Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-03-28-Speech-3-032"
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"en.20070328.12.3-032"2
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"Mr President, Chancellor Merkel, the public festivities in the streets of Berlin were wonderful, but their keynote was perfunctory, pompous euronationalism. Mrs Merkel made a good speech. Our own President, Mr Poettering, signed a document on behalf of myself and my fellow MEPs, even though we had still not been shown the wording and had had no opportunity to influence it. No such thing must ever happen again. The European Parliament should not take part in preparing documents that MEPs are not allowed to see until the documents are adopted.
The most important clause is the last one, with its commitment to adopt a new Constitution that can enter into force before the EU elections in June 2009. Germany wants to see the Constitution doctored. There is a desire to change its name and perhaps to remove textual references to the flag and anthem, although not the flag and anthem themselves. Part II would be removed, and this with a view to adopting the common fundamental rights in a two-line reference to these. A handful of amendments would be made to Part III so that the Constitution might be presented as an innocent little amending treaty, but the main content would be the same as that rejected by French and Dutch voters.
All democratic forces should now, therefore, unite in demanding referendums on the next treaty in all the countries, and why not on the same day? In that way, our leaders would be forced to devise a document that could be approved by the voters, and the next treaty would give more influence to the voters instead of taking influence away from them, as the Constitution does. The heart of the matter is, of course, that, in 59 areas, there is a shift from unanimity to qualified majority voting, that is to say from unanimity, in which each country’s voters have the last word, to qualified majority voting among officials, ministers and lobbyists behind closed doors in Brussels. That is the order of the day: too much Machiavelli and not enough Montesquieu. Thank you, Mr President, even though in this case there is nothing to say thank you for."@en1
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