Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-09-07-Speech-3-326"
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"en.20050907.22.3-326"2
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".
Mr President, whilst I do not believe that the United Kingdom should be part of the EU, it would be quite wrong of me to deny the right of those parents who work for the qualifying institutions – in most cases outside their country of origin and in many cases in a country that does not share their mother tongue – to give their children a suitable education. The European schools provide the only practical way for many such parents to exercise that right. I have no quibbles there.
In most respects, the rapporteur has considered the European schools in the same proper light. It would be churlish of me not to say so. I do, however, differ from her on one or two points.
First of all, the rapporteur defines Category I pupils as children of staff in the service of Community institutions and bodies. There is a significant omission here. Category I status also covers children of the staff of the UK Atomic Energy Authority seconded to the joint European tourist projects in Culham, near Oxford, and children of staff covered by the service regulations of the European Patent Office in Munich. The UK Atomic Energy Authority is most certainly not a Community institution and, furthermore, the joint European tourism project involves one EU pre-accession state, Romania, and one completely non-EU state, Switzerland.
As for the European Patent Office, it covers Switzerland, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Monaco, and will soon bring in Norway. As I had to stress during the debate on computer patents, that means that it is most assuredly not a Community institution. I am sad to have to make that point again so soon.
Too often we see an assumption in this Parliament that Europe and the EU are one and the same thing. Here is another example. This is not a trivial point in a general sense, nor is it trivial with specific regard to this report, because the rapporteur states that only 1.6% of pupils at Culham are Category I. She may well be correct, but if she actually means that only 1.6% of pupils at Culham are children of staff in the Community institutions then she could be very wide of the mark. I hope she can clarify that statistic.
I am most concerned by the Commissioner's suggestion that the option of offering the European baccalaureate outside the current school system should be considered. Could the rapporteur please clarify that as well?
Is the Commission suggesting that the European baccalaureate should be available in schools other than the European schools? I simply do not see why it is necessary to interfere with other schools in order to broaden and modernise the curriculum of the European schools. If I were a teacher and a pupil gave the EU as the answer, I would have to conclude that it was a very stupid question."@en1
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