Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-12-04-Speech-3-052"
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"en.20021204.3.3-052"2
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"Mr President, I rise to share the concerns of those who have expressed fear about decisions being taken without consulting Parliament on curtailing the mandate of the current European Commission.
Of course we recognise that new Member States have a right to a Commissioner as from day one of their membership of the European Union. Of course it makes sense not to reshuffle all the portfolios of the existing Commission just for a few months. Therefore it makes sense to curtail the mandate of the existing Commission and move rapidly to the approval of a new Commission by the new Parliament with the full democratic legitimacy that it entails. But how can this be done? Under the current Treaty, there are only two ways. One is that every single Member of the current Commission agrees to resign on an agreed date, or this Parliament adopts a motion of censure forcing them to resign. Both scenarios would be a little bit odd unless they were subject to an agreement among the three institutions. Another way would be for the Council to put it in the accession treaty but again if they were to do that unilaterally, without consensus and agreement, that would undermine the spirit of the Treaties.
So what I think should happen is that we do negotiate and reach an agreement on what would be sensible, which would be to fix an early date for the Commission to be replaced, on condition that the new Commission has the full legitimacy of going through the full procedure by the new house to be elected in the European elections. That is a
. Under those circumstances, it would make sense, as has been suggested, to bring the date of the elections forward from June to May, because then the new house in June could already vote on the President and in July we could have the hearings and vote on the Commission as a whole, which could then begin, if that were agreed, already in August or September. That would allow us to go forward more speedily. It would get rid of the problems of Commissioners without portfolios for a lengthily period and it would make sense in its own right to have the elections early in May, which is a good idea on its own merits. By the way, Mr President, I am sure you would be interested in this, it would avoid us having the problems in this House of having full Members for one session only just prior to the European Elections. I think that is the route the Council should pursue in dialogue with us."@en1
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