Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-11-16-Speech-3-147"
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"en.20051116.16.3-147"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I am delighted that we have the opportunity today, in the presence of the President-in-Office of the Council and the President of the Commission, to make an appraisal of the informal European Council held at the end of last month.
Unfortunately, while the idea of convening the Council was not a bad idea, it suffered most in the execution. Indeed, at a time when the European Union is on its last legs, given that we have twenty million unemployed, where we do not know how to address social problems, especially those which broke out recently in France, and where the citizens' confidence in governments is falling by geometrical progression, the idea of the leaders of the European Union meeting in London in order to discuss the European social model and the resistance to globalisation was, on the face of it, a very good one.
Unfortunately, instead of agreement prevailing, we again witnessed the customary quarrels break out about as important an issue to the future of Europe as the financial perspectives.
I would remind the House that Mr Blair, during his speech from this same tribune in the European Parliament on 23 June, stated that he had always been an enthusiastic champion of Europe. I wonder, four and a half months later, how Mr Blair is translating these words into practice. What is the appraisal of his country's Presidency so far, given that one month before it ends we have not reached agreement on the financial perspectives. The social model has not progressed even one inch and the Council's response to globalisation is the creation of an ambiguous adjustment fund.
I truly wonder, Mr President of the Commission, if you have seriously thought about the reaction of the workers made redundant when you tell them that there is the panacea of the fund for all the ills of globalisation.
The British Presidency had the opportunity to write history at Hampton Court. Instead, it demonstrated once again that this is a union of interests which wastes time and public money on talks of no substance and whose mistakes, unfortunately, have to be paid for by the citizens of Europe."@en1
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