Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-03-24-Speech-3-208"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20100324.16.3-208"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
"Mr President, I welcome this report on Parliament’s budget guidelines and I welcome the discussion on what our priorities are to ensure that Parliament can do its job.
The initial report was perhaps understandably vague and general. However, the amendments at committee stage ensured we are now clear on what is important. The Committee on Budgets tried to balance the need to recognise our responsibilities following Lisbon with the need to keep increased spending as low as possible and that is particularly important with margins and public finances being so tight. I am sure all Members will take that point on board.
That is why deciding our priorities in these guidelines is crucial and, of course, it is not just about spending money. It is also about looking for savings and it is about spending the money in the best possible way.
Therefore, I am pleased that, for example, the need for an integrated knowledge management system that would bring together all the different sources of information for Members and citizens is widely accepted.
The analysis of Europarl TV, to see if it is effective or not, is also welcome. An evaluation of a secretarial allowance and the global cost of employing more staff, including accommodation, I believe is also vital, as is a medium- and long-term building strategy for the Parliament and other institutions which perhaps we should be working with much more closely than we are already.
And, of course, there is always the difficult issue of the 20% threshold agreed so many years ago. I and the Committee on Budgets believe that any changes to that 20% should be the subject of a discussion between the Committee on Budgets and the Bureau and eventually between all the different institutions. It should not be a unilateral decision.
The S&D Group have tabled a few more amendments to be voted upon tomorrow which we believe will improve the guidelines even further. One amendment points out the difficulty of putting all administrative expenditure under heading 5; another amendment calls for the early publication of the guidelines and estimates to ensure we can make our decisions in a proper and timely way. I hope tomorrow, colleagues will support these and other amendments which are aimed at improving the guidelines.
I would also hope that colleagues would recognise that, following the agreement of these guidelines, we will have to undertake difficult discussions on the estimates recently published by the Secretary-General. Only then will we begin to talk about our priorities and only then will we have the proper discussion to achieve the balance between functioning as a Parliament and keeping our expenditure as low as possible."@en1
|
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata | |
| lpv:videoURI |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples