Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-09-27-Speech-3-015"
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"en.20060927.3.3-015"2
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"Mr President, I should like to thank Mr Cavada for his oral question, the opportunity for this debate, and the excellent work that he and his colleagues do in their committee.
I had the honour to chair that committee at the time of the Council meeting in 1999 in Tampere. I have observed the process from Tampere to Tampere. It has been seven lean years. Rather like a critic once said of Samuel Beckett’s play
: ‘It is a two-act play in which nothing happens, twice.’
I salute the efforts of Commissioner Frattini and of the Finnish Presidency in trying to coax and cajole the Member States forward. Mr Rajamäki spoke of breathing new life into the spirit of Tampere. It is desperately needed. But the fact is that the country I know best threw a spanner into the works when it insisted on having three pillars. Other countries are now blocking the process of repair. Unless we are able to bring in the footbridge – the ‘
clause’ – we will never have a credible policy in justice and home affairs. We will continue with a policy like a push-bike when what we need is a Ducati.
Member States sit there in their medieval fastnesses with the drawbridges firmly up. In the name of national sovereignty they are enhancing global anarchy. Our citizens demand better.
In the early period of building the European Union, political leaders were ahead of public opinion. They saw leadership as painting a vision of the Europe they wanted and leading people towards it. That can be a dangerous strategy, but far less dangerous than being in the position – as you pointed out, Commissioner – of being behind public opinion. Our citizens are asking: why is there no immigration policy to prevent the human tragedy we see on our southern shores? Why are we not sharing criminal intelligence in the fight against terrorism or the fight against drugs? Why is there no access to justice for victims of cross-border crime or cross-border marital breakdown? When ministers meet, as Abba Eban once said in a different context, they ‘never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity’.
We want to see more emphasis on European values. We may have no constitution, but we have a Charter of Fundamental Rights. Mr Rajamäki, you said that human rights are at the top of the Council’s concerns and fully taken into account. Are you sure? What about the CIA secret prisons saga, where this House was right to set up a committee on rendition to see whether we need to use Article 7? What about the PNR issue, where the 2007 agreement to replace the sticking-plaster solution you have devised this month must be in tandem with the framework decision on the protection of personal data? And what about minimum procedural guarantees for suspects in criminal proceedings: why is that issue still at the bottom of the in-tray?
Of course there is some progress. But too often the Union looks like the mime artist Marcel Marceau; he appears to be climbing a wall but actually he is going nowhere. I want Mr Frattini and the Presidency to take to the Council on 6 October the message that Europe demands better."@en1
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"Waiting for Godot"1
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