Only the spoken word prevails !

On the Road to the 21st Century

Report by EPP President Wilfried Martens
to the XIII EPP Congress, February 4, 1999
Brussels

1. Introduction

Less than 350 days divide us from the 21st century. Everyone has a confused sense that this passage from one century to the next, from one millennium to another, is charged with a special meaning, is heavy with worries in the face of the acceleration of History, of technology, of science; but that it is also rich in hopes and expectations.

How should the EPP, our party, approach this symbolic rendez-vous?

With great satisfaction that for half a century, our values and our conception of Man and of politics have advanced on our continent. Europe lives in peace and liberty.

The revolution by the people of Central and Central Eastern Europe took the rug out from under Socialism as the big counter-blueprint.

There is now no credible alternative to a democratic civil society, to the market economy, to representative democracy, to the individual's inalienable human rights. The question of what system to live under is no longer asked. Our political vision, one for which we have fought for 50 years, has triumphed.

Socialism has not just died on the streets of Prague, Budapest, and Dresden. The closed, state-run economy has not been a great success in a global economy open to the 20th century. The euro and the Pact on Stability and Growth have finally put an end to this illusion.

Can you have Socialist parties without Socialism?

In an attempt to rejuvenate themselves, certain Socialist parties mimic Christian Democratic concepts: the Third way between Socialism and capitalism, regionalisation, more respect for local communities, emphasizing the significance of family and education – not just that, but also advancing privatisation and deregulation and Europe's opening out, all this in the teeth of convictions held by many of their own parties' members and officials. That is Tony Blair's project in Great Britain.

Others gamble on keeping the status quo. They attempt to by-pass the changes made necessary by globalization by leaving structures as they are. They promise people they will obstruct the necessary adaptation of the welfare state, and buy their electoral majority with close cooperation with Communists. That is Lionel Jospin's project in France.

Others again misuse the new, broader, political consensus to turn politics into a matter of decisions between individual leaders, and fill the resulting political vacuum with controversies connected with Green movement projects: abandoning nuclear power and dual nationality as a general rule. That is Gerhard Schröder in Germany.

The European Socialist parties' success in elections is not despite but because of the historic collapse of Socialism. Only by throwing their historical ballast overboard did they stand a chance. II On the Situation of People's Parties in Europe

Are we to be the victims of our own success?

The people of Central and Eastern Europe trust us, us the people's parties. When will it finally be recognised that the people of the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe sent the so-called reformed Socialists packing as well? When will we be able to read that, of 12 governments in the applicant countries of Central and Eastern Europe, there is one solitary Socialist government left, and that the majority belong to our political family?

Emil Constantinescu, Ivan Kostov, Radu Vasile, Jerzy Buzek, Gedimnias Vagnorius, Mikulas Dzurinda, Edward Fenech-Adami, and Glafcos Clerides, represent our political family.

In Spain we saw a small miracle. Under the leadership of Jose-Maria Aznar, Christian-Social forces, those committed to freedom, and others rooted in conservative values, came together in a great centrist party, one that has been very successful in fighting unemployment.

When are we going to be able to read that in the European Parliament today we are as strong as we last were almost 30 years ago, and that around a third of the deputies are ours?

That must be the message of this Congress of ours. The European People's Party is picking up the gauntlet. We are fighting to become the majority in Europe. In the European election campaign over the coming months we will do everything to become the strongest political force. We want a majority for our ideas, for our project for Europe.

We can be relaxed about the verdict of history. The second half of the 20th century will be seen in the history books as a period of peace, growing prosperity, and ever more rooted democracy. In the states which founded the Community the second half of the 20th century was the heyday of Christian Democracy.

Great Christian Democratic figures have shaped this Europe.

We should begin this Congress with a word of thanks to Helmut Kohl.

Helmut Kohl led Germany for 16 years, and left a decisive mark on Europe. He achieved German unity and advanced the cause of European unity. Helmut Kohl is a great Christian Democrat, a great German, and a great European. He is a committed friend of the European People's Party.

The European People's Party will express its very particular thanks to him at a special occasion. Today we convey our deep respect and the best wishes of the European People's Party's XIIIth Congress. Helmut, we thank you.

We will remain true to Europe and fight nationalism. We support an open society based on firm values, one opposed to any and every fundamentalist narrowness. We remain the force of the political centre.

III. Shaping the 21st Century

The slogan of this congress is "On the Road to the 21st Century."

We shaped the second half of the 20th century because we were close to people's problems. Reconstruction after the war, active commitment to social justice in education, and giving everyone a chance to improve their situation in a society without barriers, and reconciliation with our neighbours by creating a peaceful European political order.

What is the challenge for the beginning of the 21st century?

More than was ever the case in the past, our possibilities in life in the 21st century will be determined by global events.

With the arrival of global markets for both goods and jobs that does not just apply to the economy.

It applies to the preservation of all the natural elements that we need for human life.

It applies to communication between cultures.

It applies to floods of refugees and population movements.

It applies to wars and civil wars and ethnic conflicts, wherever they take place.

Our conception of time and space is fundamentally changing.

Our intention is not to grin and bear globalization; we intend to shape it. Globalization is not a natural event, but a political challenge. It takes European union into its third phase: reconstruction and reconciliation after the war. Setting free economic dynamism through the internal market and currency union in the 80s and 90s. Political union and global player in the 21st century.

Only those who have the force to shape globalization will be able to lead politically in the 21stcentury.

So I invite you, all 500 of the delegates to this EPP Congress, to do something terribly old- fashioned; tomorrow, spend a whole day quarrelling about a political programme. Where are we going with the European Union? What are our concepts for economic and social policy? What ideas do we have for education and research policy? How are we going to solve the issues of immigration and asylum and the fight against international organised crime? What is our global responsibility for securing peace, and how can we safeguard Creation?

The EPP is the only European party to shoulder such a huge undertaking and – together with all its member parties – to work out a really detailed programme, and discuss it sentence by sentence in the context of a party congress, and then vote on it. We can be proud of that. You are setting an example of living democracy in Europe. Across the frontiers of regions, nations, languages, and different historical experience. We prove that national interests can be embedded in common European interest. Together we are building the European House, and showing confidence in the power of ideas.

Fifty years of European unity are just one example of the idealists, the utopians, being the genuine realists. Step by step Europe is becoming a reality. Currency union is in place. Economic integration will deliver the decisive impulse to political integration. Monetary Union is not the end of integration policy but the beginning of a new dynamic phase which must – and will – lead us to real Political Union.

Must, because petty national politics in Europe cannot solve tomorrow's problems. Will, because the unification of Europe is a historical necessity which can only be impeded by compromising one's own basic interests.

We as the European People's Party can shape the future. True to our ideals, and open to people from other traditions who, with us, want to build a united Europe.

Today, tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, will determine the course we take. Then we will fight every day for our great goal: majority support for our politics on June 13.

IV. For a Centre Way

The European People's Party is open to all who wish to support our programme, and it remains a party of the centre. The political centre: striving for balance in society, rejection of extremism in any form, reconciliation of social responsibility with economic efficiency, economy and ecology, national identity and European commitment, these remain the kernel of our political philosophy. The future can only be shaped from the centre.

We had the force to bring together on the basis of this programme Christian-democrat, moderate and centre parties.

We reject extremism in any form. I thank our friend François Bayrou for the clear, unambiguous line he was drawn between us and the far Right, and his categorical No, in the spring regional elections, to every form of support from Front National deputies. There can be no co-operation between democrats and extremists.

But we also call on Social Democrats in Europe to draw the line on their side, with the far-Left. It is a scandal that today's Social Democrats show neither embarrassment nor reservations about once again sitting in Land governments alongside those who carry joint responsibility for the Wall, for barbed-wire, and 40 years of dictatorship and unfreedom. We owe it to the countless millions of victims of enforced Communist rule in Europe to sprinkle some salt into this wound.

V. Perspectives for the European Union

At no time in its history has European unification developed as dynamically as in the last 15 years:

The Single European Act in 1984, enlargement to Spain and Portugal in1986, the Maastricht Treaty in 1991, the Internal Market in 1992, enlargement to Austria, Sweden, and Finland in1995, the Amsterdam Treaty in 1997, the start of membership negotiations with the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and Cyprus in1998, introduction of the euro on January 1, 1999.

European unification takes on a new quality with the Treaties of Maastricht and Amsterdam and the introduction of the euro.

The peoples of Europe have irrevocably combined their destinies. The European Union has long ceased to be a loose confederation of states, rather it's a community of destiny. Today we are in transition to a decentralized European federal state, one which respects regional and national specificities, and is in a position forcefully to represent common European interests in the global power-game.

Citizens expect the right to the highest democratic standards in such a Union.

They expect the Commission, which has the exclusive right of initiative and therefore a key role, to be politically balanced. An unbalanced Commission, one which ignores the results of the European elections, is hardly in a position to secure the confidence of the European Parliament.

Every Commissioner will have to satisfy the highest demands, both in terms of character and professional qualification. We need the best people in Europe.

The President of the Commission must be given more power. He must - that is the experience of the last few weeks - be permitted to withdraw the dossier of Commissioners who cannot satisfy the demands made of them, and in the final analysis be able to fire them. Future Commissions will not be accorded citizens' trust if they deny the individual responsibility of Commissioners. And you need the trust of the democratically-elected representatives of the people.

So let's strengthen parliament in the European elections. Let's give it the power to be the citizens' attorney. Through a strong EPP Group. Let us work together in the coming weeks and months until the election on June 13. Europe needs a strong democracy. Europe needs a strong European People's Party.

VI. Conclusion

This presidency has, over recent years, had to make difficult decisions of far-reaching importance: the integration of the EUCD into the EPP, our parliamentary group's taking in of more than 30 deputies, the elaboration of decisions on common economic and social policies at the Toulouse Congress.

I would like to underline the determining role which Jean-Claude Juncker has played in this respect. The decisions of the Luxembourg European Council in December 1997 remain, for us members of the EPP, reference points for a genuine European employment policy. Dear Jean-Claude, you were president of the EPP, and in all our name, I give you warm thanks for your commitment and what you have achieved.

We made these decisions because they are important for our future. It was important for me, at all the critical junctures, to know that Klaus Welle was at my side as Secretary General.

Four and a half years ago I proposed to the EPP that Klaus Welle should become its Secretary General.

Quite a few people asked me at the time: at 30, isn't he too young, too inexperienced?

I believe that today we can say: he did his job with panache, with brilliance.

Klaus Welle was a Secretary General for all parties, small and large.
He is no friend of the status quo. He has advanced the cause of the EPP both in terms of its programme and its organization. These four and half years were good ones for the European People's Party.

Thank-you, Klaus.

In December, at my proposal, the Group of the European People's Party in the European Parliament elected Klaus Welle as its new Secretary General.

So tomorrow - provided I am re-elected chairman - I will propose a new Secretary General.

And I will once again ask that you have confidence in a member of the younger generation.

Alejandro Agag has been deputy Secretary General of the EPP since 1994. Meantime he served Jose-Maria Aznar for two years as his personal expert. He deserves our confidence.
For 25 years I have been trying to serve Europe.

In the 70s as chairman of my party, the Belgian CVP.

As a young part chairman I had the privilege of planning the foundation of the EPP with Hans- August Lücker.

In the 80s as head of the Belgian government.

In that time in the European Council we planned and implemented Greece's, Spain's, and Portugal's entry into the European Union. Nor should these be forgotten: the Single European Act, the Internal Market, and eventually in 1991 the Treaty of Maastricht, crowned by the Single Currency.

And in the 90s I served as chairman of the European People's Party and of its Group in the European Parliament.

We gave the party a Basic Programme. We have opened it to people's parties of other traditions, to build a common Europe. We have found partners and friends in the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe, and today they work with us on an equal footing.

I have been chairman of the European People's Party for nine years. The day will come when I hand over this great task to someone younger. Till then I am ready to do my duty in the interest of our common cause.

I am ready, together with the new presidency, the party leaders, the many who are engaged in our party's various bodies, and with you all, to lead the party over the threshold into the 21stcentury.

I ask you to show your confidence in me tomorrow.

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