Brussels, 03/06/2005 (Agence Europe) - At its extraordinary meeting on 2 June chaired by Jo Leinen, the EP constitutional committee began the task of learning lessons from the French and Dutch “no” votes on the European Constitution (see EUROPE 8960). In the morning, the Presidents of the political groups had discussed the situation with José Manuel Barroso at the Conference of Presidents, and Jens-Peter Bonde, the co-President of the Independence and Democracy group, commented to his colleagues: for half an hour President Barroso repeated what he had said at the press conference on Wednesday evening, whereas Ms Wallström, who spoke for only one minute, put forward a “plan D”, for “democracy”: “it is exactly what we need, and it is a shame that she is not President of the Commission”, exclaimed the Danish MEP. I have both good and bad memories of the Convention, he added, noting that in the working groups things worked, whereas in plenary “the Sun King” (Valéry Giscard d'Estaing) prevented all democracy. The Spanish socialist Carlos Carnero, deeply concerned, wondered: what point have we reached in some countries? If we asked them today if Spain and Portugal could join the Union, they would say no! Georgios Papasamkos (EPP-DE, Greece) attempted to be pragmatic, and said that it might be possible as a last resort to try to save certain parts of the Constitution (Charter of Rights, President of the Union, minister for foreign affairs, security and defence) by simple decision of the Member States - a sort of “Nice +”. This did not please some of his colleagues, such as Sylvia-Yvonne Kaufmann (German PDS and the only GUE/NGL MEP to have voted for the Constitution), who appealed for time to reflect and have dialogue with the citizens. She also reproached the “yes” campaigners for failing to be convincing enough with voters. Ignasi Guardans (ALDE, Spain) on the other hand thought that an attempt could be made to keep parts of the text using “imaginative solutions”, lamenting the fact that the Constitution did not have the stamina of the Spinelli treaty of 1984. On European disenchantment among young people, he exclaimed: some young people, when you talk to them about the Second World War, you would think you were talking about a Napoleonic invasion of Spain! In Poland, said Marek Czarnecki (non-attached), the politicians are more euro-sceptic than the citizens, and the government that resulted from the next elections will probably be “a lot more euro-sceptic” (his colleague from the Polish Senate said that the Polish referendum could be held on 9 October). In Luxembourg, we will have our referendum on 10 July, Luxembourg MP (and former MEP) Ben Fayot pointed out, noting: in our country, too, we have had a debate like that in France and the Netherlands, but national politicians are in fact entering the European debate for the first time “and we see that in Luxembourg too”. In his view, what is needed now is to “find the impetus” needed to send out positive signals in political and social terms.
The results of the referendums in France and the Netherlands “have given neither Chirac nor Balkenende a clear of comprehensible mandate to renegotiate the text”, said British Liberal Democrat Andrew Duff, who is looking at various options: ditching the Constitution altogether (although that would be “defeatist” and still would not resolve the problems), putting the Constitution into cold storage and keeping certain elements of it “à la carte” (although this would be “dubious from a legal perspective and controversial politically”), or deciding (at the European Council of 116 and 17 June, unanimously) to give a fresh mandate to a new Convention to “modernise the common policies of the Union”, part III. Meanwhile, no country should take a unilateral decision on the fate of the Constitution.