Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-12-03-Speech-3-130"
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"en.20081203.14.3-130"2
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"Mr President, I would like to say that this has been an extremely important debate for the Council. What I have taken from it is that, as many of you have emphasised, the Roma as a group are disadvantaged, and are very vulnerable to poverty, discrimination and racist attacks. That has been said, and unfortunately it is true, as many of you have emphasised.
As Mr Severin, Mr Cohn-Bendit and Mrs Mohácsi all quite rightly said, it is also clear that we must not harbour false optimism, and that the strategy will be extremely difficult to implement. As you stressed, in our daily work, we need to make a distinction between those who have become sedentary and those who remain nomadic. They are not the same thing: their practices and living conditions are not the same. In day-to-day practice, even though we really want to help, it truly is very difficult in reality. We must not fall prey to naïve optimism: we need to take determined, ongoing action, and I would say to you, Mr Severin, that the fact that the work of the Council in this area was initiated by Romania is also a good sign and that the fact that the Council has taken up this issue at the behest of your countrymen is extremely important.
In my view, we need to be aware that we have a long road ahead of us: we need to be clear about that, as you have been. I think that the only possible response is, as has been said, to set up structures and associations. That is what we are trying to do, but it is, indeed, extremely difficult.
Second, as you have underlined, it is vital that we take a European approach to this, not least because it is very much a cross-border problem, not at all a purely national one. It is also obvious, though – and I am saying this for the Commission and in relation to the comments made – that we have to be quite clear about the fact that the Member States also have specific responsibilities in this matter. We can only take legislative initiatives at European level if they fall under the competences granted to the Union in the Treaties today. We must – and I would say this both to Mrs Angelilli and to Mrs Járóka – also take real action at national level.
To summarise, therefore, I think that, this year, we have seen a growing recognition of the phenomenon – even if, as you will admit, it has been too slow. I am not sure if we need to follow up on what has been said, and on what basis we can do so, regarding the problem of minorities. Moreover, the Council must continue its work and, above all, the Member States’ actions and the measures actually taken both at national and local level must be stepped up, because the current situation is inhumane and unacceptable. We also need to recognise, though, that this really is a very complex problem in practice. Many thanks for your comments."@en1
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