Brussels, 29/11/2001 (Agence Europe) - The Belgian Foreign Minister Louis Michel spoke about the letter he recently sent to Nicole Fontaine (in his capacity as President of the Council of Ministers) to the conference of presidents of the political groups at the European Parliament. In the letter, he praises the fruitful co-operation between the two institutions under the Belgian Presidency, highlighting that they were able to display the necessary flexibility to allow the Council to be represented for a day and a half at each European Parliament plenary session. Recognising that Presidencies that are more remote could find it difficult, he committed himself to recommend to the Presidencies of the Council in the future that they ensure they are more present. Moving away from discussing the letter, Mr Michel said that he had come across "huge freshness" at the European Parliament and massive political commitment, which did not always exist in national parliaments. Mr Michel said that the work carried out by Messrs Leinen and Mendes de Vigo to prepare the way for the Laeken Declaration and the upcoming Convention on institutional reform had been of great use to the General Affairs Council. He hoped that the Laeken Summit would open the door to a new EU parliamentarism, stressing the need for a hard-hitting debate to ensure that the European Union had the dynamism it required. In passing, he compared the European Parliament's "genuine debate" characterised by "loyal confrontation" with the gloomy procedures aimed at seeking consensus in the Permanent Representative Committee meetings. Luxembourg Socialist Jacques Poos and the Irish President of the Liberal group, Pat Cox, insisted that the European Union High Representative for CFSP, Javier Solana, should attend the European Parliament more often (he is also General Secretary of the Council). Mentioning Jacques Poos' recent report on the reform of the Council, Louis Michel called for the General Affairs Council to be maintained, opposing the idea of creating a Council of European Affairs Ministers. He also believed that it might be useful to start thinking about whether it was a good idea to keep six-monthly Presidencies.