Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-10-21-Speech-3-017"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20091021.2.3-017"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
"Mr President, may I first of all congratulate the Swedish Government on its Presidency in general and particularly on the way it has attempted to advance the very important issues of climate change and dealing with the economic and financial crisis that faces us. I think Mr Reinfeldt and his government deserve our thanks for the way they have done this but, as has been the situation in many Presidencies, they have also had to accommodate a lot of internal institutional distractions – in this case, in relation to the Lisbon Treaty.
Despite all this, I do hope that the Swedish Presidency is able, in the time remaining to it, and indeed at the summit, to focus the attention of all European leaders on the major issues that concern the people – those issues they concentrated upon at the start of their Presidency regarding the economy, Europe and indeed climate change. I wish them well in the remaining time and thank them for their work so far.
Institutional theology is not the priority of the citizens of Europe. What we need, of course, is the Lisbon Agenda, not the Lisbon Treaty.
The Lisbon Agenda has a noble objective: an objective of creating the most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economy in the world, capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs, greater social cohesion and respect for the environment by 2010.
Now that should have made a real difference in the lives of millions of people and provided a firm foundation for our economic future and yet, as Mr Reinfeldt himself said, the Lisbon Agenda has been a failure.
Why can we never actually get results that matter to our citizens? The laudable aims in the Laeken Declaration were not then put into practice, and now the Lisbon Agenda faces the same lack of purpose and achievement.
So near, Mr President, but so far, and again initiatives relating to the economies of Member States must be clearly understandable to ordinary people. Job creation should not be about creating jobs for former Prime Ministers to be President of the Council, or for globetrotting aficionados to be High Representatives for Foreign Affairs.
Those two jobs will hardly help hard-pressed small and medium-sized businesses in any of our countries. They will not ease the crisis being borne by millions of families right now.
And institutional changes do not help with climate changes. The greatest threats to our world need confronting, and practical and workable solutions need to be found. Thousands of pages of text, most of it too complicated for our citizens ever to understand, simply consumes the trees that we need to protect.
Let us put pressure on the world community to come together to save the planet for future generations, not on those who do not fully share the enthusiasm of some people for the European institutions."@en1
|
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata | |
| lpv:videoURI |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples