Brussels, 30/10/2002 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday the European Commission held a long debate over the second document it will be presenting to the European Convention chaired by Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, following on from its first document giving an overview of the Commission's vision of the future of Europe unveiled last spring (see Europe/Documents No. 2276/2277 dated 25 May 2002).
Commission spokesperson Jonathan Faull would only comment that it had been a very "rich" dialogue and that the document would be published mid-November. In response to a question, he said that debate in the College was currently following a list of questions drawn up by President Romano Prodi, itself based on discussions underway in other for and also various contributions to the Convention.
In response to reporters' questions at a press conference on Wednesday about this opposition to the idea of a long-standing President of the Council, the European Trade Commissioner, Pascal Lamy, said that this idea was "impractical", causing more problems than it would solve. He added that this was not a "scoop", but the position of the Commission (see Europe of 16 October, p.5).