Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, I would have liked to say something in response to the speech by Mr de Gaulle. Now, unfortunately, he has left the Chamber after his speech, which has actually done more to raise the tone of the debate than his presence did. The Finnish President-in-Office of the Council has presented her ideas, and I would like to draw your attention, Madam President-in-Office of the Council, to one point which I consider essential in connection with the debate on the construction of the area of freedom, security and justice. Practically all the ideas you have presented, and everything my fellow Members have mentioned here in the debate – as far as the collaboration of the European Parliament, national parliaments, the Council and the Commission is concerned – is within a legal arena, which involves a great danger, the danger of alienating the legislature of the citizens, male and female, of Europe. What is this construction of the area of freedom, security and justice about? It is about security and fundamental rights, that is, on the one hand, the immediate rights of the individual and the protection of security and, on the other hand, the protection of these individual rights by state bodies or by state bodies as they should be established in Europe. These are two factors, which can affect every individual citizen of Europe, male or female, directly. There is thus a direct involvement in almost all subjects, whether it is asylum, immigration, migration, EUROPOL, whether it is the Charter of Fundamental Rights, or anything else, there is a direct involvement of each individual citizen, male or female, in this matter. But how will legislation be implemented? All the fine words of the Council do not alter the fact that in 90% of all acts which are passed, only the Council is actively involved. And how is it involved? Well, 15 executives come to Brussels, perform the function of a legislature in Brussels, and finally travel back home to their capital cities and then implement the laws enacted by the Council alone, which is to say, the executives in this way, as the practise has been until now, increasingly exclude the national parliaments – as can be seen so clearly in the case of EUROPOL and the materialisation of the EUROPOL Convention – and do not transfer the legislative function to the European Parliament. In this absence of referral to Parliament, the area of freedom, security and justice, which specifically represents the establishment of a structure of individual claims for protection and of possibilities of intervention in the individual sphere, cannot be established in a way that is really democratically justified. The European Parliament must therefore appeal to the Council and the Commission. Particularly in the areas which you have already – all too timidly, in my opinion – decided to make the European Parliament a legislative body with equal rights in the foreseeable future, if you wish to establish a democratic area of freedom, security and justice, in Tampere you must ensure that for the next Intergovernmental Conference we will be a legislative body with equal rights, otherwise you run the risk of alienating the European Union further from the citizens in general.

Political group: PSE