Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-09-02-Speech-2-411"
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"en.20080902.32.2-411"2
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"Mr President, I should like to congratulate the rapporteur, Mr De Rossa, on his excellent report. As a member of the Committee on Petitions, I am always very conscious of the fact that for many EU citizens we are the face of the EU. When I say ‘we’ I mean the Committee on Petitions itself, and the Commission, which also evaluates petitions. In this particular instance, the complainant was effectively ignored and the Ombudsman’s verdict was that this constituted maladministration.
I am pleased to see that the rapporteur and the Committee on Petitions agree with his position. European citizens have a right to expect that the Commission, as the guardian of the Treaties, will ensure that European legislation is implemented in a timely and effective manner. They have the right to expect a timely response as well as an effective one, and while the Commission has discretion as to how to proceed in a certain case – i.e. whether or not to instigate infringement proceedings – it does not have the discretion to fail to adopt a position within a reasonable amount of time, which was the case in this matter.
With regard to Amendment 1, this is a matter that needs to be dealt with, but separately from this report.
Finally, just a personal comment on the work of the Committee on Petitions: sending in a petition is, for many citizens, their only contact with the EU institutions. It is crucial that this system works in an effective and transparent manner. The Commission is part of the process, but so too is Parliament. We must ensure that sufficient resources are available to the committee to carry out its work in an effective and timely manner.
To fully understand this issue, we need to put ourselves in the shoes of the petitioner and see it from their perspective. As an individual or a small group they are taking on the system. If the system does not respond in an effective manner they see it as a bureaucratic nightmare, and this alienates the petitioner and probably everybody they speak to about the matter. For the sake of the public and of the EU, that is something we must not do."@en1
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