Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-03-14-Speech-2-125"
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"en.20000314.8.2-125"2
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"Mr President, for years now, the European Parliament and our group have been asking for a proper description of fundamental rights of the European citizens in the European treaties. The request was made at the time of the Treaty of Maastricht and the Treaty of Amsterdam. In this connection, I would also remind you of the report which I had the privilege of writing in conjunction with Mrs Dury in preparation for the Treaty of Amsterdam. This question was raised in that document too. In fact, it was in this document that we achieved our first successes, for our anti-discrimination clause was used in the Treaty of Amsterdam virtually verbatim. Later on, at the Cologne Summit, Parliament’s wider request was also honoured. A meeting was proposed for the purpose of producing a Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European citizen. The question which concerns us today, more than anything is: what should this charter contain and what legal force should it have? As far as the latter is concerned, I would like to express my unequivocal support in favour of including a charter in the treaties and in favour of a charter which can be enforced on behalf of citizens upon the European courts. We should not produce empty shells; our citizens would see through them straight away anyway. As far as the content is concerned, the charter must tie in with the existing conventions, such as the Council of Europe’s European Convention for the protection of human rights. In fact, in my opinion, the Union should sign up to that Convention without delay. The charter should at least deal with the citizens’ fundamental rights, the political rights, the social rights and, in my opinion, the rights of minorities too, and it should form a supplement to what we already have. It should not duplicate what is already there. New threats, in particular, will need to be anticipated, such as in the field of information and biotechnology, and in the protection of the environment, of which man forms part.
Mr President, the rights of minorities appear to constitute one of the most difficult areas in the charter and because this has been and will be one of Europe’s key problems, I would argue in favour of including fundamental rights of minorities in the charter. I will probably submit a text on this matter myself. But the most important fact, Mr President, is that the charter will be given legal force, that it will be included in the Treaty and that our citizens will be reassured that the European Union will take its fundamental rights seriously too, and will want to defend them up to the highest level."@en1
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