Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-03-10-Speech-2-090"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20090310.7.2-090"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
"− Mr President, I should like to thank the Members for an interesting debate and for their many valuable comments.
Finally, I shall just comment on the ‘space to think’ under Article 4(3). If we think carefully, I guess most people would agree that Parliament, as well as the Commission and the Council, needs a certain space to think. Documents related to decisions that have not yet been taken, or reflecting internal discussions, are not the same as other documents. What about the records of political group meetings or preparations? You have yourselves identified a number of problems and limitations arising from refusing a space to think, considering, again, what would benefit citizens most and what would be most helpful.
I must say that I would have preferred the Council to be here – as many of you have said – just as I would have preferred a fuller House, because these are absolutely crucial issues for all of us. The big task for us all in the next few weeks or months is to find common ground. That is also true within this House, and today’s debate has shown that it is not always that easy. The more divisions there are, the more difficult it will be when the three institutions hold discussions. Parliament, the Council and the Commission each have their role, which should be respected, and I hope Parliament will speak with one strong voice, because that will benefit us all and benefit the end result, which I hope will be a balanced and workable compromise text.
Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 will now be updated to ‘version two’, one might say. It is important to point out again that we are not starting from scratch: we already have a good basis, and it is just a matter of improving on that. This will also be a version for the age of the Internet, as was mentioned in the debate. Electronic registers will now be included, and add to that active dissemination, as examples of these improvements.
The ideal situation would, of course, be for us to disseminate information so actively that no requests for access have to be made since everything is already out there – with some exceptions, of course. I can give you one example of what can be done, which is that I have already made my own correspondence register available on the Internet, so you can see my correspondence and documents.
It is not possible for me to go through all the comments that were made during the debate, but I want to comment briefly on a few crucial points, one of which concerns the definition of documents under Article 3. This is one of the articles of the Commission’s proposal that have been most discussed and, I admit, most criticised.
We maintain that the current definition leads to ambiguity and a risk of unpredictability and bad practice. Is this Post-It note a document, for example? Mr Cashman is saying it is, and according to the wide definition in the Regulation, it could very well be so – as could the other scribbles I have here. Sometimes it is not helpful to make a definition too broad. We still maintain a wide definition, but we will reduce the discretionary non-disclosure of documents. The definition that we propose is much wider than the notion of official documents often used in national legislation. It comes very close to the concept of information in the UK Freedom of Information Act and in the Dutch law on transparency, for example. The registration of documents is an obligation under internal Commission rules, but these do not determine whether a document falls within the scope of the regulation. So we clarified and helped with the definition of documents. This will also help citizens to know what is it you can and should ask for in order to get full information. A more precise definition of documents means safer administration and more clarity for citizens.
The Court has ruled that documents relating to an ongoing investigation are manifestly covered by an exception to the right of access and, therefore, that those files are currently not acceptable and this does not constitute additional restriction of the right of access. In no Member State do citizens have access to the files of the competition authorities – I just wanted to make that point.
I also acknowledge that we could have explained and phrased things better in Article 3. I believe we share the same goal, and thus it should also be possible to find a clear and unambiguous wording. This is an example of an area where we should be able to achieve a good compromise text.
Another fiercely discussed point is Article 5(2) concerning access to Member States’ documents. Let me be clear that the Commission’s intention has been to implement what the European Court of Justice has ruled, and Member States must effectively justify why they refuse access to one of their documents, just as the institutions do regarding all other documents. The bottom line will always be the rules in Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001.
However, it is equally important that the Commission can have correspondence with Member States, for example, in the field of infringements of EU law. We need to have the possibility to quickly find satisfactory solutions from the perspective of both the Commission and EU citizens, as codified by EU law. Those kinds of contacts need to remain confidential, and that is also what the Court has said."@en1
|
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata | |
| lpv:videoURI |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples