Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-09-05-Speech-2-182"
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"en.20060905.23.2-182"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, in the debate in recent months on the growing political integration of Europe, with its ups and downs, we have often said that Europe needs to give people a better idea of its project, its purpose and, I would say, its indispensability: the Europe of results, conceived by us specifically to give people a real key to understanding its
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Now, however, its social dimension needs to be promoted as well, alongside the dimensions of growth and knowledge, the objectives that we are always proclaiming. This must be accompanied by research into what Europe must become, so that we can tell Europe’s people clearly whether the future of Europe – and not just its past history and that of the 20th century, which we all know and have lived through – will still have this priority, this distinguishing mark that has characterised the diverse models and systems in the various Member States.
It is precisely at a European level that we need to make this leap: the progress made so far in the various countries and Member States is now confronted by challenges that isolated responses alone are unlikely to overcome. Clearly – I must say this to those who fear that Brussels will decide everything: what, how, and with a single model – clearly, evidently and indisputably, the competence and responsibility for social policies lie with the Member States, and decisions on how much and what kind of revenue to spend on our social systems, depending on whether the emphasis is more on social security or education or reparation, must be made at a national level.
That these are national decisions is beyond doubt, and I too uphold the idea that my country should decide what kind of welfare state to create, but I also consider it necessary to adopt a common approach at European level regarding certain fundamental rights that must be safeguarded: social rights that, I would remind you, we included in the rights section of our draft Constitution. We have to start here, with a common approach to lay down certain guidelines, precisely because our national social systems are faced with the worst challenge of all: economic and financial compatibility. Indeed, we want competitiveness and social cohesion to go hand in hand as the two sides of the same coin of integrated development of a society.
That is why I think today’s debate is important; that is why I think it should be part of the European agenda, even though some may perhaps question it because it is just an own-initiative report on this subject. It is not enough to talk about institutional models; it is not enough to talk about what kind of governance is necessary; it is essential to debate the competitive model for our free economy.
The citizens also want to know this, when they make their political choice, when they also make, or refuse to make, the economic choices that we shall ask them to make for the sake of higher employment or some other reason: they will ask whether these social rights are in any case a distinguishing mark of all the welfare systems that the various countries will be implementing."@en1
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