Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-01-18-Speech-2-280"
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"en.20000118.9.2-280"2
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"Mr President, I am sure the Commission will be relieved to hear that the 97 discharge is unlikely to have the same impact as the 96 discharge which, as you are all so very well aware, led to the forced resignation of the Santer Commission. The Socialist Group will be voting to grant discharge. I am sure you will be relieved to hear that as well.
But that is not to say that we are satisfied, and that everything in the garden is rosy. It is clear that a radical overhaul of the Commission is long overdue. It indicates, however, that we acknowledge that steps are being made in the right direction.
I just want to outline some of the issues that we, as Socialists, have put down as amendments. We hope these will be carried because they are important in the way that they will impact on future reform.
First of all, the immunity of officials: this should be lifted if and when requested by a national prosecutor. We need to make it much easier to prosecute officials who are guilty of fraud and corruption.
It is critical to note that the Commission has too often failed to act on the reforms recommended by the Court of Auditors. The Court's report is there for a reason, our response to it is there for a reason and it is important that it is followed through. I have just heard now that an audit progress board is going to be set up by the Commission. Even if we hear nothing else, we know that is going in the right direction in terms of the reforms that we want to see. Too often we have put forward recommendations and they have not been acted upon even though you have said very often that you will act on them. We want to see that follow-through to a much greater extent in future.
The other issue is access to confidential documents. We have had problems in the past in terms of our responsibility in carrying out discharge because we have not had access to the documents we should have had. We understand that we also have a responsibility here, that if we are given documents we must ensure that confidential documents will indeed be kept confidential. We have put down an amendment to that effect.
One issue which is referred to in the van der Laan report is the whole question of the Gaza hospital. The situation there is totally unacceptable. We will not put up with it for much longer and we are looking for immediate action on that issue.
I would like to congratulate Lousewies van der Laan. I do not usually bother congratulating people but I think she has produced a very cogent report and deserves our thanks."@en1
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