Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-10-08-Speech-3-084"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20031008.8.3-084"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
"Mr President, I want to pay a compliment to the four speakers before me in the debate who took part in the negotiations on this interinstitutional agreement and particularly to commend, as Nick Clegg did, Monica Frassoni's report and its explanatory statement to the House.
However, I want to slightly disagree with some of the points that have just been made. When we talk about better legislation, it seems to me that suddenly there descends upon this 21st Century parliament the feel that the late-18th Century Beccaria and Bentham walk the stage with us.
Legislation is a science which can be improved, because we all know what the good of the human condition is and all we have to do is devise technical means to achieve it. We know, as Mr Medina Ortega has just said, that this is not, in fact, the case. The duties of the members of a democratic legislature are not to seek a single institutional view. The judges of the members of a democratic legislature are to address the dialectic of contemporary politics, to express the points upon which we disagree and not the points upon which we agree.
Out of disagreement or debate comes perhaps, in the end, wisdom and decision, but we do not start out on the assumption that there is one right answer and it is a technical question of how to achieve it. Nor can we reasonably start out from the assumption that impact assessment is easy. We have 'legislation missiles' which make impact as they land and through that we can tell what the impact is.
Everybody who has studied the sociology of law is well aware that this is not true. What legislation has actually brought about remains controversial for years after it has been passed. There are many strands in the effects of legislation. We do not even always agree on the juridical impact, far less the economic impact of legislation.
A week or so ago, we had a huge argument about the Copyright Directive because people were not sure, not about the cost, but what it would actually mean in its implications before the courts of law. Legal certainty is a myth and an illusion. The most that good legislators can do is diminish legal uncertainty and we should approach our task with due modesty in that regard.
That brings me back to the point about subsidiarity which matters to us all greatly. Impact assessment taken on the grand scale seems to suppose that all law impacts equally and in the same way on all parts of this vast and diverse Union. What an absurd view. It is not true. Every time you look at a real case, you find that it impacts differently in different places. This is what makes subsidiarity so important. I strongly commend Monica Frassoni's report and its explanatory statement. I shall vote for it, but I express some doubts about the underlying suppositions of this debate."@en1
|
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples