Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-10-23-Speech-2-065"
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"en.20071023.7.2-065"2
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"Mr President, after the failure of the Constitution it seemed that the principle of democratic decision-making had once again gained the upper hand within the EU, at least for a while. We were wrong to think that. Very quickly the same Constitution has returned to the table under a different title. Its authors do not even bother concealing the fact that it is the original Constitution in a slightly modified form with the intention of ignoring the people’s democratic will in a referendum.
The Treaty, which reinforces the role of non-elected officials of the EU, thereby reinforcing the democracy deficit, is creating, among other things, 105 legislative and non-legislative competences of the EU. In 68 cases it replaces the right of national veto with majority decision-making. It subverts the national competences in the area of foreign policy. It hands decision-making in the EU to the big Member States, notably Germany, at the expense of the small countries.
A simple comparison shows that it is almost exactly identical to the Constitution for a European federal state rejected by the French people and buried by the Dutch. The impertinence with which it has been returned on the table with the straight face of a poker player and now under a new Orwellian title is astounding. A new type of utopian nationalism won in Lisbon: pan-European and EU nationalism; nationalism without any real national, cultural and historic foundations, rooted only in the long office corridors in Brussels. Berlaymont patriotism has claimed victory.
Those of us who represent countries that lived for nearly half a century under the communist totalitarian regime are not easily surprised by anything. We have been accustomed to the insolence of power and contempt for the people’s will. Not even in the CMEA, however, have we experienced such overt deception as today’s deception by the EU of the people of the Member States. At least in the CMEA similar attempts were hidden behind the party politburos; but that is a thing of the past.
The citizens want to decide themselves whether they will hand over their sovereign rights to a European super-state without a democratic or historical framework. That is why I want to see a referendum."@en1
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