Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-03-12-Speech-3-206"
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"en.20080312.15.3-206"2
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"Mr President of the European Parliament, Mr President-in-Office, Presidents of the various European institutions, former Presidents of the House, ladies and gentlemen, representatives of the national parliaments, visiting guests, I am very pleased to be celebrating the European Parliament’s first half century with you today. This anniversary has a considerable symbolic and political meaning for our Europe. Fifty years ago Robert Schuman presided over a new single Assembly. The three European Communities had just created the first version of a European democracy. Since then, this fundamental political choice has been relentlessly reaffirmed at each stage of European integration.
We will succeed if we maintain a constructive partnership between our institutions.
Within this partnership I wish to congratulate Parliament on its contribution to the European project in all aspects of the daily lives of all our citizens. In its 50 years this House has gained many competences and a considerable amount of power. I mean power that translates as legitimacy arising directly from the votes of European women and men. I also mean power in the formal sense: codecision, budgetary power and democratic control over the European institutions. What I really mean is political influence. The EP has imposed itself simultaneously as a colegislator sharing responsibility within the institutional triangle and in European public life, but also by forging ever closer links with the national parliaments, a large number of which are represented here today.
The power acquired by the EP down through the years has served only to strengthen Europe as a whole. A strong European Parliament is an essential partner for the other institutions, and – I must emphasise this – for the European Commission. I think I may say that the relationship between our two institutions is increasingly close, solid and mature, and that pleases me very much indeed.
When the Lisbon Treaty is ratified, it will strengthen the Community institutions even further. It will broaden the powers of the European Parliament. It will bolster the dual democratic legitimacy of the Commission through stronger links to the European Parliament and European Council. It will give the European Council a stable presidency, which will ensure that the preparation and monitoring of European Council meetings are more consistent. It will develop the role of the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, who will also be Vice-President of the European Commission.
By reinforcing the legitimacy and efficiency of our institutions, the Lisbon Treaty represents a major step forward for the European Union.
Today, and tomorrow, we must understand that there can be no zero sum game between the institutions. None of our institutions should be strengthened to the detriment of the others. On the contrary, we all want stronger European institutions if Europe is to be more efficient and more democratic. All our institutions will gain from the consolidation of Europe’s institutional architecture.
Ladies and gentlemen, in relation to the date we are commemorating today a quote occurred to me from a great Portuguese author, Agustina Bessa Luis. She said: ‘At 15, one has a future, at 25, a problem, at 40, an experience, but before the half-century, one really has no history at all’.
Today the European Parliament, this house of European democracy, can proudly claim it has a fine history in its past, I am sure, but also in its future. It is for that reason that I would like to offer you, on behalf of the European Commission and on my own behalf, my most sincere congratulations and my very best wishes for your work towards a united Europe.
Before anyone else, the founding fathers had the intuition that the emerging Europe required robust democratic European institutions to embody the increasingly stronger ties between the Six. In accordance with Jean Monnet’s inspired vision, these institutions also had to be able to evolve to accompany what they sensed as the dual events of the future: deeper integration and geographic enlargement. I must tell you it is still extremely moving to see you all here in this house of European democracy, representatives directly elected by nations who until very recently had been divided by dictatorships that prevented Europe from drawing breath in freedom.
The institutional triangle the founding fathers bequeathed us is a model unique to the world that has certainly proved its vitality and solidness after 50 years. It has adapted to a substantial extension of the scope of the tasks entrusted to the Community, and now to the EU. It has also coped with a significant dynamic enlargement of our Union.
We owe this success to the ingenuity and equilibrium of our institutional model, which does not follow a classic distribution of powers. We also owe this success to our operating method, which respects both the Community method and the principle of subsidiarity.
The institutions, however, are not an end in themselves. They remain at the service of an ideal and objectives. They are at the service of our citizens. The stronger the institutions, the better they can serve this ideal and our citizens.
Above all, the founding fathers wished to build Europe for the sake of peace. They wanted to build that new Europe through solidarity. They chose the economy as the driving force behind their political vision and their objectives.
Fifty years on, Europe at peace, enlarged to continental dimensions, needs strong institutions to cope with the challenge of its time: globalisation. No Member State can take up this challenge alone. Through its experience in opening up markets along with rules that embody its values of freedom, solidarity and sustainable development, only Europe simultaneously has the dimensions, the institutions and the instruments required to handle and shape globalisation.
To take up this challenge, the Europe of the 21
century must unite to reap success in the knowledge-based economy, provide jobs for European women and men, and make its economy more dynamic. It must take up its rightful place on the world stage: a European power, bereft of arrogance, a Europe that will be in a position to propose – not impose, but propose – the values of freedom and solidarity to the world."@en1
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