Some reservations. Broadly positive, but some reservations nevertheless. This is how I would characterise my view of the very first debate on the State of the Union at the European Parliament, starting with a speech by the president of the Commission, followed by the beginnings of a debate. I am perplexed about the attempts to reproduce exactly what happens in the state of the union event in the United States. The USA is a federal state, the US president heads the executive and the Congress directly represents the US people, whereas the EU has a different structure - it does not even have a single president or a comparable system of management. There was something false and artificial about simply repeating the US ceremony, and the attempt to force all MEPs to attend was clumsy and ruined the atmosphere at the start.
Is the intergovernmental method becoming dominant? This concerns the format. My basic reservations are about how the debate took place. Some MEPs sounded like they were delivering speeches prepared ahead of time, sparkling and witty speeches at times, but not really in reaction or response to what José Manuel Barroso had just said about the current situation and the prospects facing the European project, or his plans for the future for that matter. The central comment made by most MEPs in their speeches was a criticism of Barroso's tendency to let management of the EU slide into the intergovernmental method to the detriment of the Community method, so that mere cooperation among member states becomes the key element in Europe.
This is a legitimate concern: the Community method is an innovation that determined the success of the European project and underlies all the longest-lasting and most spectacular achievements. Above all, the speakers lambasted the European Commission for its weakness and complacency, particularly the president of the Commission, about the desires and determination of national governments and the rising power of the principal member states in the European Council (see issue 10209). In the debate, Guy Verhofstadt and Daniel Cohn-Bendit were the most brilliant speakers, and they should be congratulated for their debating verve, that breathed real life into what was otherwise rather a dull event at times.
But over and above comments about individual MEPs' debating skills, is the Community method truly in danger? The first answer is provided by the European Parliament itself: It is by definition a “Community” institution, its powers have been boosted in a spectacular manner and it has shown that it has the wisdom to make full and proper use of them with enthusiasm and skill. The second aspect is that the active and permanent involvement of heads of state in European affairs should be seen, I believe, as a step forwards rather than a step backwards. The European Council these days is at last a proper “Community institution”. And a Commission vice-president chairs the Foreign Affairs Council to boot. It is crucial to remain vigilant and guide the Commission - this is a useful and positive attitude, but it is going too far to claim that the Community method is being suffocated, particularly as the federalist movement itself recently pointed out that 60% of Altiero Spinelli's projects have now been carried out or are in the process of being carried out (see my column in issue 10207). When Guy Verhofstadt pointed out that fewer than 60% of Europeans trust the EU institutions, he should remember that this 60% includes the European Parliament itself. The same opinion poll showed that 86% of Europeans favour European economic governance and it is this very economic governance that the EU is in the process of introducing, and which would not be possible without the new-style European Parliament.
Sidelined news. My aim here is obviously not to criticise the European Parliament for its warnings about the dangers to and the need for the Community method; I welcome any arguments in this direction. But it is regrettable that the speeches prepared in advance did not cover in any detail a number of Barroso's operational announcements like explicit backing for eurobonds, in other words, introducing EU borrowing (which Germany and some other member states are not happy about) to fund big projects of common interest; explicit backing for a tax on banking; and moving towards the creation of EU own resources (an EU tax) to fill the EU coffers because member states are not able to increase the amount they pay at the moment.
I will be returning to these issues (along with a number of other subjects) soon.
(F.R./transl.fl)