Strasbourg, 14/01/2009 (Agence Europe) - The European Parliament has called on all the institutions of the Union to improve the citizens' access to documents, legislative or other, and has proposed to lead the way as regards the divulgation of information, transparency and openness within the Union. The report by Marco Cappato (ALDE, Italy) on public access to the documents of the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission was adopted in Strasbourg on Wednesday 14 January by 355 votes in favour, 195 against and 18 abstentions.
MEPs call on the Council of Ministers of the EU to hold all of its debates in public and on the Parliament to publish more information on its Members' activities. However, the plenary rejected a paragraph of the initial resolution calling on the political parties and groups of the Parliament to publish their meetings and documents on the internet.
Public access to the documents of the institutions has long been a subject close to the heart of the European Parliament, as demonstrated by the debate in plenary held the day before. Marco Cappato acknowledged that improvements have been possible due to regulations which have been adopted, largely under pressure from the EP, but added that this was not enough. He stressed a number of issues: opinion of the Court of Justice on the Maurizio Turco case. The Court backed the Italian Radical MEP, particularly concerning the obligation upon the Council to reveal how the representatives of the national delegations vote. Mr Cappato called for this opinion to be duly taken into account; - activities of the MEPs. The Parliament should lead by example in its openness, particularly in order to prevent incomplete information from leading to manipulations or populist initiatives aiming to discredit its work; - the “format” of the information to be made public. Mr Cappato called for assurances of “effective multilingualism” and for technologies to be used to facilitate access for people living with a disability. He was concerned by the fact that some groups were against this request.
Transparency “is a cherished subject”, said Vice-President of the European Commission Margot Wallström, adding that amongst other things it would do to reassure the rapporteur, the Commission would examine each and every request for information, following the parameters laid down in the Maurizio Turco case. A public register of documents of the Commission has been in existence since 2002, exchange of confidential information is possible and as far as she herself is concerned, Ms Wallström has even opened a register with her own correspondence up to the public. “The beauty of the Lisbon Treaty”, she went on, is that it will allow us to expand our opportunities in this area.
Your report was so good that there would have been no amendments in committee had you not amended it yourself to make it more radical, lamented Spanish Member Luis Herrero-Tejedor, on behalf of the EPP-ED (which will put its own amendments forward to the plenary). Mr Herrero particularly criticised the call to broadcast the meetings of the political groups, which he feels goes too far. UK Member Michael Cashman, for the Socialist Group, takes the same view, because what he feels is most important is to ensure the transparency of institutions “acting in their legislative capacity”, which particularly affects the Council. But we cannot ask the MEPs to open up their work too far: “It is not going to happen”. Michael Cashman concluded by addressing the rapporteur: “My heart is with you, but I have to follow my head”.
Whilst acknowledging that the requests concerning the political groups is too radical, German Member Alexander Alvaro pledged the support of his group, the ALDE, to the rapporteur. He also feels that it is primarily the Council which must make its work more transparent, and that improvements are vital in access to documents adopted in the framework of comitology. This is the only way to help the citizens to understand what is behind certain decisions, some of which may appear incomprehensible to them. It is precisely because we do not ask the citizens what they think (and because they are not helped to understand) that they are wary of the Union, said Polish MEP Ryszard Czarnecki, on behalf of the Union for the Europe of Nations Group. Nils Lundgren (Ind Dem) conceded that considerable progress has been made since 1993, and spoke of his pride in the fact that his country, Sweden, has the greatest tradition of transparency regarding public documents. Voicing her agreement with the rapporteur, Marian Harkin (ALDE, Ireland) pleaded for complete information regarding the Parliament, “otherwise we'll play into the hands of the 'blame Brussels debate'”.
In conclusion, the rapporteur took a small step backwards regarding broadcasting the meetings of the political groups, which should not be “an absolute or ideological obligation”, but a possibility on which interested parties should be able to take position. (L.G./transl.fl)