Brussels, 12/05/2005 (Agence Europe) - The Bundestag, the lower chamber of the German parliament, approved the draft European Constitution by a massive majority on Thursday (569 votes in favour, 23 against and two abstentions). The draft text will now pass to the upper chamber, the Bundesrat, on 27 May- two days before the French referendum. During the debate, Chancellor Gerhard Schröder admitted that the text was not perfect but added that it is also historic. “We must guard against overuse of the word 'historic'. But the Constitution of the European Union, on which we are to take position today, deserves this noble description”, he said. He warned the twenty or so conservative members, mainly from the ranks of the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU) against “small-mindedness” and called on them to “take a step backwards” and measure its significance, sixty years after the Second World War ended.
In the view of the leader of the Socialist group at the EP, Martin Schulz, the German vote may also have a positive influence on the outcome of the referendum in France. “Germany is faithful to its pro-European tradition. This German 'yes' will encourage a French 'yes' at the end of the month”, he commented in Strasbourg. Speaking on behalf of the ALDE group at the EP, Silvana Koch-Mehrin welcomed the German vote, but regretted the fact that no referendum had been held in Germany. “A referendum would have been important to counteract the democratic deficit which subsists in the EU, but the German government did not trust its citizens”, she said. The German co-president of the Greens group at the EP, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, welcomed the “massive” approval of the Bundestag, but also criticised the fact that unlike France, Germany had had no genuine public debate on the Constitution. He also feels that a referendum in Germany would have been “the right answer to public opinion”.
On Wednesday evening, a few hours after the lower chamber of the Austrian parliament (see yesterday's EUROPE), the parliament of Slovakia also ratified the draft Constitution. “Both approvals on Wednesday, the first in a range of parliamentary ratifications in May (including Germany's, which is soon to be finalised), bring the Union considerably closer to the entry into force of the Constitution”, said the Vice-President of the Commission, Margot Wallström, in a press release.
In the meantime, the British Prime Minister Tony Blair indicated on Thursday that he would hold the planned referendum on the European Constitution “in any case”, regardless of the results of the referendum in France. “Of course, we do not know what will happen in the referendum in France, but we have said that we would hold a referendum on the European Constitution in any case, and this is the government's promise”, he told the press.