Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-06-24-Speech-2-034"
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"en.20080624.3.2-034"2
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"Mr President, President-in-Office of the Council, President of the Commission, first of all, I should like to extend warm thanks to the Slovenian Presidency. It is the first Presidency by a new Member State. Thank you, you have done a good job at a difficult time! It is a difficult time because we are now having to face up to the new possibilities for reform of the EU and because of the result of the Irish referendum.
However, there is one thing that I should like to say to this House – something that I have learned from the UK, from Westminster: representative democracy has the same degree of democratic legitimacy as a referendum. If we abandon this principle, then our democratic system as a whole will be lost, and we will find ourselves in a situation of manipulation, such as the one that we have seen in Ireland. We have to take some arguments seriously. We have to make it clear – Mr Nassauer has pointed this out – that we must strengthen the European Union and that we must make every effort to limit excessive legislation. However, we also have to affirm that the telling of lies is not permitted in a democratic process.
As my fellow Member said earlier, this Treaty expressly bans reproductive cloning because it is prohibited in the Charter of Fundamental Rights. The truth is that it is becoming a Europe of values. It is precisely the case that Europe’s citizens enjoy more rights because the European Parliament and the national parliaments are becoming stronger, a citizens’ initiative is being introduced and the subsidiarity monitoring procedure has been established. That is quite true! The claims that we have too little democracy are what prevent us from having more democracy, as the majority of those who have waged the campaign of lies do not want Europe at all and put forth these spurious arguments in order to conceal that fact. We should not allow this to happen, and that is why I think that legitimacy is good.
That is why I also think that we should try to move forward with the ratification process, to be critical but also to affirm that this European Union has so far brought us the happiest period of peace, freedom and prosperity in the history of this continent. We do not have to be ashamed of the achievements of this European Union, and we should also tell people about this success if we want their support for the EU – although they are entitled to criticise the EU in individual cases.
I think that, on that basis, the 26 Member States should complete their ratification processes and that our Irish friends should then be invited to analyse this situation and come up with a proposal. As there is no immediate deadline, we should go about it in a reasonable manner. It would be nice if it could all be concluded before next year’s European elections. However, in any historical process, such details are mere trivialities. I think that we should give our Irish friends the opportunity to address this issue and to come up with a proposal."@en1
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