Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-06-07-Speech-4-012"
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"en.20070607.3.4-012"2
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".
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, I have nothing to add to the descriptions given by the President-in-Office of the Council and the Commission, for the cards are on the table and we have no need to repeat what we all know already, namely that what will be at stake on 21 and 22 June will be nothing more and nothing less than the future of the European Union as it at present exists, and when I say that, I am not excluding the possibility of that which will exist after 22 June being a different EU – a changed one, a weaker one, or a strengthened one perhaps.
What we want is a stronger EU, but, if the EU is to be made stronger, one fundamental presupposition is that we think back to one simple saying: in unity, strength. In fragmentation, weakness. That has been the experience of the European Union over recent years. It is always weak when it is disunited and at odds with itself. It is strong when it is united. Yet the European Union must be strong, for the challenges it faces are enormous, and to all those who dream of vetoes and believe that one would make them strong, one has to say that the filth borne in the air takes no heed of vetoes, nor does it pay any attention to borders. Europe is needed to help save humanity in every area of its activity, and it needs to help in ways only it can.
Europe still thinks of itself as a large continent, yet, set against the 1.3 billion Chinese and the 1.1 billion Indians – who together, at 2.4 billion, make up a third of the world’s population – the 27 Member States, with their 495 million inhabitants, make up a small one. Even the Federal Republic of Germany, which you, Mr Steinmeier, represent, would, despite its 82 million inhabitants and their enormous economic clout, be a weak country on its own without the European Union.
Europe needs this unity, and the components for it are to hand. We have the challenge of climate change to face. Even if it is from the United States of America that the call to unity comes – and even if we always have to ask what they actually want when they issue such a call – our relationship across the Atlantic demands of us that we do them a favour and unite, for they know that it is only by combining the enormous scientific, economic, cultural and social power that we, on both sides of the Atlantic, can accumulate, that we can make an effective contribution to resolving the world’s problems.
The cards are on the table; the much-praised Mrs Merkel has certainly done a good job and will have yet more hard work to put in. After all, she is a physicist, and physicists know that the most marvellous things can be put together from the most disparate elements; they also know that nothing can succeed unless they do the maths. According to the logic of mathematics, two minuses equal a plus, so there is still hope for the twins in Warsaw.
We know where the problems are, Mr President-in-Office. True to your diplomatic undertakings, you have told us that you cannot tell us everything that you know, and a good thing too, for if you did, the vast number of problems you have to deal with would make the mood in the House this morning a less than happy one.
Our task is a different one: we have to address an appeal to the governments who are meeting together on 21 and 22 June. Nice was an exercise in failure not only because this or that Head of Government nodded off in the course of the evening, but also because, the following morning, the curse of the evil deed became apparent when everyone said that the treaty would not be enough for 15 Member States and wondered how it could possibly be sufficient for 27; that was why we ended up with the Constitution. Now that itself has not been ratified, but we are 27 Member States in number, and we cannot die for Nice. If we cannot achieve better results than we did with Nice, we have to fall back on it, and then – Mr Saryusz-Wolski please note – Nice will be the death of the European Union. I do not want that, and so we have work out something that brings unity. We in this House have outlined what we think about the Barón Crespo/Brok report, and I have to say – speaking on behalf of my group – that Parliament will make that report its benchmark; offer less than what that report describes as being necessary, and there can be no agreement. My group, at any rate will not vote to accept any result that you offer us that falls short of what has been demanded, and I want to make that quite plain to the Council today. Be optimistic, Mr President-in-Office, and we will be right alongside you; keep fighting to the last minute. It is intolerable that we should end up with failure, with 26 Member States left empty-handed through the refusal of one to play ball. Unity is strength; division brings weakness."@en1
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