Anneli Jäätteenmäki, on behalf of the ALDE Group. – (FI) Mr President, I wish to thank Mr Martin for his excellent levels of cooperation.

The EU needs good governance, and transparent and democratic administration. That means Parliament having a right of access to documents relating to legislation. This is what is being negotiated right now, and things do not look good, because the Commission and the Council oppose it.

Now, however, we are considering another aspect of the matter, which is what powers Parliament has to supervise administration by means of the committee of inquiry. This is about political scrutiny, not judicial scrutiny, and that difference needs to be kept in mind, but Parliament must definitely have the right to undertake political scrutiny of this kind. I do not think that this means that national and EU civil servants have to be accorded equal status, which is the view that was taken by the Commissioner. I am not in favour of national civil servants having the same role here in Parliament that you commissioners do, for example. However, nor do you go along to national parliaments to be questioned by committees of inquiry in the same way that national civil servants do. That is the small difference to which I am referring.

It is nevertheless important that Parliament has a robust role in the supervision of the various institutions. Only in this way can we strengthen people’s confidence in the work of this European Union, and there is a lot to do in that area. As this committee of inquiry now exists and its role is being strengthened, I nevertheless hope that it will be used rarely, as has been the case hitherto, and with discretion, and only in very important cases.