Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to start at the end. Parliament has resolved to demand the creation of a legal framework under the codecision procedure and while respecting the principle of subsidiarity in connection with the implementation of the provisions on the internal market and competition and in relation to the compatibility of competition and the internal market with services of general interest. We have called upon the Commission to present, by April at the latest – and we now hear that it will take all the time it has been given – a follow-up document, in which it will show what it has learned from the consultations on the Green Paper and make it clear where it stands on the possibility of a legal framework and what it proposes to do next. That is our position where codecision, subsidiarity and adequate provision for services of general interest are concerned, and we will not accept anything to the contrary. Secondly, we are so overwhelmingly in favour of the codecision procedure not only because it increases our influence, but also because services of general interest are a quite crucial issue for the public in terms of European politics, and because we want to do everything we can to prevent the public thinking of liberalisation, competition and the internal market as being in conflict with services of general interest and security of provision, and, instead, to try to get the two to work together. We affirm that social cohesion is not excluded by competition, liberalisation and the internal market, but is, on the contrary, dependent on them and needs complementary measures. That is why the way we handle services of general interest is closely tied in with public confidence in our policies on competition and the internal market and in Europe’s competences – and that is why we, the public’s representatives in the citizens’ parliament, who have to deal with this permanent antithesis on a daily basis, want to be involved in deciding and determining what is to be done. My next point is that it is important that the principle of subsidiarity be maintained in view of the differences involved – differences in definition from one Member State to another, differences in geographical situations, differences in the problems of demographics and those affecting social and health policy. That is another reason why we are so strongly in favour of the European constitution, because the draft contained a formulation securing the principle of subsidiarity, one to which we can give our support. There is something else I would like to touch on. According to the constitution, the European Union’s goal is the social market economy and social cohesion. Treating services of general interest as not being the antithesis of competition and the internal market is what defines and gives life to the governing principle of the social market economy and creates social cohesion on that basis. I stress the need both for potential service providers to be treated impartially and for there to be security of provision, the latter of which must be ensured even if aid payments are needed to do so. The fact is that we need services of general interest only where the market is unable to guarantee these services on a universal basis, at affordable prices and to a high standard of quality. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE