HUMPHRYS: The one thing that all Europe's leaders have been agreed upon over the years is that the Union should be enlarged to embrace countries who had been in the communist fold. At least that's what they all said. Now it all looks a lot more complicated. The time has come for them to begin the process which will bring the outsiders inside. But as Paola Buonadonna reports some of the leaders of the most important countries are beginning to lose their nerve. PAOLA BUONADONNA: Prague -- the capital of one of the most successful countries of the former Warsaw Pact. Together with Poland and Hungary the Czech Republic is one of six new democracies on a fast-track to join the European Union, with another six countries waiting to begin negotiations. But despite all their efforts to meet the stringent EU membership criteria the Czechs like other Eastern European applicants are still waiting for a firm entry date. Its people are beginning to doubt the commitment of EU leaders to enlargement and warn that the absence of a target date may put the entire project in jeopardy. PAVEL TELICKA: I think it would have dire consequences, I think it would have considerable concerns for confidence in Europe. There would be a lack of confidence and that would be the feeling of a different treatment of the countries that were behind the Iron Curtain. In fact to some extent it would keep the division line in Europe artificially. KEITH VAZ MP: There is a danger on picking dates just to make people feel better. What we want is just good, proper negotiations that will give a lasting solution to the problems that these countries have. LORD WALLACE: We are endangering the stability of their societies and of their state - also damaging their economies because foreign investment will flow into countries when they have the guarantee of access to the integrated West European market. So it would be extremely damaging to delay too long and disastrous to say no. BUONADONNA: November nineteen-eighty-nine. For democracy leaders Vaclav Havel and Alexanda Dubcek. address their people in Wenceslas Square in Prague. .It's the start of the so-called Velvet Revolution. Within days they had won., without a single shot being fired. Dubcek calls for the country to break out from four decades of forced isolation and rejoin the rest of Europe. It's ten years almost to the day since the Velvet Revolution replaced the communist regime with a democratic government here in Prague and in that time the country has embarked on a painful programme of modernisation. Next week European Union leaders are expected to give a boost to the enlargement process. The Helsinki summit will declare that membership negotiations will now open with all 12 candidate countries. Enlargement is Europe's most ambitious strategic project for the next decade. The European Union plans to bring in Eastern European and Baltic countries as well as Cyprus. Instead of 15 member states there would be 27 nations with 500 million people. Turkey. is also pushing for entry and could one day be included. This huge area would be one single market, and eventually might share a single currency. After years of conflict in the Balkans an enlarged Europe, it is argued, would bring security and stability to the whole region. Although the Czech economy has slowed down recently the country is doing its best to promote enterprise and attract much needed foreign investment. This Prague hypermarket, doing brisk business even on a Sunday is part of the Tesco chain. The company has already opened 80 stores in Eastern European countries, including 13 in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Enlargement would offer the opportunity to re integrate the Czech economy with the rest of Europe. PAVEL TELICKA: We were among the most developed countries in the world before the Second World War, and we see it as an opportunity, as an opportunity to break down completely the heritage of isolation, to be able to contribute to the development in Europe, to contribute to where the European Union or European integration is heading. It is an opportunity to influence issues, decisions, norms which have an impact on us, but as an outsider, as a non-member we can't influence. BUONADONNA: Every glass manufactured in this Czech factory in the past century has been produced entirely by hand. Like many other businesses it's now having to adjust to the harsh reality of the free market. It's the same in all the applicant countries: in order to join the EU they have to reshape their whole economies, trim down their bureaucracy and privatise their industries. And before these quality goods can be sold in the Single Market they must make sure that every single item of EU legislation is brought into their own laws. GREGOR WOSCHNAGG: They have to change their whole economic system, the whole social system, and it is not only a question of taking over the book of rules of the European Union, it's also a question of applying this book if they have institutions, the courts, the administration to take care of standards of the European Union. PAVEL TELICKA: We need to show that we've learnt the lesson, that we know the problems, we have identified them, we've got the measures and we intend to implement them. So I think that it would be wrong for me to try to convince you.. I think that we need to convince by practice. And I think that in the past few months we have been progressing. BUONADONNA: It's not just the applicant countries who need to reform, however. In order to welcome 12 more members without paralysing the EU the 15 existing members will need to agree to a raft of major institutional changes. Next year Brussels will host a new Inter Governmental conference where countries will have to agree to cut down the number of commissioners, give up the veto in areas such as industrial policy and environmental taxation and change the voting system so that bigger countries have more power. With so many vested interests at stake the process could be long and difficult. PAAVO LIPPONEN: We need to make amendments in the basic treaties to ensure that an enlarged union can work, that is, the decision making functions have to be smoothed out, that's the main task, also to deepen integration, to ensure that enlargement will not mean diluting the union. BUONADONNA: The EU institutions were designed more than 50 years ago to serve just a handful of countries. To accommodate more members voting rights will have to reflect more closely the size of each country and more decisions will have to be taken by Majority Voting. Most countries in the EU now accept the argument for enlargement but for the moment are preoccupied with the particular disadvantages it will each of them. Big countries like France want to continue to dominate the decision-making in Brussels but smaller countries such as Belgium and Luxembourg are worried about losing influence in a wider Union. LORD WALLACE: There will no doubt have to be some very hard bargaining next year in which the small states already within the community, Luxembourg in particular for example, will probably fight tooth and nail against the idea that each country is not entitled to its own commissioner or that small countries are not allowed to maintain their privileges within a larger EU. GUNTHER VERHEUGEN: I understand that smaller member states are afraid that they could lose influence but it's a matter of fact that in the European Union the smaller member states have disproportionally more influence than bigger member states. If you compare the size of Luxembourg and the influence that Luxembourg has with the European Union you see clearly that the smaller member states are privileged and I think that will continue to be the case. BUONADONNA: But even if countries don't lose influence they may lose money. Since joining the European Union in 1986, Spain and Portugal have enjoyed generous regional subsidies and they're unwilling to share them with others. GUNTHER VERHEUGEN: There's only limited amount of money and certainly after enlargement the average of the income and the wealth of the European Union will go down and therefore certain regions in the present member states will not be entitled to get European money. BUONADONNA: Germany used to be the driving force behind enlargement but its enthusiasm has been diminished by the cost of its own reunification. Germans worry that enlargement will open the floodgates to cheap labour and goods from the new entrants. And that concerns Austria too. GREGOR WOSCHNAGG: Our neighbours have around twenty per cent of the salaries of the Austrian labour so this is a problem of competition, cheap labour and people may be scared that this may also increase unemployment in Austria. BUONADONNA: This Czech town is on the border with Austria. People here naturally look to the West and for ten years they've been keen to join the European Union. But every delay in the enlargement process risks dampening their enthusiasm and without their support the ambitious programme of reforms could falter. Telc, a Renaissance jewel, is far removed from the hustle and bustle of the various capitals where negotiations go on. But even ordinary people here are acutely aware of the dangers of delaying enlargement as we discovered when we visited the Samek family. JAROSLAV SAMEK: I'm worried that it would take long, you know, and those negotiations which are prolonged indefinitely, so I think it's very harmful. INGRID SAMEK: If the target is not clear, if we don't know, and we if we just hear, okay maybe one day, so I think it's de-motivating. MARIA SAMEK: We need to have a clear target, not a hazy one, you know, because people are then prepared to perhaps work harder and, you know, to fulfil all those conditions. It's very important for us. BUONADONNA: The once buoyant opinions polls in favour of membership are now beginning to slide in some Eastern European countries. The majority of Czechs are still in favour of joining the EU but politicians warn the mood in the country could turn if people felt that entry was going to be delayed. GUNTHER VERHEUGEN: It would be a terrible mistake to think that it doesn't matter when and how we do it. It matters a lot. And I have to say we probably have only limited time, time is already running out. We can already see that in some countries the governments and the parliament are losing the support for the policy of European integration. What I can say today is that the European Union is prepared to make the first decisions on accession in 2002. Next year I think we can produce an accession scenario and can answer the question of who and when and under which circumstances. PAAVO LIPPONEN: At the Helsinki summit we will be setting a date for ourselves when the European Union will be ready to enlarge maybe by the end of 2002. But on the other hand we wouldn't be setting a date for the first next accession because that depends on the performance of the candidate countries. BUONADONNA: But so far the Union has been slow to deal with its own reforms and people here don't know who to believe anymore. The President of the European Commission recently said he wanted to push ahead with a date for enlargement. But whilst member states keep proclaiming their enthusiasm they have so far made limited progress. KEITH VAZ MP: I think we should do everything we possibly can to encourage them to join as soon as possible so long as our institutions are ready for them. I don't want to see expectations being raised in countries like Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic which are not met. LORD WALLACE: I have no doubt that in almost every single capital of the EU most ministers would like to put enlargement off. It raises problems, it's difficult, it's easier to deal with domestic problems that is why the applicant countries have to keep pushing. PAVEL TELICKA: I think we have to be ambitious and we have to say that, everyone in this process can work harder than has been doing so far. And I must say that this is exactly what I would also expect from the Western European leaders, the leaders of the member states of the European Union, including the UK. BUONADONNA: Prague first dreamt of EU membership on a cold night ten years ago when communism was overthrown. But as another year is about to end Western European governments have still not set a target date for entry. Next week's summit in Helsinki will be a small step forward in what has become an incredibly slow journey towards what seems a distant prospect. But if it takes too long it could put at risk Europe's grand ambition of a Union of all its nations.