GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, the European Union is about to take a major decision which may change relations with Turkey radically. The Commission has proposed that Turkey should be accorded candidate status. If the Council in Helsinki accepts this proposal, it would lay the foundations in Turkey for a new form of dialogue with the European Union, in that Ankara would then have the prospect of future membership. It would also mean that the Union would have to keep its promises. The rapporteur’s proposals allow the mistakes of 1995 to be corrected, when the European Union intensified relations with Turkey, without guaranteeing the necessary financial aid. Financial aid for Turkey cannot be divorced from obligations in the fields of social development and democracy, rule of law and respect for human and minority rights. This is referred to equally in both reports because it is important that participation in the European economic system should go hand in glove with democratic development. Another important point is the involvement of the European Parliament. Its debates can provide further transparency and raise the political and democratic profile of relations between the European Union and Turkey. The case of Öçalan – I am referring to the death penalty – raises the question of how we will have to deal with such issues in the future. There can be only one response from all the political groups in this House and that is the demand that capital punishment be abolished. It is not a question of making an angel of peace of Öçalan. On the contrary, we need to demonstrate that respect for human rights means much more than empty rhetoric, of course it does, and not just in Turkey. This House should call on Turkey to comply with the judgement of the European Court of Human Rights, which is incompatible with the execution of Öçalan. I can read Turkish and I am pleased that, so far, I have seen no reports of negative reactions from the government in Ankara in the Turkish press or in other Turkish media. That gives me reason to hope. Despite everything said about Turkey today, it is important for us to pursue the new Turkish policy of the European Union. In this sense we support the two reports as a contribution to the democratisation of Turkey.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, the document presented by the Commission in relation to its policy in the audiovisual sector in the digital era includes, amongst other things, two ideas which I consider to be fundamental. Firstly, we must safeguard the future of the dual system of public and private television, and it is essential that European public operators can make full use of the possibilities offered by the new information technologies. Secondly, cultural and linguistic diversity is a fundamental objective of Community policy in the audiovisual sector. To this end, I wish to propose that the Commission, in its action and aid, prioritise positive discrimination in favour of the audiovisual sectors of the regional and minority cultures and languages of the European Union. A good way of favouring diversity is to give particular support to the weaker elements. Similarly, I propose that Community legislation and the decisions of the Commission itself favour the idea that broadcasts of all mass events – ceremonies, shows, sport, etc. – should be considered to be of general interest and can therefore be followed in all the languages of the European Union, including regional languages. That is the only way we can make Europe into a true union of diversities.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, I would like to congratulate Mr Sterckx on his report. It is the first in a series of reports on aviation which we will be dealing with in the course of this year. We support the development of a European aviation space encompassing all aspects of aviation, ranging from delays to environmental harm. In addition, we think that, at world level, the Union must be able to show a united front on this matter. We also have our doubts regarding the restrictions and automatic responses generated by national sentiment which, to this day, play such a significant role in European aviation. I would like to illustrate this with air traffic control, for example. These national responses and preferences also hamper cooperation, as we recently witnessed in the unfortunate breakdown in cooperation between KLM and Alitalia. We will not protest in cases where liberalisation can help achieve a more effective policy, but it is a pragmatic approach and not a dogmatic one. Indeed, where the interests of public services or the environment so require, we will not hesitate to advocate an active stance on the part of the authorities. We would also draw attention to the human side of developments within aviation. This is dominated by three issues: firstly safety. We back the setting up of a European Aviation Safety Authority which unites as many countries as possible. Our amendment on widening the scope in this way has been adopted by the Committee on Regional Policy, Transport and Tourism. Common standards and inspection agreements boost safety levels. This should not be restricted to the EU. We can and must help improve safety agreements throughout Europe. One is led to believe that lower costs as a result of liberalisation only have benefits. This may be the case for some passengers, but upon examination of recent annual reports of major aviation companies, this conclusion does not immediately follow. Personnel too experience the adverse, social effects of cost reductions. We do not want to let this situation get out of hand, especially when safety issues can be in the balance if, for example, pilots have to fly long hours. Finally, air fares may seem low, but often the overall interests of the passengers are hardly taken into consideration. It is no fun having to wait for hours because of a delay, on top of which you are likely to miss your connecting flight. It is even less fun if you become the victim of overbooking. Mr Sterckx rather feebly states in his present report that information on these situations must be made available to passengers. A fat lot of good that will do them. Passengers have rights and, more than anything, they have the right to be informed at the time when a problem arises. As I understand it, airports will be installing notice boards this summer on which they will display passenger rights in the event of delays, for example. This is a step in the right direction. It would be better still if the amendment on passengers’ right to information tabled by the Group of the were to be adopted in addition. We are always harping on about consumer interests, well, here is one.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, it is important that we, as a House, are not rushed into precipitate action by the activities of a few journalists. As I understand it, this supposed story relates to a memo dated 21 May 2002. The reform process has come a long way since then, under the watchful eye of our Committee on Budgetary Control, which Mr Kinnock will no doubt address on this issue. It seems to us that, taking into consideration the Casaca report which has dealt with many of these issues and the contributions to it, the matter is in fact being dealt with. I understand that the author of the memo referred to, Mr Muis, is due to attend the Committee on Budgetary Control meeting this week and I suggest that members of that committee ask him whether he would write the same kind of memo today as he wrote in May of last year. It would seem that the process has come a long way forward and this is probably a storm in a teacup. (Applause)

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, the fight against international terrorism is the EU's greatest challenge. In my London constituency yesterday British police arrested eight British citizens of Pakistani descent with half a tonne of bomb-making material. We need much stronger measures to combat this scourge, and my party, the British Conservatives, will even accept the appointment of a counter-terrorist coordinator if this can be shown to improve security. I also fully support cooperation between law-enforcement, judicial and intelligence services and agencies, not just within the EU, but globally with allies such as the USA, and with other powers such as Russia and China which have their own domestic Islamist problems in Chechnya and with Uighur minority and terrorists who are connected to Al Qaeda. British Conservatives reject the European arrest warrant and do not accept that this problem has anything to do with Third World poverty, as many terrorists come from wealthy middle-class educated backgrounds. Indeed, the poorest areas of the world like Africa have themselves been victims of foreign terrorism, as we saw in the embassy bombings in Kenya. We need strict enforcement of legislation on combating money laundering and on the freezing of terrorist assets, and the ratifying of the Convention on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters concerning the monitoring of bank accounts. Europol's anti-terrorist unit needs beefing up, but we do not need a European public prosecutor, and the UK is wise to stay out of Schengen and control its own borders. The European public fully accepts that security comes first and that their cherished freedoms, including privacy, will be curtailed in this fight. Lastly, I call for more condemnation by Muslim leaders of terrorism and the rejection of extremism within their communities. I was particularly disturbed to read that 13% of British Muslims support suicide bombers. I therefore welcome the statement yesterday by the British Muslim Council which has called upon all the leaders within their mosques to reject terrorism and to cooperate fully with the UK police and authorities in identifying those behind these recent attempts at violence.

Political group: PPE-DE
Madam President, if the Council and the Commission are not in a position to clarify this, then I shall endeavour to do so. The Council did not decide to postpone for a year, but a conclusion was accepted whereby if Parliament accepts a proposed amendment in this report on labelling and does not pass the Commission proposal without proposed amendments, then the Council will not accept any such amendments and will not proceed under the simplified procedure. If we dare to accept a proposed amendment, the Council will agree to the Commission’s tabling another text which has already been dealt with in the Council. If it is tabled as an official Commission proposal in accordance with our procedure, then the Council will vote in favour of it. This proposal will state, in accordance with the procedure in Regulation 820/97, that compulsory labelling is not in fact postponed but that it is allowed, for the purposes of implementation, to continue using voluntary labelling for a further year. This means that, to all intents and purposes, Parliament has been levered out, although the conclusion is such that we cannot say that they have already made a decision. A dirty trick has been used to keep us out of the codecision procedure. This is the second time because this was the case in 1997 when the Council bowled us out of the codecision procedure with a unanimous decision. We complained about this before the European Court of Justice. This time, where codecision applies quite clearly under Article 152 of the Amsterdam Treaty, it has used this procedure to bowl us out a second time. Most probably we shall again discuss renewed recourse to the European Court of Justice to protest against this illegal procedure by the Council.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, Mr President-in-Office of the Council, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to follow on from Mr Tajani’s closing remarks. Yesterday, Mr President-in-Office, I handed over to you more than 10 000 signatures of people in my constituency who are petitioning for the inclusion of a reference to the Christian heritage of Europe in the preamble to the Treaty. Quite frankly, any building that is not constructed on firm foundations will ultimately be doomed to collapse. We must not build Europe on weak foundations but on the common basis that incorporates the heritage of our continent. The people of my constituency have great faith in the Irish presidency and are confident that you will yet be able to present proposals for the inclusion of such a reference in the preamble. I also wish to say a few words about the competitiveness of the European Union, because it is a subject that will receive special treatment at the spring summit, and I should like to address my appeal to the Commission in particular. It is not sufficient to organise a summit on competitiveness once a year, and then consider the matter closed, when, throughout the year, we are inundated with proposals that would make Europe less competitive, of which the legislative and policy proposal on chemicals is but one example. This proposal is designed to de-industrialise the European Union. The Commission must be in no doubt about that. Withdraw it, and you will be contributing to a more competitive Europe. The same applies to advertising restrictions. I could name many other directives too. What I would suggest is that the Commission should declare its willingness to withdraw the ten worst proposals for directives. That would greatly enhance the competitiveness of the European Union. There is a second point I should like to raise, namely that the Member States must honour the commitments they make. I myself come from a country whose government, even though it has been told for years what it needs to do, has done nothing in years to free up the labour market and create a more competitive economy. This is where there is also a need to reflect on ways of exercising stricter control to ensure that the Member States actually fulfil their obligations. Then we shall achieve growth and employment throughout Europe.

Political group: PPE-DE
I would first like to state that there was not a majority in the committee in favour of the part of the report on a Directive concerning common rules for the internal market in electricity, the part for which Mr Turmes was responsible. If there had been just a Turmes report instead of the Rapkay-Turmes report we now have before us, it would not have seen the light of day in plenary. We are of course in agreement with the three major objectives of the process of liberalising the electricity and gas industry, and our message to the Barcelona Summit about this was clear and undisputed. It is as follows: 1) we want to ensure that consumers are free to choose their suppliers; 2) we want to guarantee that all suppliers have fair and transparent access to all networks; 3) we want to see a binding system in all Member States in order to underpin the objective described in point 2. However, Mr Turmes felt that in his part of the report, which covered the electricity industry, he should set out his entire ideology and the ' wish list in this area, which have nothing to do with the actual subject matter. His report therefore misses the point. Like my colleagues, I voted against these parts of the resolution. Because we are now involved in the codecision procedure between Parliament and the Council, Mr Turmes has, with his Red-Green wish list, not done a great service to the subject at hand here, by which I mean a reasonable and balanced liberalisation of the EU electricity market. (Explanation of vote cut short pursuant to Rule 137(1) of the Rules of Procedure)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I wish, first of all, to congratulate the Commission on the content of the position that it has adopted here, but I should like to ask Commissioner Barnier a specific question: is the Commission going to content itself with this statement or do you, Mr Barnier, and Mr Prodi intend immediately to visit the governments in order to persuade them to accept your positions? This is what differentiates a centre for discussion from an institution which is able to implement and make policy. I would like you to give me a specific answer to this question because, at the time of the Treaty of Nice, the Commission put forward good proposals and good positions, which were then ignored by the Council. With regard to the issue that has been raised here of the ‘follow-up to Nice’, I wish to express my satisfaction at the agreement that has been reached in terms of the items on the agenda. The Commission, the Council and the European Parliament have agreed that the four items are inadequate. As a matter of fact, this is inevitable, because we cannot stimulate a European debate and then restrict the intellectual exercise of extending it to other issues, as the President pointed out. Nevertheless, I should like to ask the Swedish Presidency two questions. Firstly, is it prepared to review the date for drafting this Treaty? I think that 2004 would be the worst year to undertake this exercise, not only for the reasons that Mr Dupuis has just given, but because, instead of uniting the parties in each Member State that is in favour of the European project, the election campaign often divides them. Therefore, I should like to know if the presidency and the Council are considering this issue of the date. Lastly, Madam President, neither the Council nor the presidency itself must use the debate as an excuse to do nothing. It must be an event that leads to some form of action. My specific question is this: why is the presidency afraid of there being a forum or convention that can make proposals? We do not want to replace national governments and we do not wish to take decisions – you are the decision makers – but I should like to ask, why are you afraid of our ideas, our proposals and our contribution?

Political group: PSE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, in my view, this directive is, without doubt, the most important directive for the small and family-run businesses of Europe. A good day’s work deserves a good day’s pay. But some have had to wait for it longer than others. The stronger the partner, the more power he has to make a business wait. Here, for the first time, we have a regulation which ensures that the company’s liquidity is secured once the service has been provided, and within a foreseeable period of time. I am delighted that we are debating today in the small circle, because you can see that this directive is totally uncontested and that the European Parliament stands fully behind this directive. We know that some 450,000 jobs are lost every year as the result of late payments. When we talk about job security and job creation, then we have a very important and crucial directive here which helps us to secure 450,000 jobs a year in Europe. That deserves the headlines in the press but, as you know, the fight for jobs is already taken for granted. I am proud of the fact that the European Parliament is making such an important contribution to this. This initiative was intensively promoted to start with by Marianne Thyssen, Mr Folias and Mr Murphy and we are proud of such an excellent result in the House. Payment within 30 days, precautions to ensure that payments are actually made and that the company receives the money within 90 days. It is a sensational result. Congratulations! I am proud to be a member of this Parliament.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I should also like to begin by sincerely thanking Mr Herman Schmid for the very expert way in which he has overseen the preparation of this opinion. Thanks to his knowledge, expertise and focus, we have obtained a very stringent report. I also very much agree with his observations to the effect that the European employment policy must be organised to a greater degree from the bottom up rather than from the top down. That is a matter on which I agree with him, in spite of the fact that our political starting points are otherwise very different. We have all of us raised the issue of whether the European employment policy has worked, and we have of course genuinely obtained a situation in which countries are speaking more of a common language in some areas. Unemployment is nonetheless still high in many countries, and it has almost become a persistent feature of countries that set the trend. There is a lack of structural reform and not enough ability to comply with the employment strategy. What ought therefore to happen? The answer is that we must strengthen the employment strategy by making it more open, because it is important for governments to commit themselves to the strategy on behalf of their electorates. It is important that we simplify the employment strategy and make its objectives clearer, and the Commission and the Council are both thinking along those lines. It is the correct path to go down. Rather than draw up a long list of quantitative objectives covering every conceivable aspect and then measure success in terms of the amount of reports and paper generated, we must clarify the objectives and ensure good communication. It is important that we involve the local and regional authorities and both sides of industry. That is something for which Parliament has fought, and it has now become an integral part of the European employment strategy. As pointed out in this opinion, it is both desirable and important for us to involve the national and regional parliaments so as to broaden the public debate and enable national politicians to assess the employment strategy, see what is being done in other countries and learn from their experiences. On the other hand, I think that open coordination should continue to be intergovernmental, and it must be flexible. Employment policy is a national competence, and that is a fact that must not be changed by the back door. It is therefore important that no change be made by the back door to the character of employment policy by, for example, giving Parliament the right of co-decision. That is not something we can support. It is also essential to ensure coordination with economic policy. Success in employment policy will of course be synonymous with success in economic policy. Many countries struggle with large budget deficits which they would not have at all if they were to abolish large-scale unemployment. There must therefore, of course, be better coordination, and I am able to welcome the initiatives the Commission is working on in this area.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, let me thank the rapporteur for the great commitment she has shown in this matter. Last year, nearly 43,000 people were killed on the road networks of the EU. One of the main reasons for this was the use of alcohol. There is no getting away from this fact. Six years in the European Parliament have given me great respect for the fact that we have tremendously differing views on many issues, but we should all agree that alcohol and driving never go together. Despite this, people are killed every day on the road networks of the EU because of this precise combination. We can also entertain very different opinions as to whether we should have common rules within the EU or whether each country should solve this problem on its own. Allow me to point out two things for those who are in two minds about this issue. My first point is that no EU country would find it acceptable if another Member State tolerated a situation in which a train driver, an airline pilot flying an aeroplane with 300 passengers on board or a sea captain responsible for the safety of 1000 people or were to drink alcohol before he or she assumed responsibility for his or her passengers. Why is it, then, that we do not impose the same requirement on those who drive on our roads? The other point I want to make is that 95% of fatal traffic accidents actually take place on the roads. All I want is that we should take the problem of these 95% as seriously as we do the problem of the 5% of accidents which occur in connection with the other types of transport. That is precisely why I consider the report to be an ideal basis for our future work on this issue, which is also why I am going to vote in favour of it tomorrow.

Political group: PPE-DE