Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-10-02-Speech-2-021"
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"en.20011002.2.2-021"2
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"Mr Prodi, your paper on European governance is an important milestone, but on a technical issue my colleague, Mr Dell'Alba, pointed out to you in a previous debate that, while the word ‘governance’ may be very common in the English and French languages, in Italian political culture it is to some extent opaque. If that is the case, it may well be that we have to get the message through in each of the EU languages. Perhaps attention could be paid to those languages in which the word ‘gouvernance’, first used by Sir John Fortescue in England in the fifteenth century when the English political class spoke French, is less clearly understood than in English and French. We ought to look at that point.
Reading your paper, it struck me that in a sense the first stage of recovery in the building of Europe is for the Commission itself to recover its self-confidence and poise. I pay credit to you Mr Prodi, and to your colleagues Mr Patten, Mr Barnier and others, for having succeeded in restoring this poise after the resignation of your predecessors. However, as you know – and you drew attention to this in your speech – there is concern in Parliament about giving respect to the institutional triangle.
There are fears about your use of civil society, which we all know really means consulting lobby groups. The most effective lobby groups do their job, which is not to represent society at large – that is this elected Parliament's duty – but to represent their own vested interest. So I am afraid the fact that you drew attention to this concern has not allayed our fears and we will continue to insist that it is we, the elected Members of this House, who represent the interests of society at large and you should not set up groups meeting directly with the Commission, evolving policy and then handing it down to us to rubber-stamp.
That is not our understanding of parliamentary democracy. I am sorry that Mr Farage has left. He obviously does not believe in parliamentary democracy. He wants a referendum every five minutes. It is absurd that in my own country, once the Prime Minister, Mr Blair, summons up the courage to confront the Chancellor, Mr Brown, we will be asked in a referendum to decide whether or not to join the single currency. Can you imagine our financial and economic future being discussed in public houses up and down the country? This is a job that elected politicians should do.
As regards your paper, the European Parliament and the Commission should be partners in the construction of Europe, not rivals. If we remember the days of Jacques Delors, your predecessor, he had a clear programme, a vision: the 1992 single market. He set out a time frame and turned that vision into reality. We must do the same with enlargement and constitutional reform, widening and deepening.
Lastly, Mr Prodi, will you organise a public platform for the leaders of the candidate countries that will be joining the EU? I know you have already met the new Polish leader, but the public at large needs to be able to see in practice that we have a vision of a fully complete, united Europe and that you, Parliament and the Council are working together to achieve this."@en1
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