Strasbourg, 13/11/2007 (Agence Europe) - Addressing the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Tuesday 13 November, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said he had come to “renew France's commitment to Europe and … to say that the French people's 'no' to the European constitution was not a refusal of Europe, it was rather expression of the feeling that more was demanded of Europe”. He said that European integration was “a hope for peace, brotherhood and progress … born out of the great tragedies of the 20th century, the blood and tears of millions of men, women and children, and their sufferings”.
“Europe has to be more than just a machine, an administrative machine, a legal machine, a machine for decreeing standards, regulations, directives, a machine for constructing constraints, rules, procedures. It cannot be separated from real life, from human feelings and passions. Europe can only be a reality, can only exist fully if it is something living for millions of men and women, if it speaks to their heart, if, for them, it is the hope of a life, a better world, if it is a great ideal, a great promise,” he went on, before stating that the rejection of the constitutional text “was only the most obvious sign of a deep crisis of mistrust towards Europe”. He added, “In this 'no', there was an anguish, there was a disappointment shared by millions of men and women across Europe who had started to despair about Europe, because they felt that it was no longer protecting them, that it had become indifferent to the problems of their lives, that it no longer spoke to them”.
After arguing for diversity, democracy and debate, all of which led him to a preference for qualified majority voting rather than unanimity (he said, for example, that “unanimity means horse trading. Unanimity is a system which allows some to impose their views on all. Unanimity is the certainty that nothing great or audacious will ever be decided, that no risks will ever be taken”), Sarkozy opined that “the simplified treaty was a political victory for Europe over itself”, but that it would be mistaken to believe that all the problems had been resolved. “Europe has chosen democracy, and in a democracy, we have to be able to debate everything: monetary policy, budget policy, trade policy, industrial policy, tax policy, every kind of policy,” he went on, before pointing out that he had proposed setting up a committee of the wise to reflect on the future and “draw the face and contours of the Europe of tomorrow”.
In this context, he hoped to be able to discuss European and national identities. “We mustn't be afraid of identities. Trying to retain one's identity is not a disease. It's when identities feel threatened, when they feel under attack that they get edgy and become dangerous,” he said, and he added that he felt that the peoples of Europe were going through a very deep identity crisis linked to globalisation and the commoditisation of the world. “Beginning Europe through the economy, through coal and steel, through trade was a stroke of genius from the founding fathers. But politics have fallen too far behind the economy, and culture even more so,” Sarkozy said. He also wants debate on: - genuine Community preferences; - the right to defend oneself against dumping; - European policy for change; - European industrial policy; - defending European farmers; - Europe's energy and food independence; - unfair competition from countries which place no environmental constraints on their producers; - a more moral financial capitalism. All these issues will be at the heart of the French presidency's priorities, he said, adding that “there are many other issues which we are going to have to discuss”: re-founding the common agricultural policy, eco-taxation, renewable energy and energy savings, defence (“How could Europe be independent, how could it have any political influence in the world, how could it be a factor for peace and balance, if it could not defend itself? How much is our commitment to Europe worth for each of us if we are incapable of discussing building European defence and renewing the Atlantic Alliance? How much is our commitment to Europe worth if each of us is unable to make the effort to defend ourselves and to defend everyone?” he wondered) and immigration which “has to be a common policy”. (O.J.)