Brussels, 17/04/2002 (Agence Europe) - The European Parliament's Economic and Monetary Committee held, on 16 April, in the presence of European Commissioner Pedro Solbes, a meeting with the representatives of the relevant committees of national parliaments. The debate was mainly on implementation of the stability and convergence programmes, the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines, and the development of cooperation between the EP and Member State parliaments.
"Time has come to involve the National Parliaments in the process of preparation of the EU main instruments in the economic policy", said Christa Randzio-Plath, Chair of the EP Committee. She announced that the committee under her chairmanship plans to provide national Member State parliaments with an opportunity to discuss these instruments together, "which in the end will have an increasing influence in the preparation of the national budgets and in the EU budget".