Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-12-15-Speech-2-213"
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"en.20091215.14.2-213"2
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"Mr President, can I just say that the issue of where I sit, I suspect, will keep coming back. I am sitting here because the Council is over there. I may have to go and sit over there or you may have to build me a seat equidistant, because I assure you I will be in trouble somewhere for wherever I sit. It is a great delight, though, to be here with Cecilia and I look forward very much to working with her.
What strikes me about the debate that we have just had is that pretty much – and I think, Mr Atkins, you may be the exception in what you said, though I listened with great care – there is a shared conviction that what we are looking for is a two-state solution. There is an enormous amount of passion from all parliamentarians, especially, if I may say, Mr De Rossa and those Members who have recently come back, and who have clearly seen for themselves the dreadful situation that exists on the ground.
I believe what is significant about the Council conclusions is that they are very clear. They give me a real sense of the direction that we need to move in. What is also very clear – and I pay tribute to the Presidency for the work that they have done on this – is the frustration in this House that things are not moving, frustration borne of views that are sometimes quite different, but nonetheless converge on a desire to see a solution. The nuances are important. The views that you hold on the differences, as well as the similarities, matter to me as I navigate our future in these discussions and negotiations.
There is no doubt to me that we have got to do two things. One is the rather political issues that you quite rightly raise. What is our relationship to be? I am at the beginning of that journey, and this debate is extremely important to me in listening to the views that have been put forward. What I take away from it is, first of all, that the Quartet must demonstrate that it is worth the money, that it is actually able to be reinvigorated. I have already talked with the staff by video link in Jerusalem, I have already talked to Mr Blair about his work and I have already talked to Secretary of State Clinton about the same things. It is very important, if it is going to work, that the word ‘reinvigorate’ is absolutely right.
Secondly, there are the issues in the region which the Presidency has raised about the broader questions of those other countries that we need to engage with. I think most significant from today is: what is the EU itself going to be able to do?
That brings me, in a sense, to what I call the practical. A number of colleagues have raised particular issues, whether it is a question of what the UK is doing on labelling, whether it is issues about the association agreement, whether this report – the Heads of Mission report – and the recommendations that I have not yet considered within it are there. We need to consider all of these issues carefully, but what we have got to do is demonstrate the practical support that we put on the ground.
I described 1 200 classrooms that were needed and I described our work in health. We are very committed to Prime Minister Fayyad’s state-building plan and to enhancing the institutions, particularly in terms of the rule of law. We must be seen to be practically engaged on the ground and practically working to find ways in which we can make the situation better for the people who have to live there every day and who look to us for the help that they need.
That is the most significant and practical thing I need to do first of all. I would describe the work that I want to do as this: we have the potential to do the political and the economic. What I want to do is draw those two things together, to find a way in which we can enhance what we do, to support the work that is going on, to make the Quartet more effective, to bring together what has been, in a sense, the Council and Commission operating side by side, and to meld it into one so that what we do on the ground really makes a difference.
In the end, it is the two sides who come together to make the decision and to find the peace. But, on the way to the end, we have a significant role to play, and I am determined, on your behalf as well as on behalf of the Commission and the Council, that we play our full part in that."@en1
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