Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-09-08-Speech-3-297"
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"en.20100908.15.3-297"2
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"Mr President, listening to this debate I would like to share with you that for many years, I was Director-General of a Polish NGO which promoted Poland’s joining the European Union, supported a ‘yes’ in the referendum and ran many programmes on political education, democracy, etc.
We also had our sponsors in Poland and abroad. They were private persons, businesses and political foundations, as well as various European Union programmes, and, of course, we were obliged to declare the sources of our money and the sums received. This was also true for all money we got from the EU budget. It would never occur to me to see this as any kind of discrimination or as hampering us in any way.
When it comes to this discussion, I am sorry to say we are losing ourselves in debates that are based on outdated documents. We are losing the big picture, and that is what we really need. This is about standards, this is about democracy, the democracy based on active citizens often organised in lively, dynamic NGOs.
Transparency is a standard of democracy, and a bill or any legal document that requires transparency for any private or public funding should be praised, and not condemned, in this Chamber.
Maybe rather, we should also encourage reporting on private donors. Why should transparency hamper activity, weaken the situation of NGOs, discriminate? Why do we need transparency? These are the questions we should ask ourselves for any organisation in the world that we support.
Israel is a democratic state. There was a lively discussion in the Knesset about this draft bill, which resulted in last August’s bill. So, thanking Commissioner Füle for all the information that he has provided us, I can only wish him, the Commission and all of us, further continuing, developing, good cooperation between the European Union and Israel."@en1
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