Nieuws van de afdeling

3 July 2012

No aid to banks from ESM without approval of Parliament

The Dutch government will bring a proposal before both houses of Parliament before granting aid to banks from the European Stability Mechanism emergency fund. The proposal will have to be approved by Parliament before the government grants such aid. This commitment was made by Finance Minister Jan Kees de Jager speaking in the Senate – the upper house of Parliament – in reaction to a motion presented by the SP’s Senate group.

2 July 2012

Stop the foreign jollies for mayors and councillors

Secretary of State for Development Cooperation Ben Knapen should end subsidies for foreign trips by mayors and councillors, which do nothing to promote the effectiveness of development cooperation projects.

30 June 2012

SP leader Roemer to party congress: ‘We will not leave the Netherlands in the hands of the right’

'Rutte woke sweating from his dream of Roemer pushing the buttons of the cash dispenser. But who’s pushing the buttons now? For emergency funds and guarantees? Not us. Just ask all of these bankers and highly-paid managers where the cash dispenser is to be found. Mark, I can put your mind at rest. If the SP is soon sitting in the Prime Minister’s residence, sleeping pills will still be available on prescription.’ So said SP leader Emile Roemer in a message to Prime mInister Mark Rutte during his speech today to the XIXth Congress of the SP.

29 June 2012

Roemer: 'EU summit is a major step in the wrong direction’

SP leader Emile Roemer has described himself as ‘far from satisfied’ by the outcome of this week’s European Council summit. In his view, what has in reality been decided is to establish a banking union. In addition, Council President Herman van Rompuy is seizing the opportunity to develop his ideas on a federal Europe. ‘Soon everything will revolve around bankrupt banks, without the banking sector first being tackled by the government of the country in question,’ says Roemer. ‘A very bad development. It’s unbelievable that our own Prime Minister Mark Rutte voted for this, given that it stands completely at odds to what he told Parliament earlier in the week.’'

28 June 2012

Council of Europe warns of European Union’s undemocratic adventure

'Superstate Europe is being built, but no thought has been given to any democratic foundation’ according to SP Senator Tiny Kox, who was speaking at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in Strasbourg, where from all sides strong criticism was made of plans by twenty-seven of the Council’s forty-seven member states to weld themselves even more strongly together in an ever more powerful European Union. To a monetary union, a banking union and a fiscal union there must now, if left to Brussels, be added a political union. As for the member states’ peoples, they have not been consulted at all. That’s asking for trouble.

28 June 2012

SP welcomes about-turn on code of conduct for Euro-MPs

Yesterday evening the European Parliament’s principle body for internal decision-making, the Conference of Presidents, took the decision to reverse recent moves to dilute the code of conduct for Euro-MPs. The Conference of Presidents brings together the elected chairs of every political group in the European Parliament and its decision means that the debate requested by the SP for next week’s Strasbourg plenary will no longer be needed. ‘I’m very happy with this,’ says SP Euro-MP Dennis de Jong. ‘It’s clear that the weakening of the European Parliament Code of Conduct which would have meant, for example, that no record need be kept of travel costs paid for by lobbyists, is now rejected. MEPs will simply have to be open about who pays for their trips.’

International