Madam President, Mr President-in-Office, Mr President of the Commission, ladies and gentlemen, you have presented an ambitious programme Mr President-in-Office. Our Group of the European People’s Party and can support this programme because – you did not state this explicitly but the overall tenor of your speech made it plain – you represent a Community-based Europe and not a Europe of intergovernmental cooperation. That is why we stand by your side, because you defend European law, democracy and Community procedure. (Applause) You are thus following in the footsteps of your Christian-Democratic predecessors, Wilfried Martens and Leo Tindemans, who also made an outstanding contribution to the work of the European Parliament. On 1 January 2002, we will have the single currency. The introduction of the euro is a peaceful revolution and we want to look forward to the advent of the single European currency. We have to be proactive in defending it. If the younger generation of today are able to pay in one currency throughout their lives, in the future, throughout Europe, in all the countries of the European Union and in some cases even further afield, then this is also an act of peace. Let us not talk down the single currency, but let us together be proactive in defending it. This also requires us – and here I have a request to make of you – to pursue a policy of stability, to fight inflation, to cut the public debt and, above all, to create the conditions to make investment in Europe worthwhile. That is why it is not enough for us to ease the tax burden on large companies; we need to ease the tax burden on small and medium-sized companies so that they are willing to invest and increase productivity and so that Europe receives a real signal in favour of economic growth. You said in the Council of Heads of State and Government that the European Union ought to be the most competitive continent in the world, but this statement is only truly meaningful if we encourage investment in Europe. I would ask you to name those Member States which do not comply with these principles because we need success across the board for Europe’s economy to be attractive. (Applause) You mentioned Laeken. The European Parliament will be represented in the convention. You are fighting – and we very much welcome this – for the involvement of the Commission and the national governments. It would give a boost to the spluttering French-German engine if both countries were to push for governments also being represented at high level in this convention, for example by ministers for Europe who are responsible for this portfolio in their national parliaments, render account to the national parliaments and thus also reach their respective public. We call on the national governments not only to send civil servants – whom we esteem highly – to this convention, but also politicians who have mandates from their governments. (Applause) My third point is transparency. We were particularly pleased to hear you say that when the Council of Ministers is actively legislating it should become a real second chamber. We firmly support this. But we can already take steps towards achieving this now, during your presidency, before Laeken. If, for example, we know that civil servants but not the ministers are sitting on a conciliation committee between Parliament and the Council, and there are internal instructions that the majority of the people represented there ought to be ministers, then we would ask you also to ensure, through the Council General Secretariat, that there are politicians present, ministers who are equal in rank to the European Parliament representatives and who will legislate at European level alongside them. (Applause) You mentioned the work of the High Representative. Our group has a high opinion of Mr Solana. We share your view, however, that, in the next reform, we need to ensure that the responsibilities of the High Representative are identical to those fulfilled by his counterpart in the Commission and that this position is based in the Commission. We must also ensure – we will be discussing this in the conference of presidents – that obviously the High Representative also comes here before the European Parliament at regular intervals to report on the European Union’s common foreign and security policy. (Applause) In conclusion, because I will keep to my allotted time, allow me to say the following. We acknowledge the fact that, precisely because of its historic responsibility for Africa, the Belgian presidency will be making this a particular priority. We support this. But at the same time we say that of course, where external relations are concerned, we need to focus our efforts – and this should not be to the detriment of Africa – on the developments in the Balkans and in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, so that we contribute to creating peace there. Given that ultimately it might be necessary for the Europeans to take joint action by deploying their security forces there, we are revealing weaknesses in our policy if the North Atlantic Alliance is telling us today that some Member States are not in any position at all to do this. We should not only talk about defence; we need to get beyond the rhetoric and give our armed forces the hardware they need to make a real contribution to maintaining peace in Europe. We wish you every success in your work, Mr President-in-Office. You are a founding member of the European Union. Belgium has already successfully completed eleven presidencies. We wish Belgium all the best for its twelfth presidency. We are at your side! (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE