Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-09-27-Speech-4-033"
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"en.20070927.3.4-033"2
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"I would like to congratulate my fellow Member Mrs Kathalijne Buitenweg on the report she has produced, and at the same time draw attention to a number of important problems.
European citizens’ awareness of the law is rather limited, and the very people who are victims of unfair discrimination, in other words ethnic minorities – and particularly the Roma –, are almost completely unaware of the relevant legal provisions or the structures that offer them legal protection. This is why so few discrimination cases are taken to court in the European Union. Moreover, the financial penalties imposed in such cases are ridiculously low, especially compared with similar proceedings conducted in the United States. Member States should have a responsibility and an obligation to inform and educate the public to ensure that as many citizens as possible across society are aware of their rights and possibilities.
Equality bodies operate at a distance from citizens; it would hardly be an exaggeration to say that they only operate on paper, without active participation on the part of those affected. Another problem is that, to be able to operate, these bodies depend to a major extent on the governments of the Member States in terms of financing, infrastructure, human resources and policy.
We need to establish an efficient, European-level system of accountability and monitoring and to make the annual reports more systematic, enabling us to observe whether equality bodies are functioning independently."@en1
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