Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-05-14-Speech-2-183"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20020514.9.2-183"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:translated text |
".
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, speakers, Commissioner, I would like to speak briefly, starting with an initial comment and then moving on to my responses to some of your speeches.
With regard to certain concrete issues raised – and this will form the fourth section of my speech – I would say the following: in relation to the directive on conditions for asylum seekers, it is true that a general approach was achieved in the Council on the same day that Parliament issued its opinion, but we are now going to work as Fifteen and we are going to take account of the suggestions made by this Parliament, as we always have.
With regard to the European police – another of the issues raised – we will present a viability study on the 30 May in Rome. This study is headed by the Italian Government with the cooperation of three or four other EU countries, including Spain.
As for the Green Paper, I believe it is adequate and that we should make progress on European repatriation policies. I believe that we would be making a great error if, in order to combat illegal immigration, we did not make an effort to cooperate with the countries from which the immigrants originate. It is true that this effort must be accompanied by cooperation policies. That is why I said that it was essential that immigration policy be treated as a key policy within our foreign policy. But how can we fail to be in favour of the Green Paper proposed by the Commission?
Finally, with regard to certain comments that have been made on racism and xenophobia, I would like to say that at the last meeting of the Justice and Home Affairs Council in April, following a communication from various countries of the European Union and of the current Presidency, we have approved a declaration against racism and xenophobia. The truth is that declarations against racism and xenophobia can be adopted – and they must be adopted because luckily we live in one of the most civilised regions, which are most respectful of the rights and freedoms of all the people of the world – but that that approval is perfectly compatible with compliance with the law and the fight against illegal actions which, in the field of immigration, are taking place every day.
I believe that this is the Council’s position on this issue. These are the approaches we are working on and on which we are going to work until the end. I am grateful for the Commission’s words and efforts, which without doubt govern all the actions of the Council and I am also grateful for the suggestions, comments, opinions and criticisms the Members have expressed here and I thank the President for her patience in allowing me to speak for longer than I should.
Although I should not make comments of a personal nature, the first comment I am going to make is personal, but I am making it because I believe that most of my colleagues in the Council agree with it.
There is absolutely no doubt that immigration has been and still is the most important phenomenon to affect the European Union and will remain so over the coming years. It is a phenomenon which will cause much greater changes than the very creation of the EU and the progress we have seen during its construction. It is therefore an issue on which we must work with the necessary skill, sufficient balance and wisdom in terms of what is said and – and this is much more important – what is done.
I believe that we must work to bring the positions of all the Member States closer together in this field, since, amongst other things, we are now, at the very least, an area of free movement of persons, goods etc.
The ideas I believe we have been working on in recent times are the following: firstly, Europe can be – in fact it is, has been and can continue to be in the future – a reception country, because people can without doubt earn a good living here and because furthermore – let us not deceive ourselves – there is a great amount of activity by many people which contributes to the economic growth of our countries. However – and this is the second idea I wanted to express here – immigration must take place legally and we must state clearly that it can not be infinite, because, amongst other things, infinite immigration creates infinite marginalisation. In this respect, we must make an effort to act as responsibly as possible. Thirdly, we must make an effort to integrate people who live outside the European Union with those who live inside. That integration effort must be made by the public administrations of the countries of the Union and also their societies, but we must also demand that all those people who come from outside accept the basic rules of co-existence which we have in the countries of the European Union, which are our Constitutions, our principles and our values, because this affects all of us. There is no doubt that immigrants have rights, but they also have obligations, just as the nationals of the countries of the European Union have. The fourth idea is that we have to fight hard against illegal immigration. We must do this by improving our police systems, visas and border controls.
I believe that the action plan against illegal immigration is a good route and that it should lead to many rules which in the future will make us more efficient, but I would also like to point out, as I said at the beginning of my intervention – and this is an aspect which I would like to emphasise in particular – that we must turn the immigration policy into a fundamental element of the European Union’s foreign policy, which – I believe – makes absolute sense if we accept, as I believe we are almost all accepting today, that immigration is the most important phenomenon of our times.
Those were my initial comments. Now I would also like to clarify some of the issues raised here by various speakers: it has been said that little progress has been made, even that no progress has been made, under the Spanish Presidency. I believe that in my first speech I summarised what the Spanish Presidency has done in relation to immigration during these six months. Obviously everyone can interpret this as they see fit, and by being subjective one can become extremely anti-objective, but, in any event, in case it is of any use to those who hold this view, I would suggest that they make a comparison with what has happened in the past: we should remember that the area of security, justice and freedom, was born in practice in Amsterdam, that it entered into force in 1999 and that a very important dimension of the Union, the economic dimension, has existed for many years, but that almost fifty years passed before we had the euro and even now many Member States, as is their legitimate right, still do not have it. Therefore, we should not be pessimistic when it comes to progress and neither should we look after number one, because that will do no good, nor bring in any votes, and furthermore I imagine that that is not the intention here.
Thirdly, I would like to make a comment with regard to some speakers’ insistence that we have put the emphasis on the fight against illegal immigration and not on other issues. Well, it is true that we have put the emphasis on illegal immigration, because it is an important issue, because there was a strong Laeken mandate and a Commission communication and, above all, because everybody wanted it, but we have also put the emphasis on active policies, such as integration policies and the promotion of legality.
We have talked about the general approach in the Council with regard to the proposed directive on the reception of asylum seekers. The action plan for combating illegal immigration contains very important preventive measures. We have initiated a series of dialogues with countries of origin and transit; including Asian countries. We have made progress with directives relating to illegal immigration which contain integration measures and we have made progress with the Union’s own action plans; I do not therefore think that statements of this type are justified."@en1
|
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples