The Fonds of Enrique Barón Crespo

Biography

Enrique Barón Crespo was born in Madrid, Spain, on the 27 March 1944. He received a degree in Law from the University of Madrid, a degree in Commerce from ICADE Business School, and was a graduate of ESSEC (Higher School of Economics and Commerce) in Paris, France. He was a lecturer in agricultural economics at the ENEA (National Institute of Agricultural Studies) in Valladolid from 1965 to 1970 and a lecturer in economic structures at Complutense University of Madrid. An active member of the May 1968 movement, he belonged to the Socialist Convergence of Madrid and was one of the leaders of the Federation of Socialist Parties at the start of Spain's transition to democracy.

From 1970 to 1977, Barón Crespo was a practicing lawyer. He actively represented defendants in political cases before the Public Order Tribunal and was equally active in defending trade union leaders.

Since 2009 he is no longer politically active in the European Parliament. He has published several books and written numerous articles about European integration issues. He is also the President and a founding member of the International Yehudi Menuhin Foundation and an administrator of the Friends of Europe think-tank.

Political posts

• 1982-1985: Spanish Minister for Transport, Tourism and Communications under the first Felipe González government (1982-1986)
• 1986-2009: Member of the European Parliament (Group of the Party of European Socialists)
• 1986-1987: Member of the Committee on Institutional Affairs
• 1986-1989: Member of the Committee on Budgets
• 1986-1989, 2004-2009: Member of the Delegation for relations with the United States
• 1989-1992: President of the European Parliament
• 1992-2002: Member of the Delegation for relations with Japan
• 1992-1994: Chair and then 1994-1999: Member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Security and Defence Policy
• 1997-1999: Member of the Subcommittee on Security and Disarmament
• 1999-2004: Chair of the Party of European Socialists parliamentary group
• 1999-2004 and 2007-2009: Member of the Committee on Constitutional Affairs
• 2004-2007: Chair of the Committee on International Trade

What's in the Archives

The fonds of Barón Crespo's Office (1989-1992) are home to over 1,000 files containing more than 8,900 items, which are organised to reflect the various areas of activity of the President's Office. Within each individual series, the documents are arranged in files relating to specific procedures dealt with during Barón Crespo's term of office.

Public figure

PE3 P1 100/PERS

The group of series is made up of seven series on subjects relating to the President's role as a public figure. The largest series are those relating to patronage and events, the President's media image and defence of human rights.

Presidency of Parliament

PE3 P1 200/PRES

This group of series is made up of seven series relating to the President's political duties.

The first of these, 'Exercise of the Presidency', covers the President's activities as head of the Institution and its representative, whether attending plenary sittings or meetings of Parliament's decision-making bodies (Bureau and the enlarged Bureau), receiving eminent persons or making official visits. The four following series cover the President's relations with bodies and individuals: interinstitutional relations (Council, Commission and other Community bodies), interparliamentary relations (Member States and third countries), external relations (Member States, third countries, international organisations, national political parties and trade unions, etc.), relations with the press, and relations with members of the public (defence of human rights, equivalence of qualifications).

The second-last series contains documents concerning relations with some of the European Parliament's political bodies, such as the College of Quaestors, the parliamentary committees and delegations and the political groups.

The last series relates more specifically to the President's Office, from the point of view of its organisation, functioning, relations with the Secretariat and mail (filed chronologically under incoming and outgoing).

Secretariat of Parliament

PE3 P1 300/SECR

This group of series presents documents relating to the administrative and legal role of the President's Office, i.e. its relations with the various directorates-general and the Legal Service. The largest series covers relations with the Directorates-General for Committees and Delegations and Infrastructure and Interpreting and with the Legal Service.

Representation of staff and political groups

PE3 P1 400/CPGP

The final group of series contains the series concerning relations with the Staff Committee, the unions and the political group secretariats.

Reflections of Former Presidents of the European Parliament: Enrique Barón Crespo

The period during which I was President of the European Parliament was a time marked by a historic leap for Europe. I began my presidency in July 1989 as President of the Parliament of the Community, and I concluded it proposing, on behalf of the EP, the birth of the European Union at the Maastricht European Council.

The first key moment was the fall, on 9 November 1989, of the Berlin wall, symbolising the disappearance of the iron curtain which had divided Europe into two and presaging the end of the cold war. My first reaction after welcoming the event was to invite President Mitterrand and Chancellor Kohl to appear together before the plenary of Parliament that very same month, in order to give an active impetus to the German unification process, for which a temporary EP committee was created.

The German Chancellor Helmut Kohl (L) and French President François Mitterrand (C) address a solemn plenary session in Strasbourg in November 1989 following the fall of the Berlin Wall. Photo with EP President Enrique Barón Crespo (R) © European Union 1989 – European Parliament

From then on, event followed event at a dizzying speed. In my initial speech to the European Council in Strasbourg in December 1989, I expressed Parliament’s strong desire to see all the Member States work together in order to open the door to the accession of the countries of central and eastern Europe.

On that occasion, I put forward, on behalf of Parliament, a ten-point plan in which it was proposed to expand the existing IGC for the establishment of economic and monetary union (EMU) and to set up another one for political union. To ensure that this reform did not rest in the governments’ hands alone, I proposed that the EP should also be involved, in order to reinforce the reform’s democratic nature and efficiency. Thus began the process leading to the proposal and subsequent creation of the Preparatory Interinstitutional Conference (PIC). That led, in March 1990, to the first-ever invitation in the history of the Community to a president of the European Parliament to address the Council, and, specifically, to introduce our proposal for a PIC.

From that moment on, the agenda was dominated by the swiftly increasing pace of history, as one event followed on another’s heels. The countries in process of freeing themselves from totalitarian communism wished to receive the President of the European Parliament, a body which they saw as incarnating the democracy and freedom they had for so many years yearned for.

The significant events of 1990 included an invitation in February from the Polish Diet to explain the EP’s view of matters, and, later, similar invitations from the Hungarian and Czechoslovak Parliaments; and, on 3 October, German Unity Day, with a ceremony in the Bundestag with President von Weizsäcker, in the company of the Commission President, Jacques Delors, and myself as President of the European Parliament, followed that very day by a speech which I gave in the Paulskirche in Frankfurt, a building symbolising Germany’s constitutional values.

In that time of democratic effervescence and reform, relations with the national parliaments came to take on their full significance. On 29 November 1990, in Montecitorio (Rome), we held the joint ‘Assizes’, i.e. the first-ever conference bringing together the European Parliament and the parliaments of the Member States, which adopted a joint resolution endorsing the concept of the European Union. In December, I had the privilege of submitting that resolution to the Rome European Council, which decided in favour of holding two parallel IGCs, one on EMU and the other on political union.

Over the length of 1991, the meetings of the Preparatory Interinstitutional Conference made it possible, for the first time, for twelve representatives of the EP to engage in dialogue with the twelve governments, the Council and the Commission. Parliament’s representation was able to draw up a ‘shortlist’ of proposals which proved of major use in introducing a number of key subjects, for the most part deriving from the draft treaty text adopted in 1984 and enriched by experience. The main points were: European citizenship and the single currency as pillars; codecision as an ordinary legislative procedure; participation in the election of the Commission President, whose term of office was extended from two years to five; and recognition of European political parties.

President Barón Crespo (R) and Secretary-General Enrico Vinci (L) at the Interinstitutional Conference in Luxembourg on April 8, 1991. © European Communities 1991 – European Parliament

In addition to the intensive pace of change within the Community, the European scene witnessed a number of what can only be called political earthquakes, in which the EP too took part. The most dramatic of these was the tragic dismemberment of former Yugoslavia – a process which put the Community’s internal cohesion to the test. Here, I made all possible efforts on behalf of the EP to find peaceful solutions, with the presidents of the parliaments of the Yugoslav federation and its republics.

Nonetheless, the process that had the greatest impact was the implosion of the Soviet Union, which threw up moments of particular tension in the visit of Foreign Minister Shevardnadze and the subsequent meeting with Mr Gorbachev.

Another major concern was our support for the difficult and arduous peace process in the Middle East. On the day the peace conference opened in Madrid, I expounded our position to the Israeli Knesset, while the EP was giving a formal hearing in plenary to King Hussein of Jordan and President Mubarak.

Happily, it was not only in Europe that the winds of freedom were blowing.

In other latitudes, I was enabled to express Europe’s solidarity with and support for the process of democratic transition before the plenary of the Chilean Congress in Valparaíso, and to hand over the Sakharov Prize to awardees incarnating the universal values of democracy and human rights: Nelson Mandela, Alexander Dubcek, and the husband and son of that remarkable exponent of dignity and perseverance, Aung San Suu Kyi.

Sakharov Prize Winner Nelson Mandela (R) meets with EP President Enrique Barón Crespo (L) in Strasbourg © European Communities 1990

Another key moment was the signing, following long and complex negotiations, of the deed of purchase of Parliament’s present site in Brussels. This has enabled us not only to hold plenaries in Brussels, but to cope with the successive enlargements. I also managed to secure the agreement that made possible our present buildings in Strasbourg.

However, the moment with the highest emotional charge was, surely, that of my final speech as President of the European Parliament, before the European Council in Maastricht. In that speech, I called on the heads of state and government meeting there to act together to bring about the European Union, and I expressed with all firmness Parliament’s positions in favour of a more democratic and effective Union. The outcome of the IGC allowed us to conclude that our voice had been heeded. A new stage had been opened up in the construction of Europe, which, it is to be hoped, will now, after Amsterdam, Nice and the constitution, come to fruition in the Treaty of Lisbon.