The Amsterdam Treaty should be ratified, despite its shortcomings, said MEPs, who voted 348 to 101 with 34 abstentions in favour of a resolution to this effect. The majority voting in favour of the resolution consisted mainly of MEPs from the two major groups, the European People's Party - including Irish MEPs Mary Banotti, John Cushnahan, Joe McCartin and Alan Gillis - and the Party of European Socialists, and Pat Cox, Liberal.
PES leader Pauline Green felt, on balance, it represented progress in bringing the EU closer to the people. On the positive side there was a new commitment to tackling unemployment, a boost to equal opportunities, greater transparency and a strong determination to combat fraud. Yet she acknowledged weaknesses, in particular the failure to streamline the institutions to enable a wider union of 25 Member States to function effectively.
Indeed, Parliament's resolution "regrets the absence from the Amsterdam Treaty of the institutional reforms needed for the effective and democratic functioning of an enlarged union, and affirms that these reforms should be completed before enlargement". The resolution goes on to call on the European Council to "affirm that no new Member States will be admitted before the completion of the institutional reform necessary for the proper functioning of an enlarged union". It also calls on the UK, Danish and Irish governments to take part at the earliest opportunity in the plans to bring the Schengen system for free movement and abolition of passport controls under the EU umbrella.
The resolution also takes the view that insufficient progress was made at Amsterdam in developing a common defence policy. Parliament wants the co-decision procedure - an equal role for MEPs in adopting EU legislation - to be extended to agriculture, fisheries and taxation. The resolution calls for adjustments to be made in the weighting or values of votes in council, and in the number of Commissioners per Member State. Qualified majority voting should be the norm.
Patricia McKenna (Irl, Greens) and other Greens voted against, along with British Conservatives, MEPs in the Left/Green groups, and other members of the smaller groups.
Bernie Malone (Dublin, PES), and UFE members Niall Andrews (Dublin), Gerard Collins (Munster), Brian Crowley (Munster), Jim Fitzsimons (Leinster), Pat the Cope Gallagher (Connacht/Ulster), and Mark Killilea (Irl), abstained.
Gerard Collins emphasised his support for the treaty. He pointed out that there would be a referendum on the Amsterdam Treaty in Ireland next spring. Parliament, he said, should confine itself to voting for or against the treaty, rather than on a long list of recommendations from the institutional committee, which he could not support.
Mrs Malone argued that the treaty was part of the continuing historic evolution of the European continent. She believed it would strengthen EU policies and the effectiveness of its institutions. She welcomed the increase in Parliament's powers and the scope for a more effective and coherent foreign policy. She stressed that the treaty posed no threat to Irish neutrality and called on the Irish government to provide simple information on it in the run up to the Irish referendum. Finally, Mrs Malone regretted that MEPs had had no say in the issue of the Strasbourg seat of the Parliament.