Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-01-30-Speech-3-024"
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"en.20080130.13.3-024"2
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"Mr President, on a point of order, under Rules 173, 19(1), 161 and 171, the decision by the Committee on Constitutional Affairs which you cited a moment ago represents, I am sorry to say, the moment at which this Parliament departs from any pretence of legality or the rule of law.
Last week, you asked for, and were granted by the Committee on Constitutional Affairs, discretionary powers arbitrarily to disapply the Rules of Procedure of this House according to your own view. The Rules allow no such latitude. You cited Rule 19(1). Let me read what it says: ‘The President shall direct all the activities of Parliament and its bodies under the conditions laid down in these rules.’ They do not allow you discretionary power to set them aside simply because you do not like the opinions of the people making amendments or requests that, in your letter, you accepted ‘were formally based on and fulfilled the requirements of … the Rules of Procedure’.
What has driven you to this, Mr President? What action has driven you to this extremity of tearing up your own rule book rather than following the letter of the law? Was it some filibuster that was preventing any business getting through? Hardly! Those of us who are asking for a referendum perhaps represent 40 or 50 out of 785. We are a small minority. The worst we could do was slightly to delay your lunch by making speeches of one minute, but even this is intolerable to you!
Could it be that the reason you have acted in this arbitrary fashion, tearing up the rule of law, is because you are taking out on us the surrogate contempt you feel for the national electorates who keep voting ‘no’ on the Lisbon Treaty whenever they are given the opportunity?
If I am wrong, prove me wrong by holding the referendums that you used to support when you thought you could win them. Put the Treaty of Lisbon to the people.
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