“Hands off the European Parliament”: the response of EP President Pat Cox, Irish liberal, to the proposal supported by some ministers of finance to limit, in the text of the future EU Constitution, the powers of the parliamentary assembly in matters of financial planning and budget, was tough. Through his spokesman, David Harley, Cox declared, on the margins of the session of the EP at Brussels on 5-6 November, that he was “scandalised by how the ministers of finance are proceeding, trying to erode the tasks of the Parliament, as regards budgetary policies. The assembly, that represents the citizens of the Union, acquired this power that it shares with the Council, twenty years ago. The proposal made by the ministers of some countries would be a step backwards”.
