Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-01-11-Speech-2-044"
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"en.20050111.5.2-044"2
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"Mr President, the Convention, in which this Parliament took part, drew up a text considered at the time to be the best possible compromise. Then the Council, in turn, reached the most workable compromise, and the new Constitutional Treaty was signed in Rome.
Depending on individual national constitutions, it is now a matter for the people, through referendums, or for the national parliaments to give final approval to the new path. It is a path which, like it or not, regards Europe not as a federal superstate that has gradually eroded away identities, traditions and cultures, but as a Union of sovereign states that have freely chosen to breathe life into a common policy. It comes at a time in human history when natural disasters and man-made tragedies require that not just the economic interests of our countries be represented on the world stage, but also the values of democracy, freedom and respect for human dignity – values that our continent has secured and set out at last after centuries of war and conflict.
If today, in this Chamber, we divide over something that no longer depends on our decision, but on ratification by the individual Member States and individual peoples of the Union, it will mean disavowing our Parliament’s ability to plan the future and relegating it to the role of a talking shop in which plenty of fine speeches are made but little is decided. That stands in stark contrast to the increase in our prerogatives which, after a great struggle, we have finally achieved precisely through the drafting of the new Treaty.
It would seem appropriate to recall that, while the values and principles of the Charter of Fundamental Rights now included in the second part of the Treaty form the ethical basis for the Union, several parts of the Constitutional Charter are still incomplete and will need updating in the light of current circumstances. Furthermore, we must ensure that the Constitution is not exploited for party-political purposes against governments that have been duly elected by their own citizens. The European Union must not run the risk of becoming a place where political groups join in battle to attack freely made national decisions on ideological grounds."@en1
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