Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-12-03-Speech-3-080"
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"en.20031203.7.3-080"2
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"Mr President, since this Parliament is usually so critical of the Commission, I would like firstly to congratulate it and the Commissioner responsible for economic and monetary affairs, Mr Solbes, for the integrity and the dignity with which they have defended the powers conferred on them by the Treaty, as guardian of the Treaties.
I do not wish to blame the Italian Presidency, but, Mr Tremonti, the decision by Ecofin is a real botch job. Because the European Union, Mr President, is a community of values and a community of law, and legal rules – the rules of the Stability and Growth Pact are legal rules – only mean something if there is an obligation to comply with them, and that compliance must be demanded equally from the small and the large countries.
Europe cannot be built upon the law of the largest. We cannot, Mr President, apply the rules of the Stability and Growth Pact to Portugal to the letter and then exonerate other larger countries.
It is one thing to be flexible and apply the rules in accordance with the circumstances, but it is another matter altogether to try to change the rules when the game has already begun, when the result is not favourable or when it does not suit us; and that attitude, Mr President, will have consequences, because a market which is not able to respect its own rules creates insecurity and a lack of confidence in the credibility of the single currency and, as the Chairman of our political group, Mr Poettering, said, today's deficit is tomorrow's debt and the taxes of the day after tomorrow. And what is worse, this decision comes at a very bad time, precisely on the eve of the work of the Intergovernmental Conference which is going to discuss the European Constitution. And I wonder with what moral authority certain Member States criticise others for exercising their legitimate rights within the context of qualified majority voting, when they are blatantly defending their national interests in violation of the spirit and the letter of the Treaties, as the Commission has acknowledged.
I would therefore congratulate the Commission, Mr President, on the integrity it has demonstrated in the defence of its role as guardian of the Treaties and I would ask whether, for the sake of coherence, the Commission intends to bring a case before the Court of Justice against the Council of Ministers for violation of the Treaties."@en1
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