Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-09-05-Speech-2-367"
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"en.20060905.28.2-367"2
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".
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the issue we are discussing today is one of the most important – I believe
most important – pre-legislative proposals on the EU agenda for this parliamentary term. It is all the more regrettable, then, that this issue, too, is being discussed just before midnight once again, whilst other supposedly ‘important’ issues receive prime-time slots in this House. Incidentally, this is further proof of the urgent need for parliamentary reform.
We ask that it stays that way – in the interest of the development of the EU and in the interest of legislation in the EU, which must also be manageable and practicable for the man in the street. That is why this project must continue. We ask the Commission to maintain the strength of its support, and also to take the opportunity of its answer to this question to make that clear publicly here in plenary.
Nevertheless, I should like to turn to the oral questions. I can count a total of six resolutions to date that Parliament has issued since the early 1990s, repeatedly and emphatically supporting the project to create a common frame of reference. Parliament has done this for the simple reason that, together with legal practitioners – EU lawyers and judges – we are of the opinion that further steps towards common principles of civil law are needed in order to render many European legislative provisions such as the
Commerce Directive feasible.
In legal disputes, particularly those between consumers and traders concerning small amounts, it is practically impossible for lawyers and judges to apply 25 – or 26 if we include Scotland – different legal systems in the EU in parallel, especially given the strange juxtaposition of the country of origin and country of destination principles, as is the case with the
Commerce Directive, for example.
That is why we need a higher common standard – I am quite happy to use a harmonised one. There is actually no disagreement about this – there is a broad consensus about it in this House. This is also the opinion of leading legal practitioners, and is one of the reasons the CCBE – Council of the Bars and Law Societies of the European Community – is planning to hold a conference in Rome this autumn, which offers its belated support to the project.
It is therefore vital to us that we obtain not only the bare bones of a frame of reference, applying exclusively to issues of consumer contract law, but a framework including, in principle, all aspects of civil law. That is a crucial point as regards later decisions on all the options for what becomes of this frame of reference. This will, of course, depend primarily on the quality of this frame of reference. We should like all options to be kept open until the Commission presents the final consultation document, however, and to be able to take a decision on it afterwards, along with others.
It is also important that we depart from the sectoral approach to civil legislation and seek a holistic approach. After all, the many inconsistencies currently existing in EU civil law can be attributed to the failure to follow this holistic approach, to see things as a whole; instead always considering only individual problems.
Another prerequisite for a frame of reference is that, in principle, the network continues to function and is still operated, as the Commission has done up to now. As rapporteur on this issue for the Committee on Legal Affairs, I can say that all the political groups agree in principle on this subject, and that an overwhelming majority of this House is in favour – something I have seldom experienced elsewhere. Mrs Wallis of the Group of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, who cannot be here this evening, has explicitly asked me to reaffirm this on her behalf, too.
As we know, the three Commissioners dealing with this issue – Commissioners Kyprianou, Frattini and McCreevy – are currently considering, or have recently been considering, how the work should be taken forward. The reason we have deliberately put this oral question – together with the corresponding resolution, which you may have been able to read already in draft form, and which will undoubtedly be adopted by a large majority in this House on Thursday – on today’s agenda is to emphasise clearly once more the strength of Parliament’s support for this project.
We want this House’s resolutions to serve as a guideline for the Commission, too, in further developing and dealing with this issue. There has always been very close cooperation and mutual support between the Commission and Parliament on this issue up to now."@en1
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