Bundestag president Norbert Lammert told the House Foreign Affairs Committee yesterday that the German Parliament had become involved in European affairs after the Constitutional Court’s decision on the Lisbon Treaty.
The court decision legally obliged the government to inform Parliament “regularly and comprehensively” on all EU directives and legislation to give the Bundedstag the opportunity to make its own comments.
Prof. Lammert said that the government was obliged to take the Bundestag’s comments as the German official position. This applied also to any future changes in the EU fiscal discipline pact.
Replying to questions put by the Committee Chairman Francis Zammit Dimech and Labour MPs George Vella and Leo Brincat, Prof. Lammert said the German government was also obliged to make a formal address to Parliament before every EU summit with a formal debate following.
On political party financing he said that legally all political parties had to receive state aid according to half of their expenditure and according to the number of votes obtained in elections.
The parties were legally obliged to publish their annual income and expenditure reports to ensure transparency. Every donation to a party had to be publicised once the Bundestag’s president was informed. Political parties were fined three times the amount of money donated if received from illegal sources.
Prof. Lammert also said that it was Parliament and not the government which set the parliamentary agenda although the Chancellor had the right to convene Parliament to deliver a government order. The parliamentary committee distributed issues raised by all parliamentary groups in fixing the agenda.
Welcoming Prof. Lammert, Dr Zammit Dimech spoke of the cooperation between Malta and Germany in various fields and expressed appreciation to Germany’s support on irregular immigration to Malta. He said that Germany had already taken 250 migrants from Malta.
He pointed out that 50 German manufacturing companies operate in Malta and new initiatives were taken in the manufacturing and financial services sectors. Fourteen German enterprises had set up company in Malta over the last six years while 18 others were located in Malta after Malta Enterprise approval.
Dr Zammit Dimech said that Malta and Germany collaborated together in handling the Libyan crisis a year ago with German evacuees passing also through Malta.