Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-11-15-Speech-2-319"
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"en.20051115.28.2-319"2
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I should like to thank the Commission for its attention to detail, and for its committed efforts to push the process forward. I should also like to thank the many countries that have endeavoured to meet the criteria. Yet there must be no mistaking the fact that the conditions must be met, and not merely put off to a later date. These conditions include the EU’s capacity to absorb new members, even though we are still waiting for an explanation of how this concept can be made operational. Following the debate held on 3 October, I hope that the Commission will soon put forward a proposal on this issue.
I concur with the Commissioner’s view that enlargement is one of the European Union’s most successful foreign policy strategies, since it has brought stability to Europe and contributed to the spread of democracy and the rule of law there. The prospect of EU membership is an important tool that enables countries to push through internal reforms that would in the majority of cases be otherwise impossible, in all likelihood for domestic political reasons.
Yet in view of the fact that the European Union has just undergone enlargement to include a further 10 countries, and may well shortly be joined by another two, I believe that we must make it quite clear that we need a period of consolidation, in the same way that any business needs to consolidate after a period of growth. The question we must ask ourselves is whether we want to restore the balance between deepening and widening, to reaffirm our plans to ensure that the enlarged European Union is able to act and to focus once again on the issue of political unity, or to allow the EU to wither away to nothing but a free trade area.
Although this report has been labelled a strategy report, I believe that it fails to clarify certain issues, including the question of what shape an overall strategy should take, and what the future internal structure and external borders of this EU of ours should be. It goes without saying that a report of this kind cannot give detailed answers to the latter question, because it relates to an ongoing process. In my opinion, however, it is high time that we had some idea of where we stand on these matters so that we can make progress, and so that we do not spend all our time dealing with isolated cases, which result in the kind of automated processes that place the European Union at risk. Thought should also be given to whether it would not be a good idea to find an alternative to full membership and the neighbourhood policy, at least on a short-term basis. This would allow countries the prospect of EU membership in order to focus their development efforts, but at the same time avoid any negative impact on the EU’s capacity for development. This alternative could resemble the European Economic Area of previous decades. I find it regrettable that the Commission has not proposed such initiatives, and is instead too caught up in the details, without daring to think big."@en1
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