Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-09-22-Speech-1-112"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20080922.20.1-112"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:translated text |
"Madam President, I would like to thank all members of the Committee on Petitions, especially all the shadow rapporteurs and our Chairman, Marcin Libicki, for their cooperation and daily work on petitions.
In many ways we have improved cooperation with the Commission, the Ombudsman and institutions such as SOLVIT to speed up responses to petitions.
Petitions often require mediation outside the courts, not a solution which simply consists in bringing the matter before the European courts.
One of the most important cases in recent years, in 2007 and previously, was the petition on the Via Baltica, a roadway which goes through an area protected under Community law; the European Commission and the Court of Justice have already acted in an exemplary manner to prevent irreparable damage to the environment.
Other very important cases (and at this point I would like to thank Commissioner McCreevy, who is here today) were the Valencia urban development law, where Mr McCreevy and his team acted effectively to defend the Public Procurement Directive. Other cases were Equitable Life, the Loiret in France, protection of water quality in France and the delicate issue of custody of children in Germany.
We currently have a number of petitions such as the petition for a single seat for the European Parliament, which has been signed by one and a half million citizens: we demand the right to process that petition, a right which has not been granted by the Bureau of Parliament.
Finally, we make some proposals, including a change of name to the Petitions Committee, which would become the ‘Committee on Citizens’ Petitions’ so as to clarify the essential function and role of European citizens within the Committee. To the same end we ask that Parliament be opened up in all ways on the Internet and request interoperability of Parliament’s web systems; the web systems currently close the door to thousands or millions of Europeans who do not have the type of software needed to access the web, where my speech here in Parliament is being broadcast right now.
More than ever, we need petitions from citizens to bring Europe closer to the street and day-to-day problems. More than ever we need petitions from citizens to ensure that Community law is complied with and implemented.
We need petitions from citizens so that we can provide tangible proof of what Europe is for, to prove that Europe is not an opaque institution but something that affects everyone’s daily lives and that we are able to hold a dialogue with thousands of citizens.
We are succeeding. In 2007 the Petitions Committee had 50% more cases than in 2006. That success is a reflection of our work; it is a success which blazes the trail for the European institutions in general.
My country, Spain, is the country with the highest number of petitions studied at the Petitions Committee. One third of petitions on the environment of the European Union are from Spain. This is a reflection of the confidence in European institutions which exists in Spain, and a reflection of the work we have done in Spain. But there is an increasing number of cases from new Member States of the European Union such as Romania or Poland.
However, the success of the Petitions Committee, the success in the number of petitions, is also causing a number of administrative and political problems. The Committee lacks resources. The number of cases is continually growing yet the same number of people are working at the Secretariat and the same number of people are working at the European Commission to process the petitions.
The institutions need to respond sensitively to citizens’ concerns; we need sufficient resources to be able to deal with the petitions quickly and appropriately. Sometimes petitions procedures drag on for years and years; if petitions are not processed they lose their validity and the European Institutions completely lose their capacity to intervene.
Sometimes there is a lack of high-calibre legal and administrative care in the way petitions are handled by the European Commission. Yes, there are petitions which irritate the powerful. Yes, there are petitions which irritate the authorities. Yes, there are petitions which are inconvenient because they bring hundreds or thousands of people to the European Parliament. Yet this is how Europe will be strengthened.
Last year we made six fact-finding visits to Germany, Spain, Ireland, Poland, France and Cyprus, each of which resulted in a report. We placed particular importance on petitions which reflect citizens’ concerns about the environment and its protection, and petitions relating to directives on water, property rights and minority rights."@en1
|
| lpv:videoURI |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples