Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-11-25-Speech-4-009"
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"en.20101125.4.4-009"2
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"Mr President, Mr Diamandouros, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I think that we can see the mission of the European Ombudsman as involving two objectives.
Mr Diamandouros, I wish you all the best, and I am very much looking forward to reading your annual report for 2010.
First of all, there is the legal objective, which entails ensuring that the European institutions show respect for the fundamental right of good administration. Ensuring respect for this right is the very essence of the Ombudsman’s function. We are now at a key moment in the sense that the Treaty of Lisbon, which now includes the European Charter of Fundamental Rights, makes this right legally binding in Article 41. The Ombudsman therefore now has a legal basis, and one which I would say has been strengthened, to carry out his activities properly.
To achieve this objective of full respect for good administration, the Ombudsman must be inflexible when it comes to the institutions. The special reports are a tool which comes into its own here. They allow the Ombudsman to point out cases of blatant bad administration when all means of resolving disputes have been exhausted. The Porsche affair is very significant in this regard. Here, I would like to praise the determination, if I may say so, of Mr Diamandouros, in his efforts to obtain the information that he is completely entitled to request.
The second objective is moral in nature. For the Ombudsman, it involves promoting a culture of service, which is not explicitly mentioned in the treaties, but which certainly forms part of the commitments that apply to the institutions. In order to ensure that such a culture of service is established, two things are necessary. First of all, the Ombudsman must continue to encourage amicable solutions, as he has already been doing for several years. I will say again that 56% of complaints received are resolved amicably.
He must then continue his efforts with respect to communication, so that European citizens are informed of their rights, as well as the existing procedures for ensuring that these rights are respected. With regard to this, the introduction of an interactive guide is an important step forward, and I believe that many of our citizens are grateful to you for that.
So, the summary of the Ombudsman’s activities in 2009 is an entirely positive one, and that is what I tried to reflect in my report. However, I also included a number of recommendations. First, I think it is essential to strengthen links with the national parliaments and national ombudsmen. Taking action in Brussels without making sure that there is a link at national level means that it is much less effective. That is why I am asking the European Ombudsman to give more encouragement to national ombudsmen to hold regular exchanges of views with their national parliaments, modelled on the exchanges held between the European Ombudsman and ourselves in the European Parliament.
The European Network of Ombudsmen is an important tool to this end. I think that sharing information and good practices is essential in this regard. I want to say again here how important it is to introduce a common intranet portal for ombudsmen to exchange all this information.
Mr President, the citizen must be at the heart of our concerns. Transparency, proximity, good administration, a culture of service – those are the watchwords. This proximity also relates to our institution, however. That is why I would like to praise Mr Diamandouros once again for devoting so much effort to maintaining a constant link with the European Parliament and, in particular, with the Committee on Petitions. As I underlined in my report, I believe that it would be very beneficial for our two institutions and, beyond that, for European citizens if we had more exchanges when the Ombudsman carries out an own-initiative inquiry.
Thus far, Mr Diamandouros has got down very well to his task of calling the institutions to order when they wander down the tortuous path of opacity and bad administration."@en1
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