Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-05-31-Speech-3-072"
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"en.20060531.9.3-072"2
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".
Mr President, straight away I must thank all those who have taken part in this debate.
As someone, I think it was my predecessor, Jean-Luc Dehaene, said: I am not advocating enlargement now and not doing all the rest, I am advocating doing both at the same time. For it to be possible to do both at the same time, however, one must have the courage, again this year, or, at the latest, next year, to initiate socio-economic governance in the European Union. Otherwise, once again, for year after year, we shall be fighting, talking away endlessly about the Constitution, and consequently losing even more the support of the citizens of the European Union.
I shall begin with the question of Declaration 30 because this Declaration has quite a strange history. The principle of four fifths of Member States was already present in the original proposals that were presented by the Prodi Commission. It appeared there, however, in order to state that if four fifths of the Member States ratified the treaty, then we would go ahead, which was naturally unacceptable to certain members of the European Council. Subsequently, we, the Convention and then the Intergovernmental Conference, wanted to retain this concept of four fifths.
How was the matter to be presented? We could not say that if four fifths of the Member States ratified the Treaty, we would go ahead with it, because that would amount after all to abolishing the unanimity rule, which indeed will need to happen one day. The Americans did it in 1787 on the occasion of the Philadelphia Convention. It was a seizure of power by 9 out of the 13 States that existed at the time.
What had to be done, therefore, in order to retain the four-fifths concept? In the end the following wording was decided on: ‘the matter will be referred to the European Council’. This is what is stated in the Declaration annexed to the Treaty, while in reality the concept of four fifths has a very different origin since, in the beginning, there was no question of organising a debate within the European Council.
The motive behind this concept, a motive which stems from the Convention and the proposals of the Prodi Commission, and ultimately was not taken up in the final text, neither by the Convention nor by the Intergovernmental Conference, was to find a solution to a particular situation. Who did they have in mind, then, in relation to this concept? Certainly not the French, but rather that part of the Union that is on the side of Mr Kirkhope and others, a part anyway that is on the other side of the Channel. That is what they had in mind. They said: if everyone says ‘yes’ and the British say ‘no’, we shall still see each other within the European Council so that we can carry on. That was the motive behind the four fifths. Lo and behold, it is the wretched French who vote ‘no’, and present us with the problem of the application of the four fifths. In substance, I am in agreement: the ideal would be to have a system where unanimity disappeared and was replaced by something else, a European referendum or a four-fifths majority, for example. To achieve that, however, we should have to have referendums, popular consultations, and in the countries who voted ‘no’ as well.
That is the reason why I am talking about a second track. You can do anything: continue with ratification, fine, I am asking for that; make use of the four fifths principle, fine; extend the period of reflection, fine; organise an Intergovernmental Conference as Mr Duff is asking, fine, but all that still means years and years of work. This work, between you and me, is going to be very interesting but it would really be a serious error not to do something else straightaway. We are going, therefore, to consider the four fifths, Declaration 30 and an Intergovernmental Conference; and we shall perhaps make this or that change to the draft Constitution, otherwise it will never be acceptable in the two countries that said ‘no’. All these things are obvious and constitute, indeed, the first track to be followed.
It would be a gross error, however, not to open up straight away a second track that does not require amending the Treaty. Now, all the things I spoke about in my introduction, all the proposals that I made require no amendment to the Treaty. Another big advantage is that France and the Netherlands are already part of the Euro zone. There is no need for us to initiate a great debate to find out whether or not they wish to participate.
The second aspect that I wish to emphasise regarding cooperation within the Euro zone is that it is an open cooperation, it is not a closed club, it is a reality that exists and which will grow with the entry of Slovenia by 1 January 2007 at the latest. I do not know whether the Ecofin Council has completed its scrutiny of the other countries, on the basis of the opinion of the Commission and the European Central Bank, but these countries will join nonetheless, maybe not in 2007, but then it will be 1 January 2008. It is therefore certain that this group will continue to grow.
Why not move forward with it in real terms? Because if the citizens said ‘no’ at the time of the referendum in France, it is because there is no socio-economic convergence and because there is no way to respond to their expectations at the social level. Consequently, we have to follow the two tracks and, if it is true that it would be a mistake to abandon ratification of the Constitution, it would be another grave mistake to straight away take the other track, that of the socio-economic governance that everyone wants. That is perhaps the most important conclusion that one can draw from the referendum in France and indeed also in the Netherlands."@en1
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