Madam, - Dana Rosemary Scallon, MEP, is to be congratulated for arranging information meetings throughout her constituency, to bring the facts regarding Europe to the electorate (February 16th).
She believes the Commission's legal action against the recent decision on the Stability and Growth Pact implies that the EU has primacy over the member-state governments. It does no such thing. It implies (whatever verdict the Court of Justice may reach) that the law has primacy over the member-states and the Union alike.
Had it been thought appropriate to relax the terms of the pact, the member-states, acting collectively, could have changed the law. They did not. Instead they decided it was acceptable that some states could continue to act in contravention of the pact. The Commission, as guardian of the Union's acquis, had no option but to ask the court to rule on the legality of that proceeding.
One would expect parliamentarians to favour the Commission's defence of an agreement which Parliament had endorsed and, in general, to support its wish to place respect for the law above mere convenience. - Yours, etc.,
MICHAEL DRURY, Avenue Louise, Brussels.