Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-05-05-Speech-3-508"
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"en.20100505.75.3-508"2
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"Mr President, almost all the Members who have spoken have expressed their support for the European Union signing up to the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, and we are fully in agreement with them.
I would like to say that we are pleased that there is a consensus with regard to the importance of moving forward with the development of the mandate presented by the European Commission and that there is going to be a Parliament sitting on this, as announced by Mr Jáuregui and I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate him and the other rapporteurs of this report, Mrs Gál and Mr Preda. I would also like to say that it is the intention of the Spanish Presidency that this mandate – based on the text sent by the Commission, which we understand has to be responsible for negotiating it with the European Council – should be adopted by the Council of Ministers, the Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) Council, on 4 June.
I would like to refer to the two speeches that seemed to express reticence or opposition to this, considering it either a threat to the competences of the Union, in the case of Mr Ziobro, or unnecessary, in the case of Mrs Morvai.
I would like to refer to both of these speeches and answer them both specifically. With regard to Mr Ziobro’s argument, there is no problem with the Strasbourg Court interfering in the Union’s competences. That is not its objective and, moreover, this is stated in Protocol 8 of the Treaty of Lisbon. It is clear that it does not change the competences or powers of the Union’s institutions. There is no problem.
In addition to the issue of the ‘co-respondent’ mechanism – in other words, the European Union along with a Member State – when there is an appeal against a Member State before the Strasbourg Court, one of the subjects that is being dealt with in a working group on this matter is that of exhausting the judicial remedies of the Luxembourg Court first, before going to the European Court of Human Rights.
This is one of the subjects that are being worked on from a technical point of view in the working group, so that there will not be any doubt that the European Court of Human Rights does not impinge on the competences of the Union; it simply establishes whether or not there has been an infringement of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights.
The second argument is that of Mrs Morvai, who says, ‘I can go against a decision by an authority of my country and I can go to the European Court of Human Rights, so why do I need the European Union to sign up?’ I think that this is quite clear: the European Union has competences that the Member States do not have. The European Union not only has competences, but what is more, it has increased them.
The European Union has become an institution that takes decisions through directives, regulations and decisions from a legal point of view, which could infringe the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights. That is why the European Union’s journey towards an increasingly powerful institution means that as well as the Member States signing the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and submitting to the jurisdiction of Strasbourg, the European Union therefore also needs to submit to the jurisdiction of Strasbourg; that is why the Treaty of Lisbon establishes that this is the case.
In addition, the history of the European Court of Human rights and its case law has been highly positive for human rights in Europe. The European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights, which is the text that the Court applies, is quite old – it dates back to 1950 – and, like the Treaty of Rome, it was also signed in Rome. Protocols have since been added to it over time. It is old, but nevertheless there has been a wealth of case law that has become the case law of the constitutional courts and supreme courts of the Member States. It has formed a sort of common doctrine, which is essentially the doctrine that the Luxembourg Court and the Strasbourg Court together are seeking to establish for the future in the interpretation of human rights.
We therefore feel it is entirely justified for the European Union to sign this Convention. Moreover, we feel that it is going to protect not only the people of the Member States, but also people who come from outside the European Union and have the status of a foreign resident, because the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights protects anyone who is under the jurisdiction of a Member State and in the future anyone who is under jurisdiction that is affected by the decisions taken by the European Union. It is therefore not only nationals of the Member States, but also those who are not nationals of the Member States who will be protected by this Convention if the Union signs it."@en1
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