Strasbourg, 25/10/2000 (Agence Europe) - President of the EU Council Pierre Moscovici, speaking at a press conference, clarified certain aspects of the position held by France on institutional reform. In particular:
- He confirmed that France is not in favour of extending EP/Council codecision to Common Agricultural Policy, even if the decisions in this field have already been taken by qualified majority. "We are not in favour of retroactive extension of codecision", he said.
- On the subject of qualified majority, he challenged the fact that France had a restrictive attitude. "I do not know where this reputation comes from. We have only two reservations" shared, moreover, by other countries, concerning: i) visas, asylum and immigration, because this would require changes to the French Constitution, for which there is no majority today (but France is willing to proceed in a pragmatic way after Nice, he said); ii) in commercial policy matters, concerning services and intellectual property.
- Regarding the number of votes for Germany in Council (taking the population size into account), he said: "As far as I know, we have not yet, at the IGC, given targeted goals or spoken of the possibility of "uncoupling Germany". He believes that it is Schröder and Fischer's word that counts. He says the only public declaration by Germany, as far as he knows, is that "this is not a problem".
- Regarding the problem of the "small countries", Mr Moscovici repeated that he does not like this definition in the slightest, and that there are no "large" or "small" countries but countries which "have left their mark on the history of Europe" (he cited the Portuguese and the Dutch). He added that he would be seeing Messrs Guterres, Gama and Seixas da Costa in Lisbon on 2 November and that he hopes Portugal, which was such a good Presidency, "will not make groundless accusations against me".
- As far as the role of the European Parliament in enhanced cooperation is concerned, Mr Moscovici considers he can accept consultation procedure on the triggering of the mechanism, but does not see how the Parliament as a whole (as the Gil-Robles Report proposes - see other article) could vote with decision-making powers on themes relating to enhanced cooperation, while half or a third of European representatives are from countries that do not take part in such cooperation. It is a question of legitimacy, said Mr Moscovici, in that it would be introducing a "sort of outside veto" on those not taking part.