Strasbourg, 02/05/2001 (Agence Europe) - As pointed out earlier (see EUROPE of 1 May, p.5, and 27 April, p.6), students from twenty countries of Europe meeting in Strasbourg at the initiative of the "Jeunes européens français" have adopted a "European Charter for the Rights and Duties of Students". They discussed the future of Europe with MEP Alain Lamassoure, rapporteur for the EP's constitutional committee on the breakdown of powers within the EU.
Throughout Friday, some 150 young people answered a questionnaire on a certain number of major solutions prepared by Alain Lamassoure, during committee work attended by Mr Lamassoure. A speaker for and a speaker against expressed their views on each of these options.
Some 300 students took part in the plenary vote on Saturday and around 40 of them took the floor during the debate - mainly Italians, Germans, English, Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, Greeks, French students in foreign universities and also Slovenians, Czechs, Bulgarians and Serbs. The results of the vote on a certain number of key issues were:
- Referendum on a European Constitution. For 41% of those voting, votes after consultation should be added together throughout the Union, and an overall two-third majority should entail application of the Constitution in all countries, including those where the vote was minority. Twenty-eight percent of voters felt votes should be registered on a country by country basis, and the Constitution should only apply in countries where there is a majority. For only 17%, votes must be noted country by country, and the negative result in any one such country would block application in all the others (as was the case for the Treaty of Maastricht, after the Danish "no").
- European citizenship (which is currently added to national citizenship and does not replace it). To the question "do you consider that citizenship should be an exclusive attribute of Europe, with each citizens keeping his/her original nationality (example: European citizen of Italian nationality), 81% of voters replied in the affirmative and only 12% in the negative, which shows that these young persons do have the feeling they belong to a European community, without having the impression that they have given up their home land.
- Name for tomorrow's political Europe. 66% of voters were in favour of the current term "European Union" (and young people from Eastern Europe in particular), while only 10% were in favour of the "European Community" and only 10% for the "United States of Europe" and "European Federation".
- Official recognition by Europe, if the Member States so wish, of the regions (Länder, autonomies, etc.), that would settle issues directly with Europe. Fifty-eight percent of voters were against, 42% in favour (Ed.: two Spanish, one native of Madrid and one Catalan, who defended the regionalist position, conducted the debate on this question, that will play a role in the debate on power sharing).
- The frontiers of Europe. To the question of knowing whether "to conserve a certain homogeneity" political Europe must define its final geographical limits, 67% of voters answered "yes" (one Greek was particularly convincing in favour of this thesis), while 33% felt that the possibility of candidacies from Asian Minor, Caucasus, Middle East and North African countries should be left open.
- Social Europe. Fifty-three percent of voters felt that the "broad rules for labour must be fixed at national level", and 47% were in favour of harmonisation (this is the question that caused the most division).
- Competence regarding so-called "ethical" issues (in vitro fertilisation, abortion, euthanasia, genetic research, GMOs, etc.). For 63% of voters, such issues must be dealt with at the level of each States, but 37% felt that they should be dealt with at European level.
- Civil rights. In particular, 51% of voters felt that the EU should offer an "optional right" to a "European marriage", which could be chosen as a matter of preference over a national regime.
- Working languages. For 56% of the voters, the EU must limit these languages to half a dozen, while 30% felt the current system should be preserved (all the official national languages must be working languages), and 14% consider a single working language is needed.
According to Alain Lamassoure, these results "confirm what the Eurobarometer surveys have been telling us for some time. The Europe that the public opinion wants is no longer the diplomatic-bureaucratic machine that becomes increasingly complicated with each new Treaty. The expectations of citizens are not only stronger but also simpler. If it is correctly conducted, the big public debate decided in Nice may revolutionise the approach for European construction, making it start up again on bases that the people genuinely want."