Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-04-21-Speech-3-084"
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"en.20040421.5.3-084"2
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".
Mr President, I have never knowingly turned down the opportunity of addressing this many people – a number slightly higher than the crowd I normally draw!
As you have said, Mr President, I spoke at what the leader of one Group regarded as inordinate length on this issue in the middle of the night, when the few of us here would have preferred to be where I am sure everybody else was: in their own bed. Perhaps I could have phrased that better.
Perhaps very briefly I can make three points in response, bearing in mind that I was criticised the other day on the grounds that my virtue was that I said what I thought, but that my vice was what I thought. However, I will very briefly say what I think.
First of all, as the Minister said earlier in the debate on the United States, if we had been through what New York went through in September 2001, we would have wanted our government to do everything possible to secure our freedom, to secure us against atrocity.
Secondly, I do not pretend that the agreement we have negotiated in good faith is perfect – alas, we are not in the business of perfection – but I think it is an extremely sensible proposal and it has, I believe, resulted in a number of proposals being made which Parliament pressed for and we have been able to secure. I will not go through them all.
Thirdly, let us be clear what will happen if we have to delay this for months or do not have it at all: complete disarray for the next few months, airlines facing financial chaos, people waiting in queues without any of the protection that we have managed to secure. I do not think that those people or those airlines will be singing Te Deums to thank the supporters of a motion to put off any decision for months.
I had not meant to intervene, on this occasion, but I hope that people will think very seriously about the consequences of this and the consequences for our credibility when it comes to negotiating in the security area with the United States."@en1
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