Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-07-21-Speech-3-119"
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"en.19990721.7.3-119"2
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"Mr President, it is clear that in our European Union today changes are underway, particularly in the Commission, as a result of the refusal to give discharge for the 1996 budget and then the consequent and ultimate mass resignation of the Commission. Everything in that particular story showed where codes of conduct had begun to be discussed and debated. Indeed the acting President, Mr Santer, had put out a Code of Conduct for Commissioners and officials but it seemed it did not go far enough. Everything in the story was too little, too late. From the comments of Commissioner Kinnock, the Commission might examine this tomorrow or next week. It is always in the same kind of vein.
This applies also to the question of a Code of Conduct for high level officials because in the Commission over the last few years there has indeed been lax management in internal organisation as was underlined by the Wise Men's report. This is why we were calling earlier today for the second part of that report to be available to us so we have as much information available to us when we come to the hearings in early September for the incoming Commission.
One simple example which I can give the House of the internal games which were played by the heads of cabinets – not the Commissioners – on one particular staffing matter goes to show how these things were handled. ESPRIT, an important information technology programme designated under Mr Bangemann at the beginning of the Commission as it was in early 1995, was transferred from originally DG XIII which was under Mrs Cresson to Mr Bangemann. Lo and behold, in 1998, this was then shifted back to Mrs Cresson without any formal Commission decision – it was just decided as a game between the cabinets. How much time, energy and problems were caused for staff in the running of a programme simply because the Commissioners did a deal between themselves which was not transparent, not effective and certainly unaccountable to us here in the European Parliament.
I come to this particular case of Mr Bangemann. It is to us extraordinary insensitivity at this particular time, in this current climate, when you have an acting Commission, that someone can, in that particular state of office simply say two days later he wants to go and work for a private company which is one of the major operators in the field for which he is responsible in telecommunications. It could be argued that Mr Bangemann is not doing anything strictly wrong because there was not an enforceable Code of Conduct. But the Statute is very generous to Commissioners. Is not 80 % of salary for five years enough to satisfy someone's need for financial back-up and to make sure that they do not need the extra finance which a company like
is giving?
We unanimously support in our group the Council's decision for this case to go to the Court of Justice. We are particularly hopeful that they will look at the suspension of pension rights for the Commissioner in this instance, particularly while he is engaged in a private company. What it leaves for us is a reflection of the disregard of certain members of the outgoing Commission for the need to have a rigorous approach to high standards in public life.
We therefore welcome the statement by the incoming President, Mr Prodi, that there will now be codes of conduct applied rigorously, but we have heard this before. This is what worries us. We want to be able to see these codes of conduct effectively applied so as to make sure not only that the people at the top accept political responsibility, but also that we have high quality management right the way down so that people can be appointed for what they know rather than who they know."@en1
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