Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities (UCITS)

Speech by Chris Huhne MEP delivered to the European Parliament on Mon 22nd Oct 2001

I just wish to say on behalf of the Liberal Group that I very much hope Mr Goebbels and his colleagues will withdraw their amendment. We do not believe that the amendment insisting on call-back is appropriate to this particular piece of legislation, which my colleague Olle Schmidt has described as being very carefully balanced after the common position of the Council. Nor is it appropriate in the context of the ongoing discussions over Lamfalussy. Indeed, I would go as far to say that by insisting on call-back, which was not a phrase which appeared in Parliament's second resolution on this subject after the Stockholm Council, we risk calling into question our bona fides in the lengthy negotiations which some of us have undertaken with Mr Bolkestein.

I very much hope, therefore, that the people who have put forward this amendment will withdraw it, and that discussions will take place in an appropriate place. We should not try to call into question this piece of legislation. I believe it should be put through as is.