Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-09-02-Speech-2-199"
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"en.20080902.28.2-199"2
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".
Mr President, in autumn we embark, as usual, on the decisive phase of the budget procedure, this time for the year 2009. Our task is to note and take account of all the changes that have occurred since submission of the preliminary budget proposals.
The greatest problem and difficulty for me, as rapporteur on the budget of the European Parliament and the other European institutions, is the uncertainty as to the fate of the Lisbon Treaty. The budget forecasts for 2009 were based on the most likely outcome, namely entry into force of a treaty that fundamentally enlarges the European Parliament’s powers of co-decision. Since at the present time there is a question mark over the Treaty, the normal reaction with regard to the budget is to separate the expenditure directly linked with the Lisbon Treaty from the preliminary expenditure for the coming year, and that was the request we put to all the European institutions. We have a response from the European Parliament, which is currently being examined. It is not yet an official document of Parliament’s Bureau, but it meets the requirement to separate expenditure linked to the Lisbon Treaty, which can be taken into account later if the situation changes.
Obviously the uncertainty as to the fate of the Lisbon Treaty affecting the budget for 2009 does not excuse us from applying the other principles governing establishment of the expenditure plan for 2009. We have to take account of the new rules on MEPs’ remuneration and the remuneration and employment of assistants. We have to cover the costs of the European election campaign and take account of the movements in prices of the various energy sources that occurred in 2008. Above all, 2009 is an election year, in which we must strive for rigour and financial discipline. An expansion of European bureaucracy − European administration, in other words − is not the best message to send to people whom we are asking to renew the mandates of members of the European Parliament.
I would like to draw attention to one more matter that concerns me not as the European Parliament’s rapporteur but as a member of a community of democratic nations concerned with human rights and the sovereignty of all the nations of Europe. We should react, on a budgetary level too, to what has happened in Georgia. I believe the European Parliament should take a position on this question at the first reading, since it will be difficult to persuade European taxpayers to continue providing unconditional aid to Russia when it is spending money on wars beyond its borders."@en1
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