Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-12-14-Speech-3-050"
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"en.20051214.6.3-050"2
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"Mr President, I would like to begin by apologising to the Presidency. When it agreed to open negotiations with Croatia, I confess I suspected that a rather grubby deal had been done to overcome Austria’s objections to Turkey. I was wrong. We now know that Croatia was cooperating very closely with The Hague and providing information which led to the very significant and important arrest of General Gotovina and I congratulate the Presidency on that progress.
If it is not too much of a shock for Mr Alexander, I would also like to congratulate the Presidency on its cooperation with the Parliament, which has led to huge progress on some very difficult dossiers, noticeably REACH, the long-running Eurovignette saga, and hopefully data retention. I also understand the Presidency is making great strides, or trying to make great strides, in introducing transparency to the Council and I would hope Mr Alexander could tell us what progress he has made on that.
Nonetheless there is still a lack of transparency in the Council, so I wonder whether he could just lift the veil momentarily by answering some questions. Which net payers, apart from the UK, are prepared to pay more money to solve the budget problem? Which net recipients are prepared to receive less in order to solve the budget problem? Which net recipients from old Europe are prepared to receive less in order to show solidarity to new Europe?
How many countries in the Council advocate spending programmes so long as they do not have to pay for them? Which of the main beneficiaries of the CAP are arguing for further reform? Which CAP beneficiaries are prepared, like the UK Government, to make public the information about where the money goes? By that I mean information that shows that the benefit is felt not by farmers but by multinational processors of food and big landowners. Which finance ministers are prepared to sign an annual statement of assurance of their accounts, which will put an end to the annual saga of us failing to sign off the accounts because of the failure of Member States to control their accounts? Which Member States come to the Council meeting and ask not what Europe can do for them, but what they can do for Europe?"@en1
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