Mr President, I start with the Commission's work programme for 2001. The case for the EU to do less and do it better has never been clearer or more pressing. The European Parliament should say so in the coming weeks as the committees look into this programme. With some 600 initiatives, of which almost 200 are legislative measures, there is a lot of work to be done on scrutiny and on setting our own priorities, which we look forward to doing. Turning now to the question of the post-Nice process, I would rather see it as our European future. We look back into the history of the European Union over the last generation and the continent of Europe over the last century. I should like to recall some words by Milan Kundera in his book The Book of Laughter and Forgetting where he says: 'People are always shouting that they want to create a better future. It is not true. The future is an apathetic void of no interest to anyone. The past is full of life, eager to irritate us, provoke and insult us, tempt us to destroy or repaint it. The only reason people want to be masters of the future is to change the past.' Well, we have changed the past and Europe is a different place from what it was in the post-war era. The four Nice overs are not small or casual affairs. Our view on the core issues is clear. We want to see a bigger role for national parliaments, on a systematic and constructive basis. We would welcome a clearer delineation of competences, as the Berlin Declaration by the European Democrat Union last month favoured, provided that it is not an excuse to strengthen the centre. Likewise, simplifying the Treaties would serve the public interest, but this must not be the pretext for introducing a fully-fledged European constitution, especially if the latter were the founding document of a federal state whose preamble was a legally-binding charter of rights. All of these issues need and deserve the widest possible public debate. But despite lip service to open consultation in the past, the Nice IGC process, like Amsterdam and Maastricht before it, was ultimately the preserve of national civil servants negotiating behind closed doors. The next consultation must be different. It needs to involve real and wide consultation throughout civil society, reflecting the open culture and open politics which we claim to favour. Mr Corbett quoted Chairman Mao. I would rather quote George Bush Senior: society is 'a thousand points of light', not 'a thousand flowers blooming'. Our debate on the EU's institutional future must draw on all of society, harnessing not just the resources of a closed Brussels policy world but the democratic potential of the Internet and – yes – of opinion polls. The EU must sustain a truly open society. The people must have their say, including those in the candidate countries. We must also reschedule the next IGC. In 2004 we will see a lame-duck Commission on its last legs and the European election cutting across the IGC. Better to schedule the conference for 2003, with the 2004 European Parliament elections allowing a popular verdict on some of the key choices being made by governments with enlargement under way. There are important questions. In Britain, as in other countries facing general elections in the next couple of years, one of the central issues will be: in whose hands is the future of Europe safe? With the Council of Ministers and the Commission firmly in hands, Europe today is going down the wrong track. In Britain the choice could not be clearer in our coming election: to guarantee a decentralised Europe that works, only the Conservatives offer an agenda which can get the post-Nice process right. To secure our European future, like the British, most people in Europe want to be in Europe but not run by Europe. (Laughter and applause) IN THE CHAIR: GERHARD SCHMIDVice-President

Political group: PPE-DE