LUXEMBOURG INTER-GOVERNMENTAL CONFERENCE

by Altiero Spinelli

SUMMARY: The European Parliament considers the progress of negotiations in the inter-governmental conference convened by the Milan Council meeting.

The risk that the "spirit" of the draft Treaty adopted by the Parliament on 14 February 1984 wouldrapidly be set aside soon materialized, with the assistance of the Luxembourg Government - which had an interest in concluding the negotiations, one way or another, during itshalf-year presidency - and of the Commission, which was anxious to conclude an agreement on the set of proposals put forward by the President, Mr Delors, at the Milan Council meeting.

The European Parliament repeats once again - in questions put to the Commission and the Council by Spinelli on behalf of the Committee on Institutional Affairs - the demands for real participation in the preparation and approval of the proposals for amendments to the Treaties. In vain, Spinelli had asked Parliament to support his requests by a threat to use all the institutional means at its disposal (including a "strike" by the Parliament itself) to force the Council and the Commission to accede to its demands. "Speeches in European Parliament, 1976-1986", Pier Virgilio Dastoli Editor. (EP, 23 October 1985)

Mr President, Madam President, formally speaking, the oral questions from the Committee on Institutional Affairs which I am presenting is adressed to the Commission. But it is also addressed to the Council, or, to be more precise, to the Intergovernmental Conference.

Mr Delors, I know that, at the Conference, you defended Parliament's request for full involvement in the drafting of the final text on the reform of the Community and political cooperation. I know you fully share Parliament's point of view that the reforms of the Community and political cooperation have to be covered by a single treaty and coordinated in the overall conception of the European Union.

On behalf of the Committee on Institutional Affairs, I should like to thank you. Mr Delors, and the Commission for adopting this attitude.

I shall have less to say about the content of your proposals both on political matters and powers and institutional affairs. Certainly your proposals are more advanced than those some governments have made, but, like the others, they are stuck in a groove and the real decision-making power stays in the hands of the Council - which is the main reason for growing paralysis in the Community.

The fact that the power is slightly hidden basically alters nothing. But I don't want to spend any more of the few moments I am allowed on the slender results the Conference has so far produced on reform. On only one point, I think, has the Conference clearly achieved something - the formal refusal to give Parliament the right so take part in the drafting of and final voting on the text.

Yesterday, in terms bordering on insult, the Conference told us, having planned information meetings with our President, that it understood our institution's concern and that, in the same spirit, the Conference would be submitting the results of its work to Parliament, i.e. that it would be reporting to it.

When we invited it to say whether, once it had reported on the final sext, it would be prepared to consider the report as the outcome of a first reading and cooperate on any changes with Parliament, the answer was clear - there would be no second reading. In the case of something as important as the reform of a political body that is supposed to be democratic and already has a directly-elecred Parliament, this means that this Parliament is cut out of the whole constituent procedure and looks rather like a vast, busy café where people express opinions with no political weight behind them.

Parliament is faithful to the spirit and the method of its draft and does not consider it to be intangible, something to take or leave. It is prepared to seek every avenue to real progress based on a broader consensus. What it is unwilling to accept is its draft being thrown out and Parliament itself being kept in limbo and insignificant as far as the consultation procedure is concerned.

The Committee on Institutional Affairs suggests, Honorable Members, that this debate end with a vote on a resolution it has adopted unanimously, so that Parliament's will is set down in writing. By this resolution, Parliament first, does not accept the Conference's answer, second, claims the right to genuine participation and, third, calls the governments's attention to the risks of the serious institutional crisis that would threaten the Community if the governments endorsed the Conference's decision. Everything points to the fact that the governments must go back on this decision and take our request seriously.

Madam President, in the first place I am sorry to note that in a parliamentary debate such as this one, whilst the Commission and the Council have 30 minutes speaking time, Members have only 30 seconds in which to express their opinions. Because of this time factor, therefore, I will limit what I have to say to a few precise observations.

The President of the Council, Mr Goebbels, told us that Article 236 of the EEC Treaty does not allow Parliament to be associated with the procedure for modifying the Treaties that is provided for by them. Now we in no way dispute the application of Article 236, which is to say that, in the end, it is the Ministers who should sign the agreement and send the text for ratification. What we are calling for from the Council is a political self-restriction commitment, as it were, not to sign any act until the agreement of Parliament has been obtained. This does not violate Article 236, and it can therefore be put into effect, if there is the political will to do so. Otherwise, we have to note that what will is lacking. Tertium non datur.

I would like to reply on only a few essential points to President Delors, who gave us a detailed explanation of the extent to which the Commission has taken Parliament into account.

On the question of monetary policy - he said - the Commission has been guided by Article 52 of the draft treaty of union. No, he has misread that article, because in it we say that, where monetary policies are concerned, decisions shall be taken by a qualified majority of the Council and of Parliament, whereas the states that the national monetary authorities will retain responsibility for all initiatives. It is precisely the national monetary authorities - that is to say, the governors of the central banks - who sabotaged the progression to the second stage of the 'Werner Plan' and the European Monetary System. Ought this responsi bility, then, to be in their hands? In this 'accepting Parliament's point of view'?

On the budget, President Delors said that he would have linked to propose something that, it seems, Parliament did not ask for. President Delors, did you by any chance read, in the draft treaty approved by Parliament, the part where we propose doing the budget very differently from the way in which it is done now? With the present system, every year, starting with the first budget approved by the elected Parliament, we face a crisis, because the way of calculating revenue is wrong, the way of distributing expenditure is wrong, and, finally, the procedure between the Council and Parliament is wrong. We are proposing something very different which, however, has been entirely ignored and, what is more, they now have the impudence to say that Parliament did not ask for it!

We have also proposed deadlines for decisions by Parliament and by the Council, and majority voting; but, whereas the deadlines for Parliament are laid down in the Treaty, the reservation has been made that those for the Council are to be decided in the Rules of Procedure of the Council itself. And what if the Council did not decide them, or changed them? Finally, this Community is paralysed because the Council has decided that, in all cases where majority voting was prescribed, it would not vote unless unanimity had been reached.

As far as the Commission is concerned - and this will be my last observation - well, it was not strong enough in defending the prerogatives that it needs in order to become a real executive centre. It is we that defended them for it! Why, for example, does the Commission maintain the unhealthy system of management committees and consultative committees - which Parliament regularly condemns every time a resolution is adopted in accordance with this practice, which makes it possible for the Council to take back certain important powers of management, and which should not be allowed - if the Commission really intends to be the nucleus of the European government.

There are many other observations that I have to omit. All of this shows, however, Mr Delors, that you are very persuasive in what you say, but not always very convincing.