legislation.
The 2004 annual report issued by the European Ombudsman reveals that the number of complaints received increased by 53% in 2004 compared to 2003. Even more surprisingly, only half of this increase originates from the ten newly joined Member States. In other words, it may seem that the citizens and businesses of the new Member States have fewer grievances in the EU, or are less prone to complaining.
As the representative of one of the newly joined Member States, I can tell you from experience that neither of these is true. Although it is true that the majority of the ten new Member States submitted fewer complaints compared to the proportion of their population, the main reason for this lies in their relative unfamiliarity with the institution of the European Ombudsman, and not in a lower number of grievances.
Unfortunately, under information, as well as an ingrained negative conditioning, a fear of making a complaint rooted in past experiences still persists in the eight newly joined post-socialist states. It is an unfortunate fact that to this day citizens are still contacting us, MEPs, informally, to tell us about discrimination suffered in European institutions. Therefore I know from experience that it is difficult even for us to persuade them to take their complaint to the Ombudsman.
As an MEP, but not as a European employee, I often see discrimination even one and a half years after accession. One example I could mention is the Parliament practice whereby the questions we ask in writing are only translated into our mother tongues and the languages of the fifteen old Member States, and the answers received are only given in our mother tongue, English and French.
In particular, I would like to call the attention of Mr Diamandouros to a discriminative phenomenon experienced in the course of admission to European institutions. One of the conditions of the admission exams announced to the 25 Member States is that the exam will be conducted in two of the 15 languages of the EU. This means that while a candidate from an old Member State may take the exam in his/her mother tongue and a foreign language, a candidate from a new Member State cannot use his/her mother tongue.
Countless similar complaints are received day by day. The Parliament debated the Vaxholm issue of Sweden on Tuesday, but we see similar discrimination committed against businesses in new Member States, as well. Allow me to mention the case code named Soko Bunda and Soko Pannonia, involving the exclusion of several dozens of Hungarian businesses from the German market with methods that are finally considered wrong even by the courts. Incidentally, my fellow MEPs and I have also contacted the competent Commissioner in this matter.
In view of these issues, I believe that the continuous information of citizens is of utmost importance. I was delighted to read that citizens in Member States are increasingly aware of their right to contact the Ombudsman concerning any administrative irregularities they experience. In particular, I find it very important to stress that the institution of the Ombudsman is not just one of the many superior authorities or an enforcement office – it is a special institution established to assist citizens with their concerns and complaints. An additional plus in the Ombudsman’s report for 2004 is that apart from a presentation of cases and investigations it also provides a topical analysis of the work carried out. I am particularly delighted by the fact that the Ombudsman undertakes an active public role in order to inform citizens."@en1
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