Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-05-15-Speech-1-083"
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"en.20060515.15.1-083"2
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Mr President, Mr Vice-President of the Commission, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner Verheugen’s initiative towards bringing about a marked improvement in European lawmaking, which will involve withdrawing 68 pending legislative proposals, hits the mark in no uncertain fashion. Public opinion in our own Member States has for some considerable time regarded the European Union as far too bureaucratic and as possessed of a mania for regulation, and so the time for facing up to this justified criticism is already overdue. At the end of the day, the bottom line is that the ‘less, but of better quality’ approach can bring dividends, and it would certainly be good for Europe and for its citizens, and so, Commissioner, with this approach to policymaking, you have the European Parliament – the directly elected representatives of the public – wholeheartedly and unreservedly alongside you, and I would add that it is not just the Commission, but also this House, that has work to do in this respect.
The focus of my report, though, Commissioner, is not on the ‘whether’ but on the ‘how’; it has to do, firstly, with the question of how the Commission and Parliament work together as institutions, and, secondly, with the question of whether it takes Parliament’s legislative role sufficiently into account. As you know, the Commission’s announcement that pending legislative proposals would be withdrawn or amended was the cause of some excitement in our House, and not just from an institutional point of view. This House’s committees subjected the specific individual proposals to close examination, the upshot of which was an exchange of letters on the subject between the Presidents of our two institutions. In the case of certain of the proposals, Parliament does not share the Commission’s view, but the Commission has not changed its mind.
It was almost exactly a year ago that Parliament and the Commission adopted a framework agreement that renewed the basis on which our two institutions work together, and so the Committee on Constitutional Affairs has examined not only the package you have announced in terms of its impact on the Treaties, but also, of course, the framework agreement itself, notably points 31, 32, and 33. Believing as we do that there is a need for legislation over and above the framework agreement, it is our expectation that the Commission will not turn a deaf ear to our proposals, but will instead endorse them in a spirit of sincere cooperation with Parliament.
The first thing that has to be said is that it has become apparent from the whole affair that the agreement, which has generally been held to, that our House should be informed in advance of the Commission’s intentions, is just not enough. We must not only be informed in advance, but also informed in good time, and what that means is that Parliament should be in a position to do more than just give an opinion on the proposed withdrawal of proposals. The main thing we expect from this is that proper account should be taken of our opinion when the Commission takes its final decision; if, for compelling reasons, the Commission’s decision differs from our own, then we take it as read that we will at least be given an explanation as to why.
That is why – secondly – the Commission must, in future, go about things in a different way, by adopting the discontinuity principle as practised at the national level. Every newly-appointed Commission should, immediately after taking office, draw up a list of the legislative proposals produced by its predecessor indicating which of the pending proposals it is planning to keep. There should also be an indication in the annual legislative and working programme of which of the proposals currently going through the lawmaking process are to be withdrawn or amended.
Thirdly, as part of the present streamlining initiative, a package was submitted, containing both a list of proposals and an explanation of the package itself. Quite apart from the fact that I myself cannot see why the criterion of competitiveness should be declared to be an overriding principle and virtually ennobled, I want, in my role as rapporteur, to stress that an explanation of the package is precisely what we do not want in future, for it was the explanation of the package that was the cause of a certain amount of irritation, since it cannot be one of Parliament’s functions to explore the Commission’s thinking and match the principles set out in the explanation to the various proposals to which they relate; that is precisely what the Commission is supposed to do when it announces its intention of withdrawing or modifying certain proposals, and that is why we want, in future, to see every single proposal for withdrawal justified separately. I can tell the Commissioner that it is not only important from our point of view that this practice be adopted; I also think it would be beneficial to the Commission, for, if you had explained your proposals one by one and item by item, I am sure you would not have got tangled up in the undergrowth of your own institution. You would then not have announced the withdrawal of the proposal for the Council resolution approving the European Community’s accession to the Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and on the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management, without having already noticed that it had already been adopted. You can find it in the Official Journal, L 30, for the year 2005. The Commission really does not possess the authority to declare null and void laws that have already been adopted. If you had checked them one by one, you would not have announced the withdrawal of proposals that had already been withdrawn, for it is to be presumed that you would have noticed the mistake.
My report has to do with the way in which our two institutions work together, an area in which little is laid down by the Treaty on the European Communities, which, I might add, gives the institutions in question – us in Parliament and in the Commission – discretion to determine the manner of their cooperation in a responsible way. It is my hope that my report will help to improve the EU’s institutional structures and to promote the duty of sincere cooperation between our two institutions.
I wish to thank the shadow rapporteurs of the other groups for their good cooperation, which has made it possible for us to present this report without dissent."@en1
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