Hello :), I am getting the next runtime error:
Issue
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "./perin/parse.py", line 119, in <module>
prediction = parse(sentences, model, dataset, args, language)
File "./perin/parse.py", line 91, in parse
output=parse_mid(input[i*1000:(i+1)*1000], model, dataset, args, language, **kwargs)
File "./perin/parse.py", line 62, in parse_mid
batches = dataset.load_sentences(input, args, "ucca", language)
File "/home/xhd160/perin-parsing/perin/data/shared_dataset.py", line 43, in load_sentences
for (f, l), dataset in self.child_datasets.items()
File "/home/xhd160/perin-parsing/perin/data/shared_dataset.py", line 43, in <listcomp>
for (f, l), dataset in self.child_datasets.items()
File "/home/xhd160/perin-parsing/perin/data/dataset.py", line 101, in load_sentences
"id": ("id", self.id_field),
File "/home/xhd160/perin-parsing/perin/data/parser/from_mrp/request_parser.py", line 22, in __init__
example["input"], example["lemmas"] = udpipe.lemmatize(example["sentence"])
File "/home/xhd160/perin-parsing/perin/utility/udpipe_wrapper.py", line 20, in lemmatize
response = requests.get(self.request.format(sentence)).json()
File "/home/xhd160/perin-parsing/perin_env/lib64/python3.6/site-packages/requests/models.py", line 900, in json
return complexjson.loads(self.text, **kwargs)
File "/usr/lib64/python3.6/json/__init__.py", line 354, in loads
return _default_decoder.decode(s)
File "/usr/lib64/python3.6/json/decoder.py", line 339, in decode
obj, end = self.raw_decode(s, idx=_w(s, 0).end())
File "/usr/lib64/python3.6/json/decoder.py", line 357, in raw_decode
raise JSONDecodeError("Expecting value", s, err.value) from None
json.decoder.JSONDecodeError: Expecting value: line 1 column 1 (char 0)
Code
The code that I am using that generates this error is the following, which is heavily based on the code that you provided on the google colab guide.
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
from data.batch import Batch
from config.params import Params
from data.shared_dataset import SharedDataset
from model.model import Model
import os.path
import torch
import json
from datetime import date
from tqdm import tqdm
import sys
input_file=sys.argv[1]
device = torch.device("cuda:0" if torch.cuda.is_available() else "cpu")
filename="/home/xhd160/perin-parsing/weights/english/base_ucca.h5"
output_path=input_file+".mrp"
lines=[]
with open(input_file,"r",encoding="utf-8") as fp:
try:
line = fp.readline()
lines.append(line[:-2])
cnt = 1
except:
line="jejejeje"
while line:
#print("Line {}: {}".format(cnt, line.strip()))
#try:
line = fp.readline()
cnt += 1
try:
asciidata=line.encode("ascii")
asciidata=asciidata.decode("ascii")
lines.append(asciidata[:-2])
except:
pass
#except:
# pass
lines=[line for line in lines if len(line)>1]
#print(lines[:10])
print(cnt)
print(len(lines))
print(output_path)
def load_checkpoint(filename, device):
state_dict = torch.load(filename, map_location=device)
args = Params().load_state_dict(state_dict["args"])
dataset = SharedDataset(args)
dataset.load_state_dict(args, state_dict["dataset"])
model = Model(dataset, args, initialize=False).to(device).eval()
model.load_state_dict(state_dict["model"])
return model, dataset, args
model, dataset, args = load_checkpoint(filename, device)
def parse_mid(input, model, dataset, args, language, **kwargs):
# preprocess
batches = dataset.load_sentences(input, args, "ucca", language)
output = batches.dataset.datasets[dataset.framework_to_id[("ucca", language)]].data
output = list(output.values())
for i, batch in enumerate(batches):
# parse and postprocess
with torch.no_grad():
prediction = model(Batch.to(batch, device), inference=True, **kwargs)[("ucca", language)][0]
for key, value in prediction.items():
output[i][key] = value
# clean the output
output[i]["input"] = output[i]["sentence"]
output[i] = {k: v for k, v in output[i].items() if k in {"id", "input", "nodes", "edges", "tops"}}
output[i]["framework"] = "ucca"
return output
def parse(input, model, dataset, args, language, **kwargs):
# preprocess
outputs=[]
#print(list(range(int(len(input)/100))))
for i in tqdm(range(int(len(input)/1000))):
print("trying to parse... "+str(i))
print(input[i*1000:(i+1)*1000])
output=parse_mid(input[i*1000:(i+1)*1000], model, dataset, args, language, **kwargs)
outputs=outputs+output
try:
output=parse_mid(input[(i+1)*1000:], model, dataset, args, language, **kwargs)
outputs=outputs+output
except:
pass
return outputs
# Save the parsed graph into json-like MRP format.
#
def save(output, path):
with open(path, "w+", encoding="utf8") as f:
for sentence in output:
json.dump(sentence, f, ensure_ascii=False)
f.write("\n")
sentences = lines
language = "eng" # available languages: {"eng", "zho"}
prediction = parse(sentences, model, dataset, args, language)
save(prediction, output_path)
Description of usage
I am trying to parse a document that contains 94,000 lines in English. I can parse the first 14k sentences without any problem. However after that point I get the error. I have also tried to parse the 94k sentences all at the same time, But I get an error sentence 763 not matching companion after anchor computation. in the same line: output = batches.dataset.datasets[dataset.framework_to_id[("ucca", language)]].data
This is one of the 1000 sentences that I pass to the function:
text=['The PES welcomes the full involvement of the European Parliament in this process', 'Thank you very much, Mrs Hardstaff', 'Mr von Habsburg, you have the floor for five minutes', 'Thank you very much, Mr President, for honouring me by saying that I was a member of your party', 'Our friendship is so strong that no party barriers come between us', 'Mr President, Mr Schwaiger has once again done some excellent work here and has addressed a great many problems', 'Perhaps I could look at what might be termed the political side, since this is, after all, one of the trickiest issues', 'By the way, this is the best proof we could have that Friday sittings are worth attending', 'Thinking back to all the nonsense that was talked on previous days, I must say that this subject is substantially more important than most of the others that have been discussed', 'Let us be clear about one point: the problem of Bosnia is perhaps the most difficult of all for us to deal with, as the crisis there could not be predicted', 'It was a sudden event which swept over the country, catching it unawares and directly exposing it to an attack from outside, from Serbia', 'There were further difficulties besides, as demonstrated by events in Brcko, where a problem was once again left unresolved', 'It is all very well to say that Brcko should be turned into a neutral zone', 'However, this is not what had been clearly promised, which was that the wishes of the population would be followed', 'In that case Brcko would obviously have joined the Federation of Bosnia rather than becoming neutral territory, although that would still have been better than handing it straight over to the Serbs, since there are scarcely any Serbs in Brcko', 'The majority of people there were Muslims and Croats, who certainly had no wish to live under Serbian rule', 'We should also consider that even the dismissal of Mr Poplasen from his post as President of Republika Srpska has yet again shown that the clean-up operation so vitally necessary if there is to be cooperation has not yet taken place in Republika Srpska', "The fact that Mr Karadzic's cronies continue in power to a certain extent poisons the whole situation", 'Therefore our task, first and foremost, is to help the present, legitimate government', 'This also means, of course, helping this legitimate government by setting a good example ourselves', 'It was most regrettable that a number of the worst cases of corruption in the Commission were related to this very area, and perhaps not enough has yet been done to clear up these cases', "We are a long way, after all, from putting the Commission's house in order and it is high time, given the situation, for this to be done", 'When all is said and done, it has to be acknowledged that many of the problems listed here, such as corruption, fraud and crime, actually stem from Republika Srpska and again and again spill over into the territory of the Federation', 'The latter, which I have frequently visited, enjoys quite a high degree of law and order', 'It is Republika Srpska which spreads disorder and which is still under totalitarian leadership, whereas the present government in Bosnia, as well as Muslims, Croats and even Serbs, genuinely believe in democracy', 'Yes, such a thing is possible', 'The problem is that we have never given them enough support', 'We could have worked very well with these Serbs, had we decided not to play games over and over again with Karadzic, Vladic and company, whatever their names are', 'This is an absolutely fundamental political problem', 'We shall have to call upon our Union to pursue a clear and unambivalent policy not just towards Republika Srpska within Bosnia, but also in Serbia itself', 'There is one point we must grasp, which is that as long as Milosevic is in power there will be no peace, just as there would never have been peace in Germany had Hitler been allowed to continue in power', 'They are after all broadly similar characters', 'We must finally resolve to give effective support to those forces existing in Serbia - we have seen them here ourselves on occasion', 'Only then will we have peace', 'Mr President, I will first pay tribute to the rapporteur for what is a good report', 'I do not do that as a matter of routine but only when it is justified, which is the case here', "I readily concur with Mr von Habsburg's description of the political situation in these countries - he knows it much better than I do", 'It is thus a question of creating democracy in a country which must now rebuild after war and terror have ravaged its people both physically and socially for so long', 'It is a question of creating political reforms for democracy, stability, a market economy and sustainable growth', 'It is a question of creating living conditions for the people who live in these areas, and who must both cope with their own everyday lives and deal with displaced persons and returning refugees', 'This demands proper control of how the money is spent', "Since, in the wake of the war, crime and disorder are also rife in the receiving countries, with fraud and corruption as part of everyday life, it is even more important that the money we commit is not subject to mismanagement on the donor's side", 'It is immensely important, from the point of view of trust towards us as politicians and parliamentarians, that matters now proceed according to acceptable rules', 'It is also important to cooperate with other lenders and funding agencies, such as the IMF and the European Investment Bank, and to involve the new institutions, the banking system, the central bank and so forth in Bosnia-Herzegovina', 'Reporting on and monitoring of activities is also absolutely crucial, so that we who are now appropriating funds can ascertain what happens and correct any errors', 'It is also a good idea to have a clear deadline for when reports and so on are to be presented', 'This is a good proposal', 'It can also be a good reform - everything depends on how it is set up, implemented and controlled', 'Mr President, even in the peaceful states of Central and Eastern Europe we see that economic and financial assistance have no effect without the rule of law and good governance', 'But this is particularly the case in a country destroyed by war, where the war may have ended but peace has not yet been achieved', 'There is crime and corruption everywhere, even in our own countries, but of course it is far worse in a country whose future is something not many people believe in and who therefore feel that they need to feather their own nests quickly before everything falls apart', 'Through statements like those made by Lord Owen, who said that Republika Srpska might be annexed to Serbia after all, we are supporting crime and mismanagement', 'This destroys confidence that the country of Bosnia-Herzegovina will continue to exist in the future, and that is dangerous because it could bring all our economic and financial efforts to nothing', 'I therefore hold the view that we need political stability, and this primarily involves the return of displaced people and refugees', 'If we had figures available we would see what the ratio was', 'Therefore I urgently request that such data be provided to help us assess the situation', 'As far as Brcko is concerned, neutrality is certainly better than annexing it to Serbia against the will of the people, but this neutrality can only be a transitional solution', 'It must be internationally guaranteed', 'It brings back fateful memories of the Baltic Corridor before the Second World War', 'We have to recognise that true peace is still a long way off for this country', 'Step by step we must try to bolster stability, but we should also realise that it will take years, maybe even decades, for normal conditions to be restored', 'Dayton was just a first step, and a thoroughly inadequate agreement at that, and we need to make considerable improvements to it here', "Mr President, the Commission congratulates the rapporteur, Mr Schwaiger, for the excellent report which Parliament is to vote on today, and thanks him for the support he has given to the Commission's proposal", 'The Commission is proposing macro-financial assistance for Bosnia-Herzegovina amounting to a total of EUR 60 million, consisting of a loan of up to EUR 30 m and a non-repayable component of up to EUR 30 m', "The granting of a non-repayable component is due to the country's level of development and will require a special decision from the budgetary authority", 'The operation is designed to be a one-off addition to the measures provided for under the PHARE And OBNOVA programmes', 'The specific objective of the operation proposed is to support efforts to bring about macro-economic stability and structural reform in Bosnia-Herzegovina, in the context of the programme agreed with the International Monetary Fund', 'Furthermore, at the last meeting of the Peace Implementation Council, held on 15-16 December in Madrid, ministers recognised that economic reforms, together with the strengthening of the common institutions, are fundamental priorities if the autonomous development of Bosnia-Herzegovina is to be safeguarded', 'Since the authorities in Bosnia-Herzegovina concluded a stand-by agreement with the IMF in May 1998, some progress has been made on fundamental economic reforms', 'A common currency, the convertible marka, has been adopted, a common state budget has been passed, and budgetary spending by both entities has been strictly kept within the constraints of the revenue available', 'On 1 January 1999, a single customs code, consistent with European Union rules, came into force, and progress has been made in harmonising the trade regimes of both entities', 'In addition, a World Bank programme to improve the management of public finances has been completed', 'Nonetheless, a hefty package of work still remains to be done', 'Gross domestic product per capita is estimated at well below pre-war levels. Overall unemployment is estimated at between 35 and 40 %', "Bosnia-Herzegovina's external financial situation is still shaky and not enough progress has been made in fundamental sectors such as privatisation, the reform of the banking and payments system and tax reform", "To conclude, Mr President, I should like to make a number of comments on the rapporteur's proposed amendments", 'The Commission supports Amendments Nos 1, 4 and 5', 'It also shares the concerns expressed in many of the amendments rejected, but at the same time it considers it important to safeguard the effective implementation of the assistance, the integrity of the aims pursued and the exceptional nature of this financial instrument', 'The implementation procedures have proved their worth in many similar operations managed by the Commission', 'Making the procedures unduly burdensome could jeopardise the efficacy of the operation', 'I would like to emphasise that the Commission intends to guarantee that the macro-financial assistance complements and is entirely consistent with other forms of Community assistance to Bosnia-Herzegovina', 'In particular, it intends to make full use of the advice of CAFAO, the Tax and Customs Assistance Office funded by the European Union, and will give priority to the implementation of measures recommended by the Office to combat fraud and corruption', 'I would also point out, whilst on this subject, that the macro-financial assistance provided in the form of a non-repayable grant and a loan will be paid into an account at the Central Bank, in order to increase its currency reserves and boost the balance of payments', 'It would be extremely difficult for funds to be embezzled or misused under these circumstances, given also that the use of official reserves is subject to constant supervision by the IMF', "The Commission notes Parliament's desire to be informed of the conditions laid down for granting this assistance in good time, and it will therefore forward a report on this as soon as possible, as is provided for in any case in the proposal", 'Nevertheless, in order to negotiate these conditions, which are an essential part of the operation, a certain degree of flexibility is needed and we must comply with any confidentiality requirements which the authorities in the country might impose regarding the substance and timetable of the reforms', 'The Commission is however prepared to answer any questions Parliament sees fit to ask during the operation and after it has been completed', "In the Commission's eyes it is vital to safeguard the objectives of an operation which is designed to support macro-economic stability and economic reforms, and to this end the implementation of the assistance needs to be well coordinated with the international financial institutions present in Bosnia-Herzegovina", 'Nevertheless, given the exceptional circumstances prevailing in this area, the Commission will remain in close contact with the Office of the High Representative in Bosnia-Herzegovina, as it already does anyway', 'Finally, as in other Community operations of a financial nature, the principles of sound and efficient management and rigorous budgetary control will of course be complied with', 'The Commission will support these principles before the Council, to make sure that they are properly applied in the final decision', "Mr President, Commissioner, I take it from what you have said that you will accept and incorporate all the proposals made by the Committee on Foreign Affairs, which are now the European Parliament's proposals", 'I just have one question regarding Amendment No 11 to Article 5(1)(new): does this also refer to informing the European Parliament before the second tranche of financial assistance is released', 'We feel it would make sense to draw up a short interim report and only to proceed further once you have informed us and we have been able to assure you of our further support', 'Mr President, as I have already said, the Commission supports Amendments Nos 1, 4 and 5, and I have also stressed that the Commission shares the concerns voiced in many of the amendments which it has rejected but the spirit of which it will bear in mind', 'As for the amendment Mr Schwaiger is referring to, that is No 11, the Commission does not feel it can accept it as such but intends to take account of it in a Commission statement to the Council of Ministers, which will of course be made in public', 'The reason why we are unwilling to accept the amendment as such is that the procedure proposed could present risks for the efficiency of the operation', 'That is all I can tell you about this matter for the moment', 'Thank you, Commissioner', 'The debate is closed', 'We shall now proceed to the vote', 'Parliament adopted the legislative resolutio', 'Parliament has now come to the end of its agenda', "The Minutes of today's sitting will be submitted to the House for its approval at the beginning of its next sitting", 'Ladies and gentlemen, you are aware of how much I value the fact that you all work with me to help things run smoothly and to carry out the good and fruitful work we do at these Friday morning sittings', 'In all seriousness, allow me to say how I feel and to express my gratitude, on behalf of the House, to all those who collaborate with us, since this has been a week of very intense work', 'This week we approved the amendments to be made to the Rules of Procedure by a vast majority', 'These amendments will not enter into force until all the Member States have approved the amendments made to the Treaties in Amsterdam', 'This means that, as we are coming to the end of this parliamentary term, we have almost completely prepared the Rules of Procedure of this House for its next term', 'I must say that I felt as if we were planting a tree, that we had stopped concentrating on our day-to-day work for a few moments so that we could also take a responsible look at the future', 'I hope - and I am sure, as you all are - that this tree will bear fruit and will shelter the Members who, as representatives of the people of Europe, will hold these seats in the next parliamentary term', 'Mr President, I just wanted to express my thanks to the French authorities for providing such exemplary cover for the demonstrations by the Kurds and the farmers and for giving full consideration to the security of this House', 'Many thanks to the French authorities', 'Mr President, I do not wish to thank the French authorities', 'I have had two groups of visitors who were subjected to a great deal of extremely annoying red tape', 'They were searched and made to pay fines', 'What my groups suffered this morning gives a very poor impression of Europe and I believe that the French authorities should respect the Schengen area and not be so overzealous', 'They really are working to rule', 'I must protest at the way in which groups of visitors who come here to Strasbourg are treated', 'Ladies and gentlemen, I would propose that we do not begin a debate on this question', 'Adjournment of the sessio', 'I declare the session of the European Parliament adjourned', 'The sitting was closed at 11.35 a.m', 'Resumption of the sessio', 'I declare resumed the session of the European Parliament adjourned on Friday, 12 March 1999', 'Approval of the Minute', 'The Minutes of the sitting of Friday, 12 March 1999 have been distributed', 'Are there any comments', 'Mr President, I would remind the House of the recent death of Yehudi Menuhin in Berlin on 12 March. Berlin was the scene of his rise to fame and it was to Berlin that he returned in 1945 to promote dialogue with the German people', 'He was the first Jewish person to do so', 'Yehudi Menuhin made a conscious decision to become a European', 'He supported those who fought for freedom in the Soviet Union and was the first to put forward in the Knesset the notion of an Israeli-Palestinian confederation. He conducted the peace concert in Sarajevo, and worked to ensure that culture and the development of culture featured in our Treaties', 'Mr President, I think we owe something to this self-professed European and British citizen', "I am not calling for a minute's silence simply because I believe Yehudi Menuhin himself would have wished our debates to continue as planned", 'I appreciate that today is a difficult day, but I do feel that the House should pay tribute to the memory of Yehudi Menuhin', 'Loud applaus', 'I think the applause indicates that the House supports your views, and they will be passed on as appropriate', 'Mr President, I refer to the Minutes of the last plenary session in Strasbourg', 'On Thursday I asked if we could have some information regarding the ongoing dispute about the interpreters and the payment of their wages', 'I understand that today we shall be discussing the wages of other personnel but I think we should be looking into the matter of the interpreters', 'Madam Fontaine promised that a note would be circulated explaining the current situation', 'Can you advise me if that note is now on its way', 'Thank you for reminding me of this issue, Mr Falconer', 'It was dealt with at the last meeting of the Bureau, and a note explaining the situation will be distributed to Members immediately', "The Bureau instructed the Secretary-General to act on Parliament's behalf and to bring all possible pressure to bear in the search for a solution to the problem, in the hope that it will be resolved as soon as possible", 'The Minutes were approve', 'Order of busines', 'The draft agenda as drawn up by the Conference of Presidents pursuant to Rule 95 of the Rules of Procedure has been distributed', 'Pursuant to Rule 97 of the Rules of Procedure, and in view of the events which took place last week, I propose the following amendments to the agenda for the sittings to be held today and tomorrow', 'I should inform the House that these changes have already been included in a corrigendum to the agenda, but they need to be formally adopted', 'The President read out the amendments to the agend', 'Mr President, you have just mentioned as an item on the agenda, incorporating the corrigendum that we have received, the statement by the Council following the resignation of the Commission', 'I do not think that this wording represents what actually happened last week, which was the resignation - albeit collective - of the members of the Commission', 'I think we should not give the public the wrong impression, particularly by leading it to believe that the motion of censure was adopted', 'There would indeed have been a collective resignation if the motion of censure which I and 69 of my colleagues tabled had been adopted, but this is not what happened', 'The agenda should therefore refer to the individual resignation of the members of the Commission, so as to prevent any misunderstanding among the public', "Mr Fabre-Aubrespy, I do not think there is any problem about saying in the agenda 'the resignation of all the members of the Commission'", 'It is not just one or two members who have resigned, but all of them', 'They announced this in one single document, which they all signed, so I think we can quite easily call this the resignation of all the members of the Commission', 'I cannot see any problem in leaving this item as it stands', "Mr President, tomorrow's agenda includes the De Giovanni report on scrutiny of the exercise of the Commission's powers", 'I would ask you to take a vote on whether this report can be removed from the agenda and referred back to the Institutional Affairs Committee', 'I have already spoken to the chairman, and we agree that the events of the last few days have made some additional work necessary', 'Mrs Theato, referral back to committee must be requested by a political group or by 29 Members', 'Does any group wish to take over this request', 'Mr President, you will recall that I asked at the last part-session for the groups and committees to be given another opportunity to peruse this rather insubstantial document and to see whether it represents the best solution', 'For that reason, my group is naturally in favour of referring the report back to committee', 'Mr President, I should like to speak in favour of this proposal because, under these new circumstances, it makes a good deal of sense to reopen the discussion of an agreement which had its merits but could of course be further improved with the new Commission', 'I can therefore say, on behalf of my group, that we are fully behind this idea', 'Parliament approved the request for referral back to committe', 'Mr President, I believe I speak for many other Members as I put the following question, which I hope the Commission can respond to', 'Following the resignation of all the members of the Commission, we have repeatedly read that the Commission will continue to deal with current business, but will not for instance take legislative decisions. This is perfectly understandable', 'The Commission is very well acquainted with everything involved in this debate and I should like to know if, despite its great significance, the Commission feels it counts as current business', 'I suggest that we do not debate this question now', 'It would seem best to ask the Council itself to reply when it takes the floor shortly', 'I can also make available to you a legal report prepared by Parliament covering this very contingency', 'Mr President, I have heard that the Commission and the Council Presidency will be here today and tomorrow', 'Mr President, we have a historic duty ..', 'The President cut the speaker of', 'Mr Ephremidis, this is not the time to hold a debate on Kosovo', 'There are other opportunities for that', 'It is not possible at the moment', 'The order of business was thus establishe', 'Statement by the Commissio', 'Mr Santer, you have the floor to make your statement', 'Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, we are currently going through one of the most difficult periods in the construction of Europe', 'These are very distressing times for me and for the other members of the Commission, both professionally and personally', 'We assisted the Committee of Independent Experts in its work, and we acted swiftly and without hesitation by resigning as soon as we knew its conclusions', 'It was a very painful decision, but it was necessary to preserve the institution of the Commission and the European Union as a whole', 'We must now ensure that the right lessons are learnt from this crisis, which must be the catalyst for deep-rooted and permanent reform in the European institutions', 'I hope that it will pave the way for a more transparent, responsible and democratic Europe, a Europe that applies the most rigorous ethical standards', 'This is what the people and the taxpayers of Europe expect of us', 'I have said that the Commission intends to leave office as soon as possible, and this naturally depends on when the Member States and Parliament decide to appoint and approve our successors', 'Until then we shall endeavour to provide a smooth transition', 'We will not take any new political initiatives, but we will deal with matters already in hand and any urgent business, and we will meet our institutional and legal obligations', 'I think it is in the interests of all the institutions that interinstitutional relations should not be affected', 'As for the report by the independent experts, I said at the outset that their work had our support and that we would act on their conclusions', 'We have kept our word, but I have to say that my colleagues and I were dismayed that such general and sweeping conclusions were drawn from the cases examined', "As many Members of this House have recognised, we have done more than any Commission before us to try to improve the Commission's working methods", 'When I took office four years ago, I started work straight away on modernising the administrative tradition at the Commission, and many of these reforms are now in place', 'I regret that the turbulence of the last few weeks has prevented greater attention from being focused on the reforms that we had already launched', 'Perhaps it is a law of history that crises occur when things are getting better, not when they are getting worse', 'We now need to move on and learn from past mistakes', "The experts' report talks at length about 'responsibility', an essential concept for any modern civil service which is responsible to those it serves", 'I am convinced that our reforms are starting to bring about change, and the next Commission needs to go even further', 'The concept is one that applies equally to all the institutions, and it also implies that the funding the Commission is allocated must be commensurate with the tasks it is given', 'No matter what the political pressure, the Commission must not take on any new tasks if it does not have the financial and human resources to carry them out', 'Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I wish my successor, who I hope will be appointed very quickly, every success in his difficult task, and I hope the European Parliament will give him its full support in the greater interest of the Union', 'Applaus', 'Thank you, Mr Santer', 'Through its applause, the House has shown how much it has appreciated the dignity with which you have acted throughout this period', 'Thank you', 'Mixed reaction', 'Council statement following the resignation of the Commissio', 'The next item is the Council statement following the resignation of the Commission, followed by a debate', 'Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, coming at a time when Europe faces difficult decisions concerning its future development, the resignation of the European Commission is a severe test of our resilience, but it is also perhaps a salutary shock', 'First of all, our thanks and recognition are due to the European Parliament', 'It has vigorously exercised its parliamentary right of scrutiny, which is only right and fitting', 'Without the dedicated work of many of your staff from all the political groups, the beneficial process that is now taking place would never have happened', 'The people of our Member States rightly expect the institutions of the European Union to use the revenue from their taxes in a responsible manner', 'But let me add in the clearest possible terms that the members of the Commission and their staff also merit our respect and thanks', 'Strategic decisions were taken during their tenure, such as the introduction of the euro and the start of the present enlargement process, decisions in which the Commission played a vital part', 'Not least among its achievements is Agenda 2000', 'The Commission must complete the work it has started on this initiative while it is still in office, which I hope will be done within a few days', 'Europe, the presidency and all of us here must be able to depend on a fully operational Commission in the coming days', 'The resignation of the Commission has highlighted the slow but steady development of a European public opinion and the strengthening of parliamentary democracy as a component of the Union', 'It is my belief that the principles of democracy have stood this test, and I welcome that from the bottom of my heart', 'Applaus', 'But the deplorable errors that have now been uncovered must not bring the entire institution into disrepute', 'Since the European Communities were founded more than 40 years ago, the Commission has been the key institution in the unceasing advance of European integration', 'It has to represent the common good of all 15 Member States in an impartial way and must also continue to be the driving force and initiator of new developments in the realm of European policy', 'If we wish to achieve the aims of the Union - and there is surely no doubt of that - we cannot afford to discredit an institution which is unparalleled in the history of our nation states', 'The European Union needs a strong Commission with authority to act, and needs it quickly', 'What is now required is the total radical reform that President Santer has already initiated', 'That too must be explicitly recognised', 'The MAP 2000 programme for better organisation and personnel management and the SEM 2000 programme, designed to improve financial control, are steps in the right direction', "The Commission's internal inspectorate, UCLAF, must become an independent control body", 'Where do we go from here', 'It is absolutely crucial that the European Union should demonstrate its effectiveness at this difficult juncture', 'As far as the special meeting of the European Council in Berlin is concerned, this means that the German Presidency must do everything it can to broker a political deal on the Agenda 2000 package', 'Success in Berlin is now more crucial than ever', 'Applaus', 'Let me add that this will be one of the most decisive weeks Europe has faced; not only do we have the Berlin meeting this week, but the crisis in Kosovo has regrettably come to a head', 'And we have had the resignation of the Commission', 'The accumulation of these three crises also shows how much we in Europe - our nations, the Commission, the European Council and Parliament - have to do at the present time; we have a huge burden of responsibility to shoulder if we are to overcome these crises together', 'The resignation of the Commission is neither a political nor a legal obstacle to the achievement of the success to which we all aspire', 'In accordance with the Treaty, the Commission will continue to perform its official duties until it is replaced by a new Commission', 'That arrangement is an essential means of ensuring a stable transition', 'I am confident that Berlin will be a success and that Agenda 2000 can be formally adopted before the end of the present legislative term', 'The way has been prepared by regular contacts between the European Parliament, the presidency and the Commission for progress briefings', "The European Council in Berlin will also have to deal, of course, with the consequences of the Commission's resignation", "The Council presidency has a great deal of sympathy with your President's proposal, which is supported by all political groups, that the procedure to nominate a candidate for the office of President of the European Commission should be initiated as soon as possible", 'According to that proposal, the European Parliament could approve the nomination of a new Commission President at its part-session in April, and then in May - which is a very ambitious target - it could approve the nomination of the new Commission', 'Applaus', 'The decisions that have to be taken are of enormous political importance', 'Let me assure you that it is the concern of the Council presidency to arrive at a speedy and constructive solution in close coordination with the European Parliament, the Member States of the European Union and the Commission which is in office', 'In Berlin, the Heads of State and Government will deal in detail with the question of the next steps to be taken and - if possible - may even move on to talk about specific individuals', 'The presidency will try to secure a political agreement among the Heads of State and Government on a candidate who could be nominated in time for your part-session in April', 'Besides requiring us to resolve the burning issues of the moment, the latest developments also give us cause to devote more thought to the future working methods and composition of the bodies of the Union in general, especially in the light of the forthcoming enlargement of the European Union', 'The protocol on the bodies of the Union which is annexed to the Treaty of Amsterdam, as well as the relevant conclusions of the European Council summits in Luxembourg, Cardiff and Vienna, have established the framework for our reflections', 'In preparation for the Cologne meeting of the European Council, the presidency will shortly present proposals as to how and when we should address the institutional questions which were not settled by the Treaty of Amsterdam and which have to be resolved before enlargement takes place', 'However, we may have to go even further than that', 'After all, it is absolutely essential to keep developing the democratic control that this House has exercised so efficiently', 'Public confidence in the institution must be fully restored, and that is precisely what the present crisis offers us the opportunity to do', 'The developments we have witnessed must never be repeated, otherwise the ideal of European unification would be seriously prejudiced', 'In adopting reforms, we must also consider the relative power of the various bodies and their role within the constitutional fabric of the Union', 'The Commission, with its exclusive power to initiate legislation, is an important instrument of European lawmaking, for which the Council together with this House are ultimately responsible', 'The Commission is also empowered by the Treaty and secondary legislation to perform executive functions', 'Greater care must be taken in the forthcoming reform process to ensure that the Commission is not constantly being entrusted with new tasks without being given the material, human and financial resources it requires in order to perform them', 'Applaus', 'I believe that if we are serious about European unification, the conclusion to be drawn from this crisis is that the new Commission must be given the funds it needs to guarantee the orderly management of our affairs', 'Applaus', 'Every future reform must focus on strengthening the democratic control and legitimation of the executive and legislative branches of the European tier of government', 'That is not only dictated by the constitutional traditions of all the Member States; it is also an absolute prerequisite for a viable Union', 'The present crisis also presents an opportunity to accelerate the reform process and, or so I hope, to make the reforms more incisive than was initially envisaged', 'We must, and indeed we can, seize that opportunity together for the sake of Europe', 'Applaus', "Mr President, the events of the past week have revealed, perhaps for the first time ever, an expression of 'pan-European public opinion'", 'It is important to state at the outset that the resignation of the Commission last Monday was not because the experts had found the twenty Commissioners guilty of personal fraud', 'In fact, the opposite was the case', 'They explicitly cleared the twenty of such accusations and allegations', 'As far as nepotism is concerned, it found only one Commissioner overwhelmingly guilty of favouritism with regard to work which was not within the European remit of the Commissioner', 'It criticised certainly two others for poor judgement in employing friends or relatives whilst acknowledging that the correct procedures for recruitment had been followed, and the work they had been engaged in had been of a European nature', 'We should also be clear that accusations which were being bandied about in this House in December and January against other Commissioners, were overwhelmingly and largely dismissed', 'It is important that this House is grown up enough to recognise that fact', 'However, the report was decisive in its conclusions regarding the loss of control of management by this European Commission; and it was right and proper that in the light of the conclusions the College took the decision to resign', 'My group now expects the independent group of experts to complete the second part of its report on the structure of the European Commission', 'I give notice that I am concerned about voices I hear arguing that the group of experts have now done their job and should stand down', 'I want to caution against those voices', 'I am suspicious of their motives and their backing', 'I believe that it could be very convenient for some if the independent group of experts were to be prevented from delving in the required detail into the workings of different Directorate-Generals', 'I therefore ask this House to make sure that the group is given the space to work and that the Secretary-General of the European Commission be asked to ensure that his officials at every level cooperate to the maximum to facilitate the report', "In my group's view the second report must contain a more widely-ranging review of the Commission's culture, practices and procedures", 'We want it to deal, amongst other issues, with how financial contracts are awarded and the procedures for contracts for interim or temporary staff to implement programmes, and to follow up allegations of fraud, mismanagement and nepotism involving staff', 'The group of experts is not in danger of removing or, in fact, countermanding in some way the powers of this House', 'To believe that, is to demonstrate a lack of confidence in our work', 'This report and the one which will follow, is about something quite different', 'It is a procedure and process that is not unknown in any of our countries, in order to look from time to time at the culture which permeates administrations and executives in each country', 'Now is time to look to the future', 'The European Commission is not in the habit of resigning', 'This is, after all, the first time in our forty-two year history that such a thing has happened', "It is quite unthinkable that the European Commission, having resigned, should quietly continue with 'business as usual' until the end of their mandate", 'We want not just the President of the Commission replaced, but a new Commission in place with speed, properly ratified by this Parliament, using the powers which will be given to us in the incoming Amsterdam Treaty', 'Given this background, the European Council should put forward an experienced, competent candidate committed to in-depth reform, with a clear vision as to where he or she is going, with a programme to get there and credentials which are beyond reproach', 'What is clear, is that the new President of the Commission must assume not just the political responsibility for the Commission, but the political leadership as well', 'This Parliament must also recognise the exceptional nature of this moment', 'We must not allow ourselves to engage in a constitutional or institutional debate about dry procedures and put up bureaucratic obstruction to change, and rapid change at that', 'The impact on European public opinion, if the European Council and the European Parliament were to come together to put in place a new Commission able to demonstrate its commitment to serving the people of Europe, would be instrumental in rejuvenating the vision of Europe', 'Colleagues, our responsibility now is to address three principles to the Council', 'Firstly, we want immediate action to show we have grasped the moment; and we hope that the Council will accept the opportunity which the European Parliament has provided through the work of the independent group of experts', 'The first principle is immediate action', 'Those are the principles at which we should be looking in our deliberations over the next two days', 'I am sure those are the principles which the people of the European Union want to see as a result of the crisis that currently engulfs us', 'If we do that, working together, I believe that we have an opportunity now to demonstrate a new sort of future, a new sort of Europe for the next millennium', 'Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, my comments are directed primarily at the President-in-Office of the Council', 'It is clear, as you say, that the European Parliament has payed a significant role in this crisis', 'The Committee of Wise Men recognised that fact as well', "Parliament has been taking vigorous action for over a year now on the basis of the Court of Auditors' reports", 'The same cannot be said of the Council', 'The report of the Wise Men says in as many words that the Council has been conspicuous by its silence in this whole affair', 'It is therefore useful to recap on the facts', "More than a year ago, in March 1998, Parliament's Committee on Budgetary Control voted, on the basis of Mr Elles's report, to defer granting a discharge in respect of the 1996 budget and asked the Commission to take the necessary measures towards the middle of September", 'In October 1998, the European Parliament adopted a resolution on the independence, role and statute of the anti-fraud office which was to succeed UCLAF', "The Commission was not yet able last December to comply with the European Parliament's demands", 'The PPE Group then brought forward a programme of action, to be implemented within twelve months, which would modernise the Commission by 1 January 2000', 'We called for an independent anti-fraud office, changes to the Staff Regulations and a code of conduct for Commissioners and senior officials, we called for the members of the Commission to be individually politically responsible, and we asked for Commissioners to make a declaration of their interests', 'The Socialist Group did not ask these vital questions', 'They voted in favour of the discharge', 'They subsequently tabled a motion of rejection which was in effect a vote of confidence', 'Sustained applause from the righ', 'In January 1999, we called on Mrs Cresson to accept her political responsibilities and resign', 'This too was rejected, and the Committee of Wise Men was then set up', 'I admit that a majority of my group did not vote in favour of that', 'But, and please take note, the Committee of Wise Men agreed with the findings of the Committee on Budgetary Control, added to them and vindicated the positions which we as the PPE Group had adopted', "Happily the Commissioners do not stand accused either of fraud or of lining their own pockets, but there is the fateful passage in the Wise Men's report, paragraph 9.9.2.", "The Commissioners' argument that they were not aware of problems which were well known and known even at the highest level in their departments is tantamount to an admission that the political executive is no longer in control of the administration it is supposed to head", 'Much of the responsibility for this loss of control lies primarily with the Commissioners individually and the Commission as a whole', 'Things that had been going on for years unbeknown to many people have now been brought to light by this report of the Committee of Wise Men', 'The present Commission is also having to take responsibility for the previous one', 'The report of the Wise Men details it all: in 1990, tourism; from 1992 onwards, the programmes for the Mediterranean region, humanitarian aid, training under the Leonardo da Vinci programmes and security', 'The Committee of the Wise Men says that the supervisory bodies are a mess, that the procedure takes too long and that staff policy has been a machine running out of control', 'I wish to pay tribute publicly here, ladies and gentlemen, to the personal integrity of the Commission President, Jacques Santer', 'I wish to acknowledge that the political achievements of this Commission are impressive: the single currency, employment, preparations for enlargement and the preparation of Agenda 2000', 'I wish to state that the reforms which Mr Santer has proposed, for instance the codes of conduct, were impressive reforms', "But the main thrust of the Wise Men's report has made praise impossible, which is why we must now express appreciation of the fact that you have accepted the political consequences of this Wise Men's report", 'Where do we go from here', 'For the benefit of Mrs Green, I would say that we are willing to let the Committee of Wise Men continue with their work until April, but on condition that we are able to assess that work at our last part-session in May', 'We shall be discussing this shortly in the Conference of Presidents', "Secondly, and here again I address myself to the President-in-Office of the Council, the Commission itself said in a statement of 17 March: 'we urge the Member States to appoint a new Commission without delay'", 'We are asking you to appoint the new Commission President in Berlin and to ensure that a new Commission is in any event in place before the European elections', 'Whichever Treaty you care to apply, Maastricht or Amsterdam, this Commission will remain in office until the beginning of January 2000', 'After that and, I hope, after the European elections, a fresh decision will have to be taken by the conference of the European Union governments', 'We want a start to be made on the reforms straight away', 'We have no illusions', 'These reforms will take years, but we have to start on them right away', 'It will take time, but the time has come when we have to rebuild confidence', 'We need a strong Commission', 'It is the guardian of the Treaties', 'We need a Commission which is accountable, accountable to Parliament', 'We need a Commission which more than ever, as the Treaty says, is independent, transparent and above all pursues the general interest of the Union', 'A great many people, even some in this House, keep saying that all this is good for their country', 'Who talks about the general interest, the bien commun of the European Union, this European Union which is now in deep crisis', 'This crisis can also be a challenge, a challenge not only for the new Commission, but for all of us', 'Let us try to make a true challenge out of this crisis and breathe new life into the European Union', 'Applause from the PPE Grou', 'Mr President, this has been a week without precedent with the resignation en masse of the European Commission', 'I believe that Mr Jacques Santer is a decent man', 'His Commission included a number of positive and strategic achievements', 'The launch of the Euro, the conclusion of the Amsterdam Treaty, the preparation of Agenda 2000, the opening up of enlargement negotiations', 'In part, the Santer Commission, ironically, has become a victim of its own willingness to examine fraud and corruption within the Commission', 'In part, it has been a victim of the chaotic, undermanaged and sometimes unmanaged growth of responsibilities during the Delors years', 'Ultimately, however, this Commission was the author of its own demise', "Over the past twelve months, in relation to the conduct of affairs with this House, Jacques Santer, unerringly if unwittingly, led his Commission to last week's crisis-in-the-making", 'At every critical point during that period, he has caused the Commission to offer to this House solutions that, had they been offered at the outset of each stage, might have worked', 'In the end, and always at that stage, they proved too little and too late', 'For his own political misjudgements, Jacques Santer has paid the ultimate political price and with him his colleagues have resigned', 'If this has been a difficult week for the European Commission, it has been a good week for European democracy', 'For the Parliament, this entire debate has represented a coming of age, a new maturity in understanding our democratic rights and our capacity and our duty to act in the public interest when we assert them', 'The system of governance in the European Union needs to be subject to more democratic control and public accountability', 'We believe we have crossed a new and irreversible threshold in that process', 'I might add that threshold is one we would never have crossed if we had followed the soft advice of a false sense of confidence commended by some to this House last December', 'For its part, the European Parliament will no longer be prepared to be presumed to be the junior partner in European decision-making', 'It is not that the Parliament should be first among equals, but from now on it must be an equal among equals', 'We find ourselves now in the process of creating a new, minimum and acceptable European norm for the management of public affairs and Community institutions which does not permit cultural exceptionalism', "Hiring one's dentist to do work of dubious, if any, European value is not acceptable", "Last week saw the downfall of a Commission in which some members had already made a start along the road to 'berthelisation ', and in future we will always be ready to condemn any Commission that again succumbs to the Berthelot syndrome", 'Berthelisme , of course, Mr President, is not confined to the corridors of power of the European Commission', 'The European Parliament must profit from this occasion to clean up its own act', 'We are vulnerable on the matter of top staff appointments', "We remain vulnerable on the question of Members' travel allowances until the system is radically overhauled", 'We are not yet as transparent as we could be or ought to be on our individual group and collective expenditures financed by public purse', 'We cannot demand in this institution, of other institutions, what we would not demand of ourselves', 'The creation of new European norms of behaviour in office must apply with no less force and conviction to the European Parliament than they will to any future European Commission', 'This failure by the Council to assume political responsibility should caution a certain modesty among those in some of our capital cities who seem prone to see the failings revealed in recent days as almost uniquely the creation of the European Commission', 'It is not an inspiring example of responsibility in action', 'Where should we go to from here, is now the essential question', 'The ELDR believes that the Santer-led caretaker Commission has lost its political and moral authority to act and so it must go immediately and be replaced by an interim Commission for the balance of its unexpired term', 'The appointment of the new millennium Commission, due to take place in January next, we believe, properly is a matter for the new Parliament with a new mandate, with new political balances and with new powers under Amsterdam', 'The current treaties already provide a way; and if the Council wishes to add to that the spirit of Amsterdam, then we can proceed to an interim Commission appointment through that means', 'But let me make it clear that the renomination of Mr Jacques Santer or Madame Edith Cresson or some others to the interim Commission would not be acceptable to the ELDR Group in the light of recent events', 'Such nominations would risk provoking even deeper crises', 'For our part, the Liberal group has consistently argued the merits of individual accountability within collegiality', 'To this end, we do not tar all the outgoing Commission with the same brush', 'We are prepared to judge each on his or her individual merit in the belief that not all were personally responsible for the ineptitude or incompetence of some', 'Let me say to the President-in-Office that I would like to take this opportunity on behalf of my Group to wish the Berlin Council well, and to say that we hope you will achieve the objectives of Agenda 2000 which are now more essential than ever', 'The Commission needs reform and Union needs a strong, independent, politically reformed Commission', 'Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the serious problems identified in some areas of management at the Commission and highlighted in the report by the Committee of Independent Experts have led to the collective resignation of the entire Commission in line with the spirit of the Treaties', 'It was a responsible and courageous decision', 'Although the Santer Commission can be proud of its undeniable success in preparing for the introduction of the single currency and guiding it through on schedule, its unprecedented resignation has created a serious institutional crisis involving far more than just the question marks over certain Commissioners or European civil servants', 'Most of the facts which were identified as having led to the completely unjustified failings highlighted in the report originated under the previous Commission administration, which has gone unpunished', 'Ladies and gentlemen, I would urge you to reread the chapter in the report on the Security Office, which was set up in 1990 and was directly answerable to the Commission President at the time', "Responsibility for this failure lies not just with the Commission, but also with Parliament and the Council, which not only agreed to the increase in the Commission's activities, but were often the ones that called for them to be increased in the first place", 'How can we get out of this institutional crisis', 'First and foremost, we need to speed up the process of reforming the institutions, a problem that was unfortunately overlooked when the Amsterdam Treaty was negotiated', 'These reforms are also a prerequisite for enlargement, and we need to establish a strict timetable and a target date, perhaps 1 January 2002', "Secondly, we must take the opportunity offered by the appointment of a new President and a new Commission to refocus the Commission's work on its main fields of responsibility as defined in the Treaties, while respecting the principle of subsidiarity", 'It would also be desirable to arrange for its management responsibilities to be transferred to the Member States and the partner states with which the Union has concluded association agreements, giving the Community bodies greater supervisory powers rather than direct administrative responsibilities', "Finally, the new Commission President must undertake a programme of action to achieve these aims, which he must present for Parliament's approval", 'Working at the head of a new team, he must clean up the Commission and put his house in order, cutting out any dead wood and concluding any disciplinary and criminal proceedings arising from the cases of fraud or corruption which have been uncovered', 'There are currently 28 directorates-general and offices, not counting the decentralised agencies', 'This is far too many, and the number needs to be considerably reduced, since it is nothing more than a feudal system', 'What we need to do now is not to create more new European civil service posts, but simply to reorganise the management procedures and make them more efficient', 'The root-and-branch reform recommended by the Committee of Experts and the Court of Auditors must be implemented immediately', 'Firstly, effective and independent financial controls should be introduced to apply the Financial Regulation strictly, using reliable audit mechanisms', "Secondly, an interinstitutional body - Parliament, the Commission and the Council - should be established to follow up the Court of Auditors' recommendations, which condemn the misuse of Community funding", 'Thirdly, a procedure for the award of contracts must be introduced which is totally transparent and is addressed to genuine professionals', 'To eliminate the temptation of corruption, which can occur all too often, the staff working in this field must be rotated on a regular basis, contrary to what has happened up to now', 'Fourthly, recruitment procedures must be reformed to prevent made-to-measure competitions which make nepotism and cronyism all too easy', 'All of these measures should be introduced as quickly as possible', "However, the Treaty of Amsterdam, which is scheduled to come into force on 1 May, changes Parliament's confirmation procedures, so it would be better not to pre-empt matters before then", 'It would also be politically preferable for it to be the Parliament elected in June that applied these new powers, so we might need to consider bringing forward the date of the constitutive sitting in July', "Finally, it is up to the Council and Parliament, the Union's two political institutions, to act in close cooperation to ensure that the European Union that emerges from this crisis has stronger structures and greater legitimacy for its activities", 'Applause from the UPE Grou', 'Mr President, it is abundantly clear that the European Union is currently experiencing the most serious institutional crisis of its history', 'The Commission itself is primarily responsible for the events which have taken place, but the governments of the Member States must bear a share of the blame as they have failed to allocate adequate resources to the Commission since the end of 1994', 'The Council should shoulder some responsibility for what happened too. It has been conspicuous by its absence throughout the present crisis', 'The Commission failed to meet the objective its President outlined when he assumed office and declared it was important to act less but to do so more effectively', 'If this crisis heralds the birth of truly European public opinion and helps to strengthen transparency, it will have served as a step in the right direction - a step towards making the European Union more democratic', 'The European Parliament has emerged from the crisis with a greater sense of authority as a body that represents all the people of Europe', 'Successive treaties have increased its legislative powers and on this occasion, Parliament has clearly asserted its role as a monitoring body. In so doing, however, it has acquired additional responsibility which it must exercise wisely in the future', 'The Committee of Independent Experts has identified some irregularities for which it holds certain Commissioners responsible. Indeed, politically, the Commission as a whole is deemed responsible', 'Although we recognise the discrepancy between the objectives and the resources allocated to achieve them, lack of political direction and mismanagement - which had already been brought into the open during the mad cow crisis - can never be justified', 'We appreciate the sense of responsibility displayed by the European Commission in resigning', 'Those of us who in the past have strongly criticised its handling of affairs must not now whip up public opinion against it. We must respect the individuals involved and the decisions they have taken', 'Nevertheless, we need to look to the future', 'Public opinion will not tolerate things carrying on in the same old way. If the people of Europe cannot trust the institutions that represent the European venture, they will no longer support it', 'The problem cannot be reduced to the search for some kind of superman or outstanding politician. People are certainly important, but so too are the methods, programme and objectives', "The Commission's role in the European institutional balance is crucial. It defends the common interest, and it must continue to fulfil it", 'We therefore need a competent and responsible Commission', 'The next Commission must improve its decision-making processes. It should be borne in mind that successful implementation of policies is not merely an administrative task, but very much a political one', 'In the eyes of the people, the Commission should embody the values of transparency and responsibility', 'It must also make available to Parliament all the information it requires to fulfil its monitoring role, and this is a prerequisite for mutual trust and effective cooperation', 'I should now like to address the President-in-Office of the Council directly', 'Our group has called for a new Commission to be appointed immediately', 'We therefore agree with Mr Fischer that the procedure and timetable for doing so should be decided at the Berlin European Council', 'We also call for early approval of a statute for Members of the European Parliament in the interests of transparency for all, not least for ourselves as Members of the European Parliament', 'Mr President-in-Office, we trust you will choose wisely', 'We shall not approve the nomination of a President without a programme or a Commission without clear objectives', 'Mr President, Mr President-in-Office of the Council, ladies and gentlemen, for over a year, Parliament has been calling for transparency and above all financial transparency', 'For over a year, Parliament has had to fight in order to extract from the Commission the information to which it is entitled under the Treaty', 'Our experience was that we got the information in dribs and drabs, too late, and very often it was incomplete', 'Looking back over this parliamentary term, it is clear that of all the European institutions it is the European Parliament which has done most to expose real and fundamental problems of mismanagement, fraud and nepotism', 'Parliament has been prepared to be confrontational over this, and rightly so', "If we had yielded last December to the Commission's threats or had gone along with the Socialist Group in approving the 1996 accounts, we would not be at the point we have reached today, a point it was absolutely essential that we should reach", 'The report of the independent experts fundamentally bears out what the Committee on Budgetary Control had uncovered in a number of reports', 'It bears out critical reports by the European Court of Auditors', 'And it vindicates Paul Van Buitenen, the official who was immediately suspended by the Commission and subjected to particularly fierce attacks', 'Applause from the Green Grou', "The essence of the problem raised in the report, however, is that there is no real - as opposed to mythical - ' collegiate' responsibility for the actions of the Commission members as a group", 'That focal problem must now be addressed', "So I find it unfortunate that the Commission's initial reactions last week were very much ones of defence and denial", 'Parliament has had similar experiences in recent years', 'We therefore find ourselves in a difficult situation, a time of crisis, but one from which the European institutions may emerge strengthened', 'I think I can see the first signs of that', 'We therefore think it is indeed vital for the Council to name a new Commission President as soon as possible, who can appear before Parliament ahead of the elections with a new team', 'The new President must be a strong European figure with vision and managerial qualities, so that reforms can be carried out in what remains of 1999', 'Lastly, we think it crucial that Mr Van Buitenen should be reinstated', 'He has played his proper part as a European official', 'Mr Cox is of course right in saying that Parliament too must continue cleaning up its own act', 'But we must focus here on our remit of exercising scrutiny over the institutions, and in that respect it is our duty to exercise full scrutiny over the executive, the Commission', 'Applause from the Green Grou', 'Mr President, my speech is mainly addressed to the President-in-Office of the Council, since he is now the only officer on board - indeed, almost the only officer left - after the resignation of the Commission and the departure of Jacques Santer, to whom I would like to pay tribute', 'Unfortunately, Joschka Fischer has already left, pressed for time, no doubt', 'I have to say that he is facing an uphill task, since he is going to have to make progress on Agenda 2000 by ensuring that the Berlin summit is a success, while at the same time seeing to the appointment of a new Commission', 'In addition to these conflicts of interest, there are also the very different feelings that we ourselves have about all this', 'Our group feels that it is very important that Parliament played its political role, sometimes rather hesitantly, admittedly, but it did so all the same, and it has emerged in a stronger position', 'It has been progress for democracy', 'At the same time, however, we need strong European institutions and in particular a strong Commission', 'So we need to find some sort of middle way between laxity, negligence and wastefulness on the one hand and systematic, destructive criticism on the other', 'Reform is needed for this, and all the institutions must make an effort here: the future Commission, of course, the future Parliament, naturally, and the Council of Ministers, because the Council of Ministers bears a great deal of the responsibility for the problems which have been identified', 'It was mainly the Council which gave the Commission so many more tasks but without the funding to be able to carry them out, and it has seriously neglected its supervisory responsibilities', 'Here again, as the President-in-Office has just said, we are going to have to get round the contradiction of wanting to do more without spending more', 'I wish the Presidency-in-Office the best of luck, since it will now have to shoulder the burden of getting the institutions out of the first political crisis to hit the European Union', 'Mr President, the Europe of Nations Group would like to thank the Wise Men, because they are not looking for scapegoats but are instead indicting the system', 'The problem is the culture of secrecy', 'The Wise Men are very precise in their conclusion: they have not found a single person who has shown the slightest sense of accountability', 'That is a severe judgement on all the members of the Commission', 'None of them should therefore be able to be reappointed now', 'We propose a temporary Commission composed of independent persons who are not themselves tainted', 'We would like to see an investigation of the charges against the current Commission and the apparatus of officials', 'There must be accountability, especially for those who have helped to withhold information', 'If it transpires that there are members of the Commission who are on record as having been strongly opposed to the adoption of the accounts and other regrettable decisions, then they could be considered for reappointment in January', 'But now, after first deciding to stand shoulder to shoulder and accept collective responsibility, the members of the Commission cannot turn round and say that they no longer share this collective responsibility which they recently took upon themselves', 'All of the Commission must go and not come back', 'The Wise Men should continue their work and extend it to the other institutions, including Parliament', 'There are now 1 000 committees, 10 000 laws - with even more amendments - and 100 000 projects', 'The temporary clean-up Commission should examine these committees, rules and projects to see what can be handed back to the Member States', 'A new Commission will be no more able to manage what the old one could not manage', "We are all indicted in the Wise Men's report, especially those who have voted in favour of the many new areas of responsibility", 'The solution is not new faces, but an extensive clean-up', 'Those who have engaged in fraud and covered up fraud will be held to account, and Mr Van Buitenen should return to his job and have his salary paid', 'The solution is a leaner form of cooperation with complete openness: a lean and open Europe', 'Madam President, if the Commissioners who so badly abused the confidence placed in them had resigned, we would not now be witnessing its members jockeying for position; but probably those Commissioners refrained from resigning at the suggestion of their own coteries', 'Indeed, it now seems clear that the Council of Ministers is seeking to discredit the entire Commission rather than to highlight the shortcomings of individuals', 'An institutional confrontation is taking place', 'The Council of Ministers wishes to tie the hands of the Commission; it wishes to strip Parliament of the role so painstakingly acquired over so many years', 'The result could be to recreate that democratic deficit which once again seems to suit the governments, in that they are working for their own partisan interests and against political union. We reiterate our protest about this', 'We all know that, without political union, economic union will remain wishful thinking, useful only to powerful lobbies but remote from - if not detrimental to - the needs of the European people', "An institutional war is therefore under way, to prevent the Commission and Parliament from cooperating constructively with one another and to place Europe's future in a strait-jacket designed by the Council of Ministers", 'But a political war is being waged too: the majority in the next Parliament, which ought to appoint the Commission President, might in fact be different from that in the Council, which represents 13 left-wing governments out of 15', 'Any other procedure would deal a blow to democracy and an insult to the European people', 'This is scandalous and undemocratic', 'Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, when several crises coincide, as is happening at the present time, a President of the Council really ought to possess the capacity to be in two places at the same time', 'Perhaps we should go ahead and adopt that now as one of our future reforms', 'Mr Fischer was unable to stay here with us, because he had to return to Bonn for a special meeting of the Federal Cabinet on the Kosovo crisis', 'I convey his apologies to you', 'The presidency sees the resolution of the Commission crisis in which we are now immersed as a joint responsibility of Parliament, the Council and the Member States', 'That is why I am pleased that a broad consensus has emerged in the course of this debate here in the House, as well as a great deal of concurrence between the opinions expressed here and the view of the Council', 'We want a quick and convincing solution - a solution that is likely to restore and strengthen public confidence in the European institutions', 'That is why we do not seek an interim arrangement; we want to have a clear idea of what awaits us in the coming years', 'We have to know now where the good ship Europe is headed and whose hand will be on the wheel', 'I agree with all of you who have said we need a Commission that will set about the task of internal reform of our work and our institution with great energy and vigour', 'The new Commission will have to meet very high standards', 'For that reason, we must take great care to ensure that the proposals which we in the Member States and the Council make are consistent with those standards', 'We want to take the first decisions in Berlin', 'What I believe we can certainly achieve is a procedural agreement, in other words on what we actually want to decide and when we intend to make those decisions', 'The presidency is thinking along the lines of following up the Berlin summit with an informal special summit at which the principal player would be selected', 'If more can be achieved in Berlin, so much the better', 'But that cannot be guaranteed, because we have to unite 15 Member States behind a common stance', 'You know how difficult that is', 'Let me emphasise how important it is that the rights of Parliament are properly respected throughout this decision-making process', 'This means that, whenever the new Commission President and the new Commission are nominated, the rights of Parliament under the Amsterdam Treaty must be upheld', 'Any other solution is unfair to Parliament and, for that matter, to the new President of the Commission, if we are thinking of making a decision now that will last until 2005', 'I see a very important message and a valuable token of your support in paragraph 9 of your joint resolution, which categorically states that our present problems must not serve as a excuse for deferring or avoiding important substantive decisions', "The priorities are quite clear: in three days' time, in Berlin on Thursday, we must bring Agenda 2000 to a conclusion, and we must ensure that the Commission crisis is quickly overcome", 'We also agree that the reform process in the European Union must include all the institutions', 'I have no wish to dismiss the possibility of the Council examining how it can organise its work more effectively and reflecting on the mistakes it might have made', 'Indeed, I believe it is necessary for us to do that', 'I should like to refer to another point that was discussed here', "One of the reforms we shall have to tackle is the Members' Statute", 'This has no direct bearing on the Commission, but it is another very important point under the general heading of institutional reforms', "Let me assure you that the presidency vigorously supports Parliament's aim of adopting the Statute before the end of the present legislative term", 'That is the only sensible way forward', 'I should like to appeal to you, ladies and gentlemen, to exert influence on the political decision-makers in your own countries so that we can obtain the broad support we require in the Council; unfortunately, we do not yet enjoy that support, but there are signs of progress', 'Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, it is pleasing to hear what we have just heard from the President-in-Office', 'However, I have to say, Mr Verheugen, that well-intentioned statements from the Council are part of the tradition of this House', 'You will understand the importance we attach to checking whether such pledges are actually honoured at some time in the future', 'But I believe that what you said between the lines, as it were, is correct, and I agree with you there: we should not really be talking in terms of a crisis in the European Union', 'In our own countries, when a government loses its majority and the confidence of the national parliament, that is a crisis for the government, but it is not a crisis of state', 'It is possible, of course, for government crises to develop into state crises, and the crisis between the institutions here - particularly within the Commission - could develop into a crisis of the European Union, but that is what we all intend to prevent', 'What we have heard today from the Council presidency sounds hopeful, in so far as it indicates that nothing in the institutional relationships between Parliament and the Commission and between Parliament and the Council will ever be the same again', 'Our relationships will be realigned', 'The two other institutions will appreciate our desire to shift the balance in favour of Parliament - not because we are out to sap the strength and usurp the powers of the other institutions, but because Parliament has grown in strength through its own activity', 'It has certainly not been easy', 'If I think back a few weeks and months - to January, for example - I remember that all the political groups, especially the main ones, were riven from top to bottom over one issue or another', 'The fact that this is no longer the case is due to the minimum consensus we reached in January, to the fact that Parliament itself appointed an impartial committee', 'I very much hope that, when the committee of five experts has presented its second report and we sit down to deal with it, such an intermediate step will no longer be necessary', 'Parliament must be able to do that under its own steam if it takes itself seriously', 'In particular, the next revision conference on the expansion of the Treaties, especially as regards the reform of the institutions, can no longer be a conventional intergovernmental conference', 'It will have to be a conference of the European institutions, and above all of Parliament and the Council', 'Madam President, this is certainly the first time that the European Union has been in this situation, and I hope it will be the last', 'Following the scathing report from the Committee of Wise Men, the resignation of the Commission was a necessity, but it could have come sooner', 'We could have had a different outcome if the Commission had taken advantage of the stay of execution we granted it when the budget discharge was deferred', 'Had that happened, we should not be in this situation today', 'Parliament could also have brought this whole matter - which has been described here as both a crisis and an opportunity - to a head two months earlier if it had made full use of its powers and passed a vote of no confidence', "Secondly, it emerges clearly from the Wise Men's report that the European Parliament and its Committee on Budgetary Control acted correctly", 'They exercised their powers of scrutiny', 'They brought the problems to light', 'And now the consequence of this is that we must initiate the action set out in the Elles report. We must look to the future, introducing and implementing appropriate reforms', 'A third point I take from the report is that the information Parliament was receiving from the Commission was inadequate; it was misleading and even fraudulent', 'This will have to be investigated', 'We have a right to information', 'We are a controlling body, and it is up to us to determine what we need to inspect and which oral and written information we require for that purpose', 'What do we do now', 'We must look forward, because for us in the European Parliament, elections are looming', 'But the public image of Europe is also on the line', 'So although we must get to the roots of the present problem, it clearly makes no sense to indulge in a surfeit of retrospection and soul-searching', 'The first thing we need is the rapid appointment of a new Commission', 'I believe it has to be an interim Commission, one which will take the action that needs to be taken, so that the year 2000 will see the installation of a competent, efficient and trusted Commission', 'Fourthly, the institutional gap between the administration and the Commissioners in terms of accountability must be closed as quickly as possible', 'This was one of the most damning criticisms of the Commission', 'It is important to look ahead and to create more democracy', "I believe the citizens of Europe understand that we in the European Parliament have begun to grow into our role as the taxpayers' watchdog and the people's advocate", 'That is the path we should continue to follow', 'Madam President, it is remarkable how much progress the European Community has made in a couple of months', 'What was unthinkable even a few months ago has now been achieved', 'Individual responsibility on the part of Commissioners will be a fact in the future and the President-in-Office should be complimented on having recognised this fact', 'Of course, we need to continue collective responsibility to the extent that the Commission, as a legislature, should not be under the pressure of individual governments', 'But we need individual accountability as many speakers have said', 'We are not only at the end of a road, we are at a new beginning', 'This requires real vision on the part of the Council, Parliament and the Commission', 'We need a new balance', 'I should like to ask the President-in-Office a question on this point', 'I listened carefully to him when he said that we did not need an interim Commission', 'I would draw his attention to the fact that paragraph 7 of our resolution speaks both of a Commission until the year 2000 and a new Commission', 'There is a certain ambiguity in the language of the Council', 'The President-in-Office says that we need to work with the Treaty of Amsterdam - I hope he speaks on behalf of all 15 Member States - which means that this Parliament will co-decide who is going to be the new President', 'I hope it is realised that there cannot simply be one candidate', 'Secondly, we want action quickly', 'All speakers have emphasised this point', 'Can we appoint a new Commission during the first week in May when this Parliament is ending its work', 'I hope that is the case', 'If it is not, we would impinge on the rights of the new Parliament which is sovereign and should give legitimacy to the Commission for the next five years', 'How can that be ensured', 'The President-in-Office needs to reply to that point', 'If we do not have a new Commission with the full assent of Parliament, it means that the new Commission will only work until September or maybe October this year', 'If that is the case, it will be a total contradiction of what we are saying, namely that we need a new Commission as quickly as possible, and that includes the point made by President Santer', 'This fundamental point should be emphasised because the ambiguity may lead to a misunderstanding', 'My final point is that we should not look at the form but the substance', 'The substance of change, namely putting into action the reform programme of Commissioner Santer, is essential', 'He was right to emphasise that many of these things have already started', 'It now comes down to the question of implementation and this needs some experienced Commissioners who are already there', 'We need a clean-up Commission until the end of this year and I hope the President-in-Office will read carefully the joint resolution by many groups which says that we must have action first and real reform later', 'This ambiguity needs clarification', 'Otherwise this debate will yield only half a result', 'Thank you, Mr Brinkhorst', 'I have no doubt that the Council has heard you and will be considering the question you have put to it', 'Madam President, Mr President-in-Office, I come from a country, Portugal, which has always believed in strong men', 'I personally have greater faith in strong institutions - strong institutions made up of strong men, of course', 'In fact, the problem of a weak country, like a weak Europe, is that it does not have strong institutions', "And the reason they are not strong is the current Zeitgeist : an extreme centre under which everyone is equal, the parties are all stealing each others' clothes, we all speak the same language and there is no ideology to speak of", 'An example of this was the motion of censure submitted by the Socialist Group, which was really all things to all men, and of course sowed confusion amongst Members', 'In the end a different motion emerged, similar to the one at the time of the BSE debate, and the result was inevitable', 'I am of course happy for one crisis to lead to another, as this is the only way strong men will come forward who can decide what Europe needs to do', 'Madam President, the Commission is paying the price for having such an untransparent and secretive style of management', 'Its resignation is a sign of crisis and indicates the failure of a Europe cut off from its citizens, turning its back on social needs and thumbing its nose at democracy', 'The Commission and the Council must learn their lesson from this by radically changing some of their practices', 'The Commission has long felt itself to be above any form of control and has refused to give Parliament the explanations it has demanded for the serious irregularities identified over a number of years', 'Its behaviour has often been obstinate and arrogant', 'It has been obstinate in following an ultra-liberal line which the public has increasingly rejected and in pursuing policies which Parliament and the Council have strongly contested, such as the liberalisation of postal services and trade relations with the USA', 'It has been arrogant in the way it has justified these policies and its undemocratic management style, though this is certainly not intended as a criticism of the work of the European civil servants, for whom we have the greatest respect', 'The irregularities which have been identified must never happen again, and this means that both the methods and the approach need to be changed', 'The Commission and the Council must stop seeing the fight against employment as a matter for discussion rather than action', 'The current emphasis on financial profitability and price stability must give way to policies promoting jobs and growth with binding targets, and the task of the ECB must be revised accordingly', 'Europe needs a breath of fresh air to bring it greater transparency and democracy', 'The relations between the European institutions and their respective responsibilities need to be clarified, and the Council must face up to its responsibilities, which has not always been the case', 'I myself think that having a stronger Commission would not solve any of our problems, quite the reverse', "What does need to be stronger is Parliament's monitoring of the Commission and its initiative-taking and evaluating role, in conjunction with the national parliaments", 'We also need to have more widespread democratic debates on European issues throughout the Union', 'It is high time that the public in the European Union became involved in the building of Europe, so that they can impose transparency, democracy, a spirit of responsibility, ethical standards - all in all, respect for themselves as citizens', 'Madam President, Mr President-in-Office, ladies and gentlemen, I believe that the Commission, rather than the whole of Europe, was embroiled in a profound crisis - of that there is no doubt - and that the crisis had already gone on too long', 'To that extent, the resignation of the Commission is only logical; it is a salutary shock that clears the way for the rebirth of credibility', 'The soul of Europe is embodied in its people, who rely on their representatives to continue the work of unification democratically and efficiently to the best of their knowledge and judgement - in a word, responsibly', 'The Commission that has just resigned, however, had lost the confidence of Parliament and the people', 'That is why the first and foremost requirement is the earliest possible appointment of a new Commission, headed by a strong European personality, a Commission that is determined to serve until the year 2004', "The ball is in the Council's court, and it must come up quickly with the necessary proposals", 'I believe this has to take place before the elections to demonstrate to the public that we can get things done', 'At the same time, I am well aware that, before the elections, parliamentary assent is still governed by the Maastricht rules, but it is the spirit of Amsterdam that will determine the political implications of our assent', 'That is why the new President of the Commission must be granted the right to demand the resignation of individual Commissioners who transgress', 'But the need for reform applies to every institution', 'The constitutional fabric of Europe, the balance between the institutions, the need for greater powers of legal redress for the citizens of the Union - all of these things have been on the agenda since at least the last intergovernmental conference in Amsterdam', 'For that reason, Mr Verheugen, I should like to propose that, when you give the starting signal for the next intergovernmental conference under your presidency, you involve the European Parliament from the outset and ensure that we are not left standing outside the gates again when the chips are down', 'This crisis is simply crying out for the establishment of a new relationship between the Council and Parliament', 'Grasp that opportunity now', 'As you know, Madam President, I am a relatively new Member of the House', 'When I first came here, I was full of admiration for the Members of the European Parliament and especially the Committee on Budgetary Control, which had carried out very rigorous and very clear analyses of what was going wrong in Parliament', 'I admired Parliament and was proud to be a part of it, because it pushed for real action to be taken', 'We could, then, have reached a decision back in the autumn', 'At the end of the year, we were ready and already felt that a motion of censure was appropriate', 'We tabled one, and in the end almost half the Members of Parliament voted in favour of it at the start of this year', 'Some Members, a majority, thought that we ought to secure more evidence from a committee of independent experts, and we got it', 'The Commission then accepted its responsibilities, and we think that is a good thing', 'Throughout all this, however, the Council has remained deaf and blind', "Even after the Commission resigned, it barely troubled to investigate in a number of Member States what the charges were and what the new Commission's remit ought to be", 'There is, after all, no question of the present Commission, which has just resigned, staying put', 'That is not an option', 'In any event, we want the incoming Commission to discharge its responsibilities fully and clean out these Augean stables', 'It will need to be a strong Commission', 'It is of no great interest to me whether it is a short-term or a long-term Commission', 'What matters is that the rights of the European Parliament, in other words the rights of our citizens, should be fully respected, now under the Maastricht Treaty and soon under the Amsterdam Treaty, and not before time', 'The Committee has a good deal more to say, a point which it has made itself, and the statements we hear each day from its members would seem to indicate that they should be given further work to do here', 'This is why the Committee should be asked to produce a second report, and why it should also give its opinion on how Parliament operates, so that everything is out in the open and no one can say that Parliament too is afraid to confront its own style of management', 'We need a temporary committee to implement the remedial measures in the same way that the Committee of Experts diagnosed the problems', "Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, our colleague Jean-Claude Martinez was the first person to condemn the Commission's mismanagement, serious errors and lies during the BSE scandal in 1990", 'We have had to wait another nine years before the Commission was forced to resign', 'The report by the Committee of Independent Experts of 15 March, which among other things criticised the Commission for having lost control of the administration it is supposed to manage, was absolutely scathing', 'Claude Perry, the director of Perry-Lux, admitted that out of 5 000 or 6 000 external experts working for the Commission, several hundred were in fictitious jobs and were receiving a daily allowance of BFR 2 860, as was the case with Euro-Conseil', 'The Maastricht and Amsterdam Treaties meant that the Commission took on a great deal more work and Community programmes, all of which threatened to make individuals and businesses alike feel increasingly smothered', 'In this Orwellian world with its supranational and totalitarian administration, it became difficult, according to the Committee of Experts, to find anyone with even the slightest sense of responsibility', 'This lack of responsibility enabled the Commissioners, and in particular the Socialist Mrs Cresson, to turn a blind eye or to cover up fraud, malpractice and nepotism', "Instead of the heavy punishment that Europe's taxpayers, having seen their money squandered, are entitled to expect, the Commission is proposing to pay the 20 Commissioners in question 60 % of their salary for three years, in other words a minimum of 60 000 francs per month", 'The voters and taxpayers are going to love that idea', 'This is why there is a justified upsurge of feeling against these anonymous officials who are trying to deprive us of our sovereignty, identity and freedom', 'When they vote for my list on 13 June in France, the public will be showing their political maturity and spirit of national resistance', 'Madam President, I think it is important to keep things in perspective as we confront the present situation', 'The European Commission has resigned following the publication of a report prepared by a Committee of Independent Experts, which both Parliament and the Commission had agreed in advance to abide by', 'Clearly, the Committee of Independent Experts is not endowed with divine right but it has drawn up a report and we must respond to its findings', 'The report did not find individual Commissioners guilty of fraud or misconduct. It arrived instead at the overall conclusion that the Commission had not been operating satisfactorily, that certain procedures were not appropriate and that the Commission was collectively responsible for this state of affairs', 'Accepting collective responsibility, the Commission then resigned', 'What should not happen is what we witnessed in the House this afternoon, when certain party leaders or leaders of political groups took advantage of the situation to attack other political groups for purely electoral reasons', 'There is no excuse for such behaviour', 'To use a biblical reference, I would invite whoever is free from sin to cast the first stone', 'As things stand at the moment, the fact is that it has been shown that the Commission was not operating satisfactorily, and as a result we need to appoint a new Commission', 'A constitutional procedure must now be embarked upon', 'The Treaties do provide for replacement of the Commission, yet Parliament finds itself in a difficult position as its term of office expires in June of this year', 'Consequently, unless Council nominations are received very soon, this Parliament will be unable to approve the new Commission', 'The task would have to be delegated to the new incoming Parliament', "A word of warning is also called for, however. Our eagerness to monitor and scrutinise the Community's public accounts must not be allowed to hinder the Community's executive role", 'I believe there is a need for caution in following up the findings of the Committee of Independent Experts', 'My feeling is that rather than concentrating on further monitoring, we should come up with fresh ideas to ensure that the new Commission is properly structured', 'Nevertheless, I think we should pay tribute to the former Commission, which is still in place in a caretaker capacity. We should pay tribute to the dignity of its members and to the dignified manner in which the Commission decided to resign, choosing not to continue in office', 'Returning to the present crisis, my view is, firstly, that a solution should be found as quickly as possible', 'Secondly, it is vital for the Berlin European Council to set out clearly the timetable and procedure to be followed', 'We should trust the wise judgment of the Berlin European Council', 'Finally, I feel that we should make all efforts to implement the Treaty of Amsterdam as it seeks to enhance the status of the European Commission', 'Above all, we need to maintain a sense of perspective', 'These must also be our priorities', 'Consequently, every effort should be made to remain focused on what must still be the main objective of the Berlin European Council', 'Madam President, firstly may I say that I find it a pity that no one is left from the Commission', 'But anyway, after the report it was inevitable that the Commission should resign', 'To my mind, it would have been far better for democratic and political developments in Europe if Parliament had had the courage to send the Commission packing in January', 'Parliament has really hidden behind the skirts of the Wise Men and has thus let a political opportunity slip', 'As regards the report of the Wise Men, I think the conclusion that the Commission has totally failed in its duty is a little too black and white', 'This Commission prepared admirably for the euro and for Agenda 2000', 'Nor do I like the ease with which accusations are made against individuals and their families, without any proof', 'For the man in the street, it is not easy to distinguish between improprieties in Parliament and in the Commission', 'That is why clear measures are needed to show people, amongst other things, how the official machinery actually works, for the very specific reason that people have a strong aversion to officials, technocrats and their bureaucracy', 'So independent financial scrutiny is required', 'I agree with Mr Brinkhorst that action is needed', 'But we must not get carried away by the emotions of the crisis and take hasty decisions which we may later regret', 'We need a strategic approach to secure democracy in Europe', 'I think that only a new Parliament can install a new Commission', 'Which means that, one way or another, we have now lost nearly three months', "But the issue we are discussing today is the replacement of the Commissioners, and in that context we consider it essential that the Commission should be replaced as speedily as possible so as to reflect all the political and legal consequences of the Commission's resignation", 'Nevertheless, this speed should not prevent very serious reflection about the immediate and fundamental causes underlying this resignation', 'It is not enough for us just to change individuals - it is also crucial to change both working methods and policies', "As we see it, these two aspects are the main reason for the Commission's resignation", 'On the one hand, there is a lack of transparency, with absurdly secretive management of instruments and public funds, which inevitably leads to irregularities, favouritism and fraud', 'But there is also the obvious insularity and remoteness of the Commission from the public because of the misguided policies that have been implemented and in particular because of their impact on our societies', 'Because of all this it has become necessary not only to change people, but also to find appropriate ways of changing our working methods and policies', 'It will be essential in future to provide for greater and more effective control of the Commission, in view of the concentration of both legislative and executive powers in that body', 'Indeed, the issue that we now have to tackle is not whether or not to strengthen the Commission, but above all how to keep a check on its activities', 'The next European Council will have to take all these aspects into consideration, and if possible, it will have to draw up a precise and realistic timetable in conjunction with Parliament so that these issues can be analysed and a new Commission appointed without delay', 'Lastly, I would like to mention that financial matters also feature on the agenda of the Berlin Council', 'It is particularly important for the Council to achieve a satisfactory outcome on both the Commission issue and Agenda 2000 - for it to be a success, the Council cannot accept just any solutions to these two important problems', 'This should be its chief concern', 'Madam President, those of us who have been taking steps here during the past two months to ensure that the Commission should be held accountable have won our case', 'We have demonstrated that we, the elected representatives, will not put up with nepotism and fraud under any circumstances, and so the Commission has at last been forced to resign', 'Obviously a new Commission should be appointed as quickly as possible so that work can be resumed', "The guiding principle behind this undertaking must be to 'clean up' inside the Commission and create the conditions for a climate of openness and transparency - more valuable assets than ink and paper", 'That is really the whole point of the exercise', 'The Committee of Independent Experts, in its report, highlights one aspect in particular: that the Commission has lost control over a large number of projects', 'Consequently, this raises the question of whether the Commission has its fingers in too many pies', 'Is it not time to apply the subsidiarity principle and delegate competence in some fields to the Member States, for example in terms of cofinancing under the common agricultural policy', 'The EU cannot deal with everything and the Commission is unable to fulfil the tasks allotted to it by the Member States, as the last Commission clearly demonstrated', 'I am not in favour of a strong Commission, but of a strong parliamentary system of government, which means that the European Parliament should have more influence and the Commission less', 'Madam President, the report by the special committee has shown beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is an urgent need for reform within the Commission', 'It has brought to light a culture of complacency towards irregular practices at the very highest level', 'This evidence might not have come to light had this Parliament not demanded urgent action in January', 'The report and its aftermath gives us an historic opportunity to force a seismic change in the relationship between the Commission and Parliament, to tackle the democratic deficit in the European Union and overhaul the system of scrutiny', 'The Commission not only needs to be brought under democratic accountability, I want to see MEPs given tough new powers to tackle mismanagement, fraud and nepotism', 'Now that they have resigned there should be no question of some Commissioners returning to their posts', 'Having volunteered to accept their collective responsibility and resign it would be incomprehensible to the citizens of Europe if the same individuals were to be reinstated', "Madam President, I will start by reminding the Council presidency of what paragraph 9.4.12 of the Committee of Wise Men's report says", "I quote: 'the external auditor (the Court of Auditors) produced reports which were clear and to the point (for example in 1992 and 1996 on tourism and in 1996 on MED and ECHO)", "However, only one of the two arms of the budgetary authority (Parliament) gave them proper consideration'", 'Manifestly, then, the second arm of the budgetary authority - the Council - has been seriously deficient here', "The fact that on the very day the Wise Men's report came out, the ECOFIN Council made its recommendation that Parliament should grant a discharge for 1997 is, in my view, an illustration of how slack the Council is", 'The Council will be taking great risks if it seeks to reappoint Commissioners who are currently in office', "We think that the new caretaker Commission should not include any members of the present Commission, because the committee's work is not yet complete", 'All manner of new frauds and other irregularities may yet come to light', 'Waiting for the committee to complete its findings will take too long', 'The new caretaker Commission must take office as soon as possible', 'The Council has a heavy responsibility here', 'If it does not do its stuff quickly, the present Commission will still be around until the end of 1999', 'That is totally unacceptable', 'We have to have a caretaker Commission before the elections', 'People have to be able to see that something is being done', 'Mrs Cresson must go right away', 'On this too the Commission has to face up to its responsibilities, and Article 159 of the Treaty states that the Council or the Commission President can apply to the Court of Justice to have members of the Commission compulsorily retired', 'Mr Santer too has forfeited too much credibility as Commission President in recent months and weeks to be able to remain in office', 'His job must be taken over immediately by the Vice-President', 'We agree with what Mr Cox said on that', 'Mr Van Buitenen must be reinstated without delay', "Madam President, whatever impression the Commission's dramatic resignation may have given, what is at issue is not the weakness of the men and women involved, but the lack of principle of the institution itself", 'Corruption is not the result of human weakness, it lies at the very heart of the European system, since what the Commission - and the European Parliament, incidentally - mainly does is to transform the wishes of numerous lobbies and interest groups into legislation', 'The Commission acts as a screen for the irresponsibility of the Council and the national governments', 'Madam President, I should like to begin by taking up something said by Mr Martens, whom I normally hold in high esteem but whose reconstruction of this crisis I find unconvincing', 'I would remind him that the last crisis revolved around fraud', 'That, in our view, was an insufficiently sound point of departure', "The Wise Men's report has proved us right: the current crisis revolves around structural political problems", 'This is what lies behind the crisis in the Commission, and we pro-Europeans believe that this could be a healthy crisis, bringing about a real reform of that institution', 'We are a thousand miles away from last time, when the issue was fraud', 'Having said that, I believe it is in the interest of Parliament and of all pro-Europeans - I repeat the term - to go into the elections with a new Commission, thereby proving that the European institutions are capable of moving rapidly', 'It is therefore very important, now that the Parliament and Commission have acted, that the Council should do likewise', 'This means that the Heads of State need to reach an agreement before the April part-session of Parliament', 'That schedule suits us perfectly', 'We hope it can be adhered to, because it should minimise criticism of the European institutions and enable the Commission to confront the burning political issues rapidly', 'This must happen, and all it takes is political will', 'Finally, the presidency must have various tasks: not only to administer the complex structure of the EU Commission, but also to reform it from within', 'Parliament has made a number of suggestions in this respect', 'My own suggestion to the Council is that it should explore in more depth the proposals on reform of the Commission which have been put forward by Parliament in various forums', 'But the other institutions, the Council and Parliament, are likewise in need of reform', 'I therefore believe that the initial step being taken - reforming the Commission and progressing towards a more democratic European Union - is the start of an important journey for the Union', "Madam President, there is a well-known saying: 'Victory has a thousand fathers, defeat is an orphan'", 'Everyone is in favour of reform today, outbidding each other', 'This was not the case a few months ago', 'Most Socialists - apart from some notable exceptions - voted against allegations of mismanagement and the need for urgent reform of the Commission in December', 'Let us not try to re-write history', 'May history note that the real vanguard for change - as Mr Martens noted earlier - were those who voted in favour of refusing to sign the 1996 discharge', 'Without this act of defiance nothing would have happened and we would have gone on as before', "Secondly, the Wise Men's Report has totally vindicated the findings of the Committee on Budgetary Control", 'Mr Van Buitenen should now be reinstated', 'Thirdly, when we come to appoint a new Commission, whatever its make-up may be, its real emphasis must be the reform of the Commission, continuing the programme for codes of conduct, the reform of the statutes and the screening report of the resources which are needed', 'Lastly, what we are moving to is a discussion between Parliament and the Council', 'The real question is: Do we want to have the rule of the few or the rule of the many', 'We are rather a pattern to others than imitators ourselves', 'Its administration favours the many instead of the few. This is why it is called a democracy.', 'Madam President, I am sure we are all aware that the present situation is without precedent in the history of the Union', 'Times such as these are a test of the strength of the European Union, and reveal whether it is built on solid foundations or whether it is merely a house of cards', 'It is therefore incumbent on us to face this crisis squarely', 'Replacing the present Commission with another is not the only problem', 'What is on the table at the moment should certainly result in reform of the working methods of a single institution. Crucially however, it should also result in reform of all the institutions themselves, that is, Parliament, the Commission and the Council', 'If it does not, we shall have squandered a unique opportunity', 'Parliament has every right to be proud of how it has assumed its responsibility and demonstrated its maturity', 'The resignation of the Commission ought to serve as a catalyst for the much-needed institutional reform', 'Madam President, first of all, I am disappointed that this House is meeting today and tomorrow, rather than on the scheduled dates', 'Our conduct here smacks of submission to the requirements of the national governments', 'Although this might happen in national parliaments, it certainly would not in regional parliaments, where the sense of democracy is more pronounced', 'Such conduct gives us scant hope that Parliament really will exercise its rightful monitoring role', 'I think that we shall have to be far more vigilant in future and, most importantly, I take exception to the fact that some invoke the Amsterdam Treaty, seeking, that is, to use a new instrument, prematurely, to handle an old affair, belatedly', "I should never wish to take away any of the new Parliament's powers, and I therefore urge that the new Parliament should be the one to decide on the Commission, so as not to have to live with a Commission on which it has had no say", "Madam President, 'Shakespeare in Love' has won and Europe is ecstatic", "You know the quotation from Hamlet: 'though this is madness, yet there is method in it' - it would be a good idea for Mr Santer to study William Shakespeare", 'But this is not madness, it is a revolution for the present and for the future', 'It is a revolution for the present because of the three things that brought it about', 'First there was the event itself: 16 March 1999 will go down in history as the day on which the Commission resigned', 'Then there was the de facto censure imposed by the European Parliament', 'In 1979 we had universal suffrage, and in 1999 we faced up to our responsibility', 'The construction of democracy is complete', "Then there was the reason that caused the revolution: Parliament's criticism of the general lack of supervision", 'There have been no cases of individual fraud, it should be pointed out - we know this for a fact and anyone who says otherwise is lying', 'In Brussels, at the eye of the storm, people understood what was going on, but the public was alarmed by the lies they read in the Murdoch press and heard from the French populists, nationalists from all parties and populists in all the media', 'We have even heard some of them here today', 'People are being taken in just to win readers or votes and to bring Europe down', 'It is up to us to tell them the truth', 'It is a revolution for the present because of the lesson it has taught us, because Europe has given a lesson in democracy', 'In the Member States there are a good many parliaments and governments that should take inspiration from us to break free and to show greater responsibility', 'But it is also a lesson for the future and a revolution, in three ways, for tomorrow', 'First of all, everyone wants a strong Commission and everyone agrees that we need it, even the UPE Group', 'Jacques Chirac and Lionel Jospin agree on it, which is good', 'Yesterday Major blocked everything, but today Blair together with France, Germany and the other Member States are all calling for Prodi', 'What a turn-about for the United Kingdom and for Europe', 'The second aspect of the revolution for the future is new controls, new regulations, and new cultures', 'We have created the single currency, now we need to create common ethical standards for government in Europe', 'The third and final aspect involves elections plus responsibility', 'Our citizens elect us and we approve the Commission and monitor it', 'European democracy has just been born, and it is up to us to ensure that it grows up properly', 'Madam President, Mr President-in-Office, ladies and gentlemen, for months we have been issuing warnings to the Commission at meetings and in personal conversations', 'They were not heeded, and the result is plain to see', 'We must recognise that times have changed, because the European Union now has the democratic strength to put its own house in order', 'I believe it is good news for the people of Europe that the system is democratic enough to ensure that an administrative apparatus cannot commit misdemeanours with impunity', 'But we must also recognise that this problem is not really about particular individuals', 'There were many honourable people in the last Commission, and we must not forget that', 'We must realise that this is primarily a structural problem; it is about a lack of efficiency within the European institutions', 'Unless we change the structures within the Commission, we shall be back in this same situation two years from now, because replacing the individuals at the top is only part of the answer', 'For that reason, we need to adopt certain procedures in connection with the installation of the new Commission', 'On the one hand, it is surely the case that the European public needs to see the right signals from us before the elections', 'On the other hand, there must be enough time to ensure that the procedure for appointing the Commission affords the opportunity for a radical reorganisation of that institution, and a good new President will use that procedure and the support of Parliament to gain the upper hand over the apparatus', 'Since the new Commission will want to remain in office for the next five years, we must also take account of our successors in Parliament, who will have to cohabit with and accept the Commission and who will also have to legitimise that same Commission in the future', 'I believe a compromise will take clear shape on this basis, and I think the Council presidency will be able to offer us a time-frame within which both requirements can be satisfied, so that we can manage the reorganisation and thereby create a better Europe', "Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, it was the Wise Men's report that achieved what this Parliament could not achieve, namely to hold the Commission to account", 'That is a shameful admission', "All those who did not support the motion of censure have been made to think again by the Wise Men's report", 'It is a fact that the 140 pages of the report contain nothing new', 'The resignation of the Commission was no heroic deed, but rather a case of the Commissioners jumping before they were pushed', 'The loss of confidence in this Commission is so calamitous that the only option for us is the quickest possible replacement of the entire team, but let me stress that merely replacing individuals is not enough', 'Real reforms are needed, not just tinkering', 'On the one hand the structures of the Commission must be thoroughly reviewed, and on the other hand there is an urgent need for an extension of the powers of scrutiny vested in this House', 'I want to focus my contribution this afternoon on that report', 'However, by way of comment, I would just like to say that the reforms we are looking for in the European Union institutions, as the previous speaker said, do not end with looking at the 20 Commissioners', 'That has been the focus for the last few months but what we need to do now is to find the causes of the widespread problems in the Commission and, more importantly, we want the Committee of Experts to recommend remedies', 'Therefore, I hope that the Committee of Experts when it meets during the course of the next few weeks and when it conducts its detailed investigations into the operation of the Commission, will look in some detail at the structural problems within the Commission', 'This is not just a question of political leadership', 'It is associated with the processes for personnel and financial management', 'It is about the whole management structure of the Commission; the relationship between the staff and their directors; the relationship between the directors and the directors-general; the relationship between the directors-general and the Commissioners and their cabinets', 'So it is extremely important that this second report, which we must now focus upon, looks at the necessary root-and-branch reform', "I hope that at the end of tomorrow's vote, the resolution we pass will set out very clearly that we want the Committee of Experts to bring forward those recommendations", 'The challenge is how we act upon that', 'If we do not do that the whole exercise of the last few months will have been a waste of time and we will have made no further progress in what is after all a major event for the public in the European Union', 'Mr President, may I say to Mr Donnelly that the President-in-Office told us we had made use of our democratic right and had done our duty', 'Let me address a brief remark to the Commission and its President', "That is why this is so disastrous, as is the fact that all the financial transactions which were undertaken by the Commission and which are now being criticised in the Wise Men's report were given the go-ahead by Financial Control", "Lastly, may I say just a few words on the Wise Men's report and on our activity here in Parliament", 'Does it surprise anyone that the Socialist Group gagged those of its members who were against giving a discharge in respect of the 1996 budget', 'Against this background, it was probably only to be expected that the head of the group would table a motion of censure with the intention of withdrawing it again', 'If the Socialist Group had behaved as consistently back in January as they now claim to have done, we might have had a new Commission up and running by now and could have spared ourselves the crisis we have all been discussing today', "Mr President, I am afraid all this is what Shakespeare calls 'much ado about nothing', and so I do not think we have the basis for a new beginning or a clean slate", 'The problem of the European Commission, after all, affects all the Community institutions without exception: fraud, nepotism, profligate spending, lack of transparency over subsidies, inflated salaries', 'Who in Parliament would dare to claim that the Commission alone suffers or has suffered from these ills', 'The fact is that the European institutions without exception, so Parliament as well, are too far removed from their people for normal democratic scrutiny to be possible', 'So the scandal over the Commission should above all lead to greater respect for the subsidiarity principle, drastic curtailing of the European policy of subsidies and hand-outs, and above all a greater exercise of scrutiny by the Member States and Member State governments', 'Until this happens, I fear that nothing much will improve', 'Mr President, I am surprised and saddened at the petty political way in which some colleagues are seeking to profit from what is an extremely serious situation', 'We are in fact facing a crisis in the institutions of the European Union, and we must face it head on', 'The resignation of the Commission was a demonstration of the political and personal sensitivity of all its members', 'However, it also demonstrated that the institutions we have established function and that we need to develop them', 'The European Parliament has displayed commendable composure and maturity in the face of this crisis', 'But the time has now come for our leaders to take some bold decisions which will work positively towards strengthening the institutions of the European Union', 'Some opponents of the European idea may have wanted to use this institutional crisis to strike at the very heart of what has brought us all here today', 'Decisions are difficult', 'However, vacuums and deadlocks are dangerous', "The Community's Heads of State and Government must make prompt decisions and come up with an unequivocal solution", 'The President-in-Office has taken a positive step by declaring that the name of the new Commission President will be put forward by April', 'I do not think this is enough', 'Swift decisions also need to be taken regarding the other members of the Commission', 'Whatever constitutional issues may be outstanding could be settled and, in accordance with the Amsterdam Treaty, the Council and the European Parliament could work to implement the necessary reforms', 'We have the opportunity to restore the confidence that is needed in the institutions of the European Union', 'I think we owe this to the people of Europe, and we owe it to the idea of the European Union', 'Mr President, the crisis that is buffeting Europe is both a serious and a healthy one: serious because without a doubt it represents an unprecedentedly difficult moment, but healthy because - as others have said - from now on the topic of institutional reform can no longer be avoided', 'It must be tackled head on, prior to enlargement, and must open the door to economic governance in the Europe of the euro', 'This Europe has given itself institutions such as the European Central Bank to manage monetary policy; now it also requires authoritative political governance, authoritative political institutions', 'This issue can no longer be ducked', 'However, what has happened is also healthy because it has at last raised the question of transparency', 'Each of us appreciates from our own experience the urgent need for transparency in the activities of the Commission', 'Anyone who has had connections with that institution, such as applying to participate in a programme, has experience of inadequate information and inadequately substantiated decisions', 'It is likewise healthy in that the Wise Men have established a sort of moral case-law, telling politicians to refrain from doing not just what is forbidden, but also what is inadvisable', "This lesson in moral case-law could also usefully be learned by the various countries' national political leaders, if the public is to feel at ease with politics and its institutions", 'One must not do what is inadvisable', 'I too look forward to a rapid solution to the crisis and an authoritative Commission presidency, and I too would stress that - if the presidency is to be strong and authoritative - it cannot be a short-term one but must have sufficient time to plan its work', 'But it should also be more responsible about the way it operates and controls its affairs, ridding itself of negligence and demagoguery and avoiding a scapegoat culture', 'We are experiencing real growing pains, with dwindling institutional resources required to cope with ever greater burdens', 'So it is not surprising that there is a sharp dividing line between collective and individual responsibility, and between Community and governmental responsibility', 'Nowadays, we cannot even rely on the legal certainty of legislative texts for either the past or the future', 'Mr President, that is why the institutions can only find a way out, a direction, a guideline, in political terms', 'Which means that it is up to the political powers that be, and in particular the Council and Parliament at present, to act swiftly to resolve this crisis', 'But acting swiftly does not mean acting with undue haste. It means that the Council should nominate a candidate to be President of the Commission within a reasonable deadline, and that this President should benefit from the democratic legitimacy bestowed by Parliament, which is absolutely essential for a strong Commission', 'And by strong, I also mean stable, and with a political future', 'Committees are not the way to achieve the necessary reform of the institutions and to imbue them with a fresh sense of drive', "Parliament will be more than willing to swiftly resolve a crisis which, if it drags on, will only give ammunition to the European Union's enemies and weaken it economically", "To do this, Parliament's demands will have to be heeded, but it is willing to reach political agreement with the Council on a solution", 'Mr President, the epicentre of this crisis is not Brussels - its origins lie in every single capital of the fifteen Member States', 'It is now incumbent on the Council, and in particular the German Presidency, to put its cards on the table and acknowledge its responsibility', 'We will be waiting here to listen to its proposals', 'Fortunately, according to what the President-in-Office of the Council has told us today, it seems that the Council is on the right track and is adopting a common sense approach', 'Let us hope so', 'Mr President, in this debate on the resignation of the Commission and the forthcoming summit in Berlin, I would like to start by thanking the good Commissioners for all the work they have done in recent years', "It is a pity things had to come to such a pass and that a call in January from this Parliament, and from a large proportion of my group's members, to dismiss those Commissioners who were under fire was not acted upon", 'If that had happened in January, both the Commission and Parliament would have emerged stronger from this conflict', 'Now the good Commissioners have been swept aside together with the bad ones', 'That really is a shame', 'And I cast a critical glance at our Socialist friends, because if they had helped us in January with that resolution, all the things which have happened would not have done so', 'We endorse the departure of the entire Commission as something which is inevitable', 'We hope to see a new Commission very soon, starting with a new Commission President', 'But we believe it has to be a caretaker Commission, because a truly definitive Commission can only be appointed once the elections are out of the way', 'That seems to me to be the normal democratic rule', 'In our Member States too we do not appoint governments first and then hold elections; we do it the other way round', 'As regards the President, it would actually be nice if Parliament could nominate a candidate', 'There are, as I understand it, three of them: Mr Prodi, Mr Solana and Mr Kok', 'I would be happy with any of them, but my own personal preference would be for Mr Prodi, the man we know best', 'He has my vote', "Anyone who can steer Italy's bureaucracy and its economy along the right track can cope with Brussels", 'So as far as I am concerned, Mr Prodi would be a most welcome choice', 'One last remark on Agenda 2000, because this too will be discussed in Berlin', 'I very much hope that changes will be made to agricultural policy, because the way it is shaping up is not good', 'I hope that changes will be made to the Structural Funds', 'I hope above all that the Netherlands will score better on Agenda 2000 than it has done so far, because the current Dutch Government can probably prepare itself rather better than it has been doing', 'As far as that is concerned, we wait eagerly to see if the results are better than they look like being', 'We await the debate on Agenda 2000 and the advent of a new Commission with equal interest', "Mr President, the view of the Dutch members of the Group of the Party of European Socialists is that the Commission's decision to resign was the only one possible in the light of the Committee of Wise Men's report", 'So that is rather different from what Mrs Maij-Weggen said just now, from dismissing two Commissioners on grounds of alleged fraud and saying that their resignation had to be seen as the preliminary outcome of a trial', "This new position, this new culture, must be reflected in the implementation of the code of conduct, the development of individual responsibility for Commissioners, a revision of the Staff Regulations, and the Members' Statute", 'This new attitude from the Commission in its way of working and its dealings with Parliament can be summed up as the end of arrogance', "That is undoubtedly a gain for Parliament, provided it is not replaced by arrogance on the Council's part", 'Perhaps the Council will find it hard to work under pressure of time', 'But it is of the utmost importance to have a new Commission as soon as possible, in advance of the elections to a new European Parliament', 'It will have to draw up an ambitious programme, to be evaluated by the House', 'The current Parliament can inform the new Commission of the reforms that are required', 'A new Commission will have to commit itself to these', "With the heralding of the Commission's new term of office in the year 2000, Parliament can then monitor the Commission's performance as it carries out this programme", 'So we want a new Commission for five and a half years, with a six-month probationary period', 'A good Commission does not need to fear a review of this kind by Parliament, because in any normal democratic national parliament, ministers are subjected to constant scrutiny', 'Mr President, anyone who takes the time to analyse the events of the past year will see that many things have been the subject of debate in this House', 'There have without doubt been injustices on an individual level, since many of those who have been forced to resign should not have done so', 'Nor is there any doubt that this whole sequence of events was used to further petty political aims in various quarters', 'I believe that acknowledging that the European Parliament has a far more important role to play than the other institutional bodies have been willing to accept is a fundamental and crucial point', 'From now on, the European Parliament must fulfil the expectations of the people of Europe as regards the ways in which it should tackle these issues', 'Others have lessons to learn as well', 'The Council of Ministers for instance, was in a great hurry to grant discharge, without examining the real facts', 'And if the Commission had acted differently in certain circumstances, we would not have ended up where we are today', 'However, the basic lesson we must take away from all this is that we must be responsible towards those who are going to vote for us in the very near future', 'Here too, Mr President, the Council of Ministers must take responsibility', 'Madam President, at this stage in the debate, virtually everything has already been said', 'I think we can now clearly see that we needed the time between January and March to prepare the report, which provides us with a quite different basis from the one we had in January for making constructive improvements in the future', 'I am impressed by the speed and efficiency with which the committee of experts has carried out its work', 'There has been some criticism of the fact that the task was given to outside experts instead of being carried out by Parliament itself', 'However, I believe that our situation is too politicised to allow us to carry out such an investigation', 'I also honestly believe that there are times when it is appropriate to resort to an outside opinion', 'It is a necessary step, albeit a difficult one to take, since it is hard to see how to resolve the problems when one is deeply involved in the work and the procedures', 'As recently as last January, we came up with a very constructive proposal on this subject']
I can parse these sentences using the code on google colab or if I parse these sentences as the first sentences in the document. I hope you can help to find the error in my usage.
Thank you in advance for any help :D
15 Mar 22, 2022
1.3k Dec 31, 2022
46 Dec 19, 2022
36 Dec 12, 2022
30 Nov 7, 2022
88 Nov 7, 2022
30 Dec 1, 2022
113 Jan 5, 2023
118 Dec 12, 2022
235 Jan 7, 2023
17 Mar 2, 2022
1 Jul 14, 2022
94 Dec 10, 2022
3 Apr 12, 2022
17 Dec 1, 2022
70 Nov 13, 2022
136 Jan 3, 2023
20 Jul 29, 2022
87 Dec 30, 2022