A partnership for European renewal

We live in a period of change. This is why the European Commission has called for a partnership for a European renewal. The EU's institutions, member states and civil societies must pull together and, each at its level, set out to meet the common challenges in order to make our common goals - prosperity, solidarity and security - a long-term reality.

It is on this vision that the European Commission has built its work programme for the next five years.

The first cornerstone of this partnership is prosperity. The European Commission relaunched the Lisbon Strategy for growth and jobs earlier this spring. This strategy will unlock Europe's potential for economic dynamism. It will help to make the EU a more attractive place to invest and work by using knowledge and innovation as engines for sustainable growth and job creation.

The second strategic objective - solidarity - also needs renewed action: cohesion policies to narrow disparities between rich and poor, common action to preserve Europe's environment and quality of life and a new social agenda to offer a safety net and a springboard for change.

Today, the Commission is engaged in pushing forward the third strategic objective, security. In November 2004 the European Council approved a far reaching programme - the Hague Programme - to strengthen freedom, security and justice across the EU. Indeed, an area of free movement as vast as the EU cannot function without a certain degree of cooperation and common standards in justice and home affairs. Increased cooperation can enable citizens to use fully their freedoms and enjoy their rights. In justice and home affairs, the EU acting together is stronger than each member state on its own. Common endeavours can help deliver an effective immigration and asylum policy and citizens' defence and support the global threat of terror and organised crime.

The Commission has now presented the new action plan that turns the Hague Programme into practicable steps and concrete measures. It sets out 10 priorities to address fundamental questions and problems relating to freedom, security and justice which have a direct bearing on our daily lives. We hope member states can endorse this action plan in the weeks to come so we can make the programme a reality.

Until just a few years ago, areas like justice and home affairs - particularly the fight against terrorism and international organised crime - were matters for the member states.

The attacks of September 11, 2001 and March 11, 2004 made it clear to everyone that the only possible response to these threats is a common response. Only by working together, above all by sharing information on the recruitment and financing of terrorists, can our response be effective. The statistics on the European arrest warrant, for example, speak for themselves when it comes to illustrating the added value of European cooperation in this area. From its entry into force until September 2004 Europe's judicial authorities have issued 2,603 warrants, 653 people have been arrested and 104 have been transferred from one member state to another. The cumbersome extradition procedure has been abolished, implementation times have been slashed and a system that was incompatible with a Europe without internal borders has been greatly simplified. Action now takes weeks, not years.

In the case of the 10 new member states that joined the EU in 2004, internal borders will disappear for good in the next five years. That will help increase protection against illegal immigration and every kind of unlawful trafficking. External borders will begin to be managed on an integrated basis by the new agency just set up. For visas, we propose that joint centres should be established to look at applications.

The action plan provides for major innovations in the sensitive area of immigration and asylum while preserving the European humanitarian tradition. With the green paper on immigration we have launched a process of public consultation with civil society on how to handle legal economic immigration at the European level. Immigration must go on being managed by the individual member states, who would decide the quota arrangements. But the member states have to be aware that all the decisions they take here will impact on the situation in other member states. That is why there is a need for a common policy that is firm in its opposition to clandestine immigration and trafficking in human beings, above all women and children.

We also have to face up to the difficult question of integration in the respect of cultural and religious diversity. We are setting out to help member states to identify and promote best practice in order to ensure that the impact of immigration on society and the economy is a positive one and that exclusion is avoided.

But the action plan also calls for forward movement in the harmonisation of civil law in particular, with some areas - those that are important in our day-to- day lives - being approximated under minimum common rules. A large part of everyone's life will sometimes depend on the workings of the justice system on the fact that the rules governing it are shared and can be easily accessed.

Lastly, the question of human rights is something we want to take very seriously. We will propose a new agency for fundamental rights. It will give Europe a new resource for defending and promoting them.

Our new action plan is not based on a bureaucratic blue print. It builds on a thorough reality check. Our ambition is to act where European action brings added value as compared to national, regional or local action.

The Commission has put its ideas on the table. Inherent in our partnership approach is consultation and participation. The European Parliament and the member states, the national parliaments, public authorities at all levels, social partners and civil society at large all need to be fully involved. Dialogue must reach beyond the Brussels-based political debate.

In many of the measures needed, the challenge is to balance the firm hand of the pursuit of security with the kindly hand of human rights. There can be no freedom without security and the first freedom is the freedom from fear. For too long Europe has been only a consumer of security. Now, before anything else, we must learn to produce it, without sacrificing our freedoms, and our rights, and the precious treasure of our privacy - and we are convinced that our action plan will bring us nearer to this end.

Mr Barroso is President of the European Commission. Mr Frattini is Vice-President and Commissioner for Justice, Freedom and Security.