Strasbourg, 16/01/2002 (Agence Europe) - As expected, Scottish Liberal, Graham Watson, who has been heading the Justice and Home Affairs committee, was elected President of the European Liberal, Democrat and Reform Party on Tuesday evening. He takes over from Irish MEP, Pat Cox, the new President of the European Parliament. Congratulating Pat Cox on the fact that the EPP-DE had kept its promise to support Mr Cox, Mr Watson explained that if co-operation between another party had allowed the cynical cronyism between Left and Right to be broken, the Liberals, "can and must remain open to further co-operation in areas where we can find common ground with others".
Let's be clear, he concluded, "there will be no blank cheque of Liberal Democrat support for any one party … we are working with others to promote our cause", which is a Liberal Democrat agenda for Europe.
Does the Group hope to grow larger? To this question, put during a press conference, Mr Watson answered saying they would like their Group to grow bigger, that they have already had contacts with parties in the Eastern European countries and that they expect they will enter the Group in good time. As far as eventual accession by Italian Radicals is concerned, Mr Watson announced that, following an approach by Marco Pannella and Emma Bonino yesterday, a dialogue had been initiated to determine whether "our ideals are compatible with theirs".
The Group's political priorities are clear: first of all enlargement but without forgetting what is happening in the rest of the world and above all the challenge of globalisation. At the internal level, it will be necessary to face the "crying need" for reform within the institutions.
Questioned on his Group's position when voting for the Forza Italia member Gargani for chairmanship of the legal committee, Graham Watson specified that they had voted against the vice-chairmanship of Mr Dell'Utri at the Committee on Justice and Home Affairs, as he had legal proceedings against him. This is not, however, the case for Mr Gargani so their votes would not be refused (even if other Groups probably vote against him). Regarding the situation that has come about in Italy since Renato Ruggiero's departure from the Foreign Ministry, Mr Watson, though stating that he was, "of course, concerned by an apparent tendency to be less pro-European in the Italian government", affirmed that a ministerial resignation does not necessarily mean a "U-turn" in any government's European policy.