Pierre Werner was born on 29 December 1913 in Saint-André, near Lille, to Luxembourgish parents.
He began his professional career in 1938 as a lawyer, but shortly afterwards decided to work as management secretary for a large bank in Luxembourg. He would keep this post until October of 1944. After the war, he entered the Ministry of Finance as an attaché and quickly found himself entrusted with important assignments by Pierre Dupong. Following the unexpected death of Dupong, Pierre Werner became Minister of Finance and of the Armed Forces on 29 December 1953, his 40th birthday.
Following the elections in March of 1959, he was named Prime Minister, a position he occupied until 1984, with a break between 1974 and 1979 when his party found itself in the opposition. He played a major role in the construction of Luxembourg as a financial centre and contributed to the economic diversification of the Grand Duchy. Pierre Werner was strongly involved in the key elements of the construction of Europe. He contributed a great deal towards Luxembourg being made a permanent capital of the European Community institutions (1965) and for obtaining the “Luxembourg Compromise” (1966). This compromise put an end to the crisis that pitted France against its five partners and the European Commission by setting in motion the progressive replacement from 1966 onwards of the unanimous voting system by that of the qualified majority, set out in the treaty of Rome.
In March of 1970, at the request of the EEC Council, Mr Werner took on the presidency of a special working group whose goal was the economic and monetary union of the Community, known as the “Werner Plan”. This plan, which could not be implemented due to the energy crisis and global recession in the 1970s to 1980s, foreshadowed down to the smallest detail the economic and monetary union such as it was created by the treaty of Maastricht in 1992.
From 1985 to 1987, Pierre Werner was the chairman of the board of directors of the CLT (Compagnie luxembourgeoise de télédiffusion) and from 1989 to 1996, he presided over the SES (Société Européenne des Satellites). His last public activities were in the service of the Luxembourg Central Bank.
Pierre Werner passed away in Luxembourg on 24 June 2002, aged 88.
