Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-06-22-Speech-3-109"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20050622.14.3-109"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:translated text |
".
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I too would like to thank the Luxembourg Presidency and yourself for having arrived at this outcome today. When the debate on the Members’ Statute began, it was extremely noble: people talked about immunity, status, and it was a means by which to underline the existence of a supranational parliament directly elected by the European people.
Then everything went wrong: it has become a debate on money and various acts of pettiness, which is highly complicated by national exceptions that have partly drained away the European value of this Statute, which has now become almost exclusively based on money. Even if we vote against paragraph 12, I call on the Presidency to consider that it is by no means this paragraph that makes the Statute less European. It is precisely all those who interfered, particularly on the fiscal system, who have got rid of the truly European content.
That said, tomorrow my group will be equally divided between those abstaining and those voting in favour, because there are a number of elements of this Statute about which we have very serious issues, the issue of pensions, in particular. We believe that we are citizens like everyone else, and that it is therefore entirely justifiable that, when you are entitled to a pension, you have in some way to contribute to, and participate in, funding that reserve. That is the reason for which a number of our members will abstain on that issue and will consequently vote in favour of our amendment.
On the other hand, I should like to underline the fact that we are very strongly in favour of this Statute. Even we perfectly understand that we are in a ‘now or never’ situation.
The final comment that I should like to make is the fact that in recent years certainly not only the Luxembourg Government, but also the Council as a whole, has complicated the situation and made it much more difficult, partly because it has introduced a new concept of, let us say, enlarged assent, by which people are not limited to saying just yes or no. We hope that in future we too in the European Parliament will be able to take advantage of this enlarged assent procedure."@en1
|
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples