GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, there are totally opposing views on European political parties within my group. The main question raised is the extent to which they can actually represent a European public. Direct links with people exist not at a pan-European, but at national or regional level. That is where the parties are anchored, that is where their members and electorate are. The situation is in fact quite paradoxical. First, there are European parties. Secondly, there is Article 191, which states that European political parties are an important factor for integration. Thirdly, at the same time, we still have no idea what European political parties actually are. On 12 December last year, the chairmen of the , the European People’s Party, the Liberal, Democrat and Reform Party and the and the secretary-general of the European Federation of Green Parties themselves stated in a joint declaration that clarification was needed as to what a European party is. Now I am convinced that, outside this House, no-one, to all intents and purposes, can comprehend or understand this. Plus, the parties tend to take themselves very seriously. It is not by chance that citizens – and not just in my country – are highly sceptical about things such as party memberships. When they commit, it is mainly in civil initiatives, non-governmental organisations and various structures within the civil society. I have nothing against European parties. I think that they face the challenge of achieving cross-border coordination of their work during the course of integration. But one thing is unacceptable and that is a situation in which European parties exist and receive funding but are still undefined. The criticism of the Court of Auditors was justified. I should like to close by saying that I too am in favour of finding a solution to this muddle. But the solution must include treating political democratic forces in Europe equally, including those which define themselves otherwise and which, for example, are critical of the EU, and not excluding them from this problem-solving process. (Applause)

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, on Monday, in my absence and without any prior notification, Mr Murphy, the leader of the British Socialist Group, raised a question about my involvement in supporting the Danish anti-euro campaign. He was very careful not to accuse me of anything but has none the less contrived to give the impression that I am somehow under suspicion. I should like to put on record that my involvement with the Danish referendum has been entirely separate from my work in this House and that I have never infringed any parliamentary rules. Unlike the Danish 'yes' campaign, the 'no' campaign cannot rely on taxpayers' money or subsidies from the European Union. It is outrageous that Mr Murphy should have sought to give the impression that I am under investigation when he has failed to produce evidence or even make any allegations against me. It cannot be right for Members to be subjected to this kind of baseless innuendo. I would ask you to insist that Mr Murphy either accuse me outright or apologise.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Commissioner, although the European Union has helped to improve health and safety legislation, it must be acknowledged that the situation is declining in some Member States and in some industries. The report by Stephen Hughes quite rightly emphasises three important points: the lack of resources, the absence of an action plan, the lack of balance between the legislative and non-legislative instruments. The report therefore calls for Community legislation to be simplified, for improvements in its implementation in the Member States and for issues relating to gender and corporate responsibility to be taken into account and for new instruments and specific measures addressing the situation in the candidate countries to be implemented. The report highlights the need for a detailed plan to be drawn up that has financial commitments and clear deadlines for each proposal and methods of monitoring its implementation. It also stresses and does so very firmly – this is something that I welcome – the need to integrate the gender dimension in the measures to be taken. Generally speaking, women receive the lowest salaries, have the least job security, and are at greatest risk of psychological or sexual harassment. Lastly, we must significantly improve the health and safety of women who are pregnant or breast-feeding or who have young children. I would also like to congratulate Stephen Hughes on this report, which I fully support.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, Mr President-in-Office, when you were talking about your objectives for the Presidency you also mentioned the conflict in the Middle East. The Committee on Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, Common Security and Defence Policy has already discussed this with you in Copenhagen. My question concerns the recent American initiative. The American President is using a mechanism that the European Union applies successfully throughout the world. He names specific objectives, for example a three-year timetable. He defines criteria against which reforms will be measured and promises to support these reforms if the criteria are complied with. That is essentially the model that we used in the enlargement process, which started in Copenhagen with the Copenhagen criteria. That is our model for our relations with the TACIS countries and, Commissioner Nielson, it has recently also become our model for ACP relations, where we have established specific principles which may also trigger sanctions. My question for the Danish Presidency is therefore as follows: the Commission operates differently in the Middle East. There we do not establish any principles; so far we have always given aid – and on a flat-rate basis – unconditionally and without encouraging reform. Do you think it is possible that a new European initiative might be developed under the Danish Presidency together with the United States, based on the tangible prospect mentioned by President Bush of there being a Palestinian state in three years, and that your Presidency might support an initiative of this kind?

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, as deputy chairman of the delegation to Israel, I set great store by the European Union’s desire to remain on good terms with that country, but if the friendship is put at risk by non-compliance with important international rules, I wonder what will become of the trust between us. In the past, the Commission has communicated on a number of occasions that the European Union does not accept Israel's illegal occupation policy. The Commission has also taken every opportunity to denounce the illegal application of the Association Agreement. A number of weeks ago, we received a response from Commissioner Patten to the effect that 'the Member States have informed the Commission that in a number of cases, import duties have been levied on goods that originated from the settlements and were imported with Israeli proofs of origin.' This illegal and incorrect practice nevertheless remains in place. This is unacceptable. The Association Agreement with Israel has been drafted and must be observed with due regard to international law and to fundamental values. If you make sound agreements, you make your friends, provided these agreements are observed correctly.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, I want to thank the Commissioner for using the word solidarity in connection with this report. This is, of course, precisely what cohesion policy and regional policy are about. I also want just briefly to ask whether the future debate will also cover all other policy areas in the European Union which are important for regional growth – education, research and social policy – so that it is possible to make use of everyone’s ability to get involved and contribute to regional growth.

Political group: PSE
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, today, on behalf of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, I am tabling a proposal for a resolution on the Commission's report on the single facility providing medium-term financial assistance for Member States' balances of payments. The financial assistance is currently governed by Council Regulation No 1969 of 1988. This mechanism can be activated either at the request of a Member State or under Article 119 of the Treaty establishing the European Community, a provision which remains in force during the third stage of Economic and Monetary Union for the States which are covered by a derogation, currently Denmark, the United Kingdom and Sweden. The regulation and the proposal for a regulation have merged two mechanisms (medium-term financial assistance and the Community loan mechanism intended to provide medium-term financial assistance for Member States' balances of payments) into a single facility providing medium-term financial assistance. This proposal changes the mechanism’s ceiling. The fact that, at the moment, only three countries can benefit from it suggests that the amount hitherto available – EUR 16 billion – can be reduced. At the same time, however, past experience tells us that we cannot reduce it by very much, for the very reason that the last time the mechanism was used, in 1993, the loan was for EUR 8 billion. Therefore, although the increase in convergence of States reduces the likelihood that the mechanism will be used, it must still have sufficient resources to meet the simultaneous needs of several countries, should this be necessary. This is why we propose to reduce the amount available from EUR 16 billion to EUR 12 billion. This resolution also envisages the possibility of considering creating a special mechanism providing financial assistance to the balance of payments of the candidate countries. Clearly, this is a possibility for the future and therefore does not have a bearing on the present situation, but it is a possibility which I considered that we could at least examine in some depth so that we will be prepared should these issues arise.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Commissioner, rapporteur, ladies and gentlemen, this debate concerns a specific issue, which is of limited reach and importance in the Azores, not wishing to make any comparison with the situation in the overseas territories or even in the autonomous region of Madeira, just two days after the Las Palmas summit of the Presidents of the Outermost Regions, which was attended by representatives of the Member States and the Commission. I should, therefore, like to welcome the conclusions of that summit and call on the Council and the Commission to take them into consideration. This year is of particular importance to the Azores where fisheries are concerned, since important initiatives such as the revision of the common fisheries policy, the revision of Poseima-Fisheries and the quotas policy for groundfish are to be approved. These are areas in which it is crucial to fully understand the realities of the Azores and to take account of their specific situation. The Commission proposals on quotas for fishing groundfish cause us the greatest concern from this point of view.

Political group: PSE
Whilst I generally support the Napolitano report, I abstained in the final vote because I believe it premature to conclude against the possibility of having a second European chamber or Senate for the Member States. It will be the task of the forthcoming Convention to develop these ideas, and to draw its own conclusions on the institutions to be created, or not to be created, depending on the global architecture that will eventually be retained.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, it so happens that the Commissioner saved himself with this excellent opening speech when he said what we actually wanted to hear. This is how a clever and experienced Commissioner obviously operates, but thank you, Neil Kinnock, for what you just said. Nevertheless, on that day, 29 September, when the Directorate-General for Press and Communication sent off a letter to all the Info-Points, it was as if a lump of ice had been dropped in the bath water. It rocked the boat and people panicked. One obviously cannot act this way, and all of us here are proof of that. These Info-Points have only been set up in recent years, and the Commission has itself made the excellent remark that these centres had an extremely valuable contribution to make as they had a good deal of experience and could work flexibly and very close to civil society and the people, and that they were a vital tool in the European Union’s information and communication strategy, representing the EU in the field. Excellent. You yourself provided evidence of this as the Commission, and I believe that in the future too you will ensure that there are information points in the field. It has already been mentioned here that the need for information is growing. The impact of enlargement will create a continuous need for information in all Member States. People have to be informed about the results of the Intergovernmental Conference, in other words the Constitutional Treaty. This is a document more than 300 pages long, which so far fewer than 2% of the citizens of the Union have read. The parliamentary elections and in particular the attempt to increase people’s interest in voting in them are of course massive tasks, which the points may happily be saddled with. Standards of monitoring have to be improved. If it is a matter of some points operating slightly dubiously, I would like the Commissioner to comment, but clearly that cannot be allowed to affect the entire network – those sections which have acted properly. I am very much in favour of the idea that next year the Commission will seek a better, more workable and more easily controllable solution. The need for information is growing as more and more issues are decided upon here, Europe’s central point, and I therefore support the Commissioner in his reforms.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, I would like to congratulate Ms Thors on her work – a difficult task since we are regulating the future. I will dwell on a few critical aspects which I feel should be brought to Parliament’s attention. For example, in my opinion, it is extremely important to concentrate on the copyright rules because the restrictions resulting from copyright agreements and the differences in standards used for transmissions are likely to hold back progress towards a genuine television without frontiers and a genuine European internal market in television services. This would probably mean losing a unique opportunity to develop a European television industry. Citizens who live or work in Member States which are not their country of origin cannot legally subscribe to foreign platforms as these do not own the right necessary to broadcast in the Member States in question. The European Parliament has already raised this issue in the past and the rapporteur analyses it, while drawing attention to the problem as it presents itself in the border regions, where the linguistic minorities live on the other side of the border. In any case, we should place greater emphasis on actions aimed at implementation. I feel that it must be stressed, as the rapporteur pointed out clearly, that in the new regulatory framework, a balance must be struck between the need to ensure the diversity of culture and content in television networks and the risk that regulation might hamper the will to invest in digital TV. We need a flexible approach in order to regulate the economic situations which are going through a period of deep-rooted change. The regulation of the market must not hamper its development and, in particular, the development of new television services. In this regard, I feel that we should go back in the forthcoming months or years to certain factors such as the separation of the regulation of the content in TV from regulation of the infrastructures. Moreover, I would argue that there should also be great focus on the interoperability of systems which, although its aim is general protection of the possibility for users to access the data broadcast via the digital platforms, is emerging at this time as a competition protection measure, protecting the possibility of access to the market for the different operators and thus opening up unprecedented legal horizons.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Commissioner, I have two questions. The current precautions in connection with BSE have been eclipsed by the dangerous foot-and-mouth epidemic. I remember back in the 1950s, when whole villages were quarantined in order to prevent the epidemic from spreading. How are the severe restrictions on movements of animals being enforced, Commissioner? What I mean is, anyone who still fails post-BSE to comply with regulations should be taught a serious lesson using other means. How secure is the situation in the European Community regarding labelling obligations? You said that culling and the travelling ban are currently the main objectives. How prepared are you to vaccinate animals which must surely be scattered throughout Europe on a strategic basis in order to help prevent the disease from spreading? Are you well prepared?

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, in the CFP reform process, I have consistently favoured retaining the founding principle of relative stability – installing the coastal zones as a permanent feature of the CFP at least up to 12 miles and strengthening the role of the proposed regional advisory councils so that real involvement of stakeholders can be achieved. I have also supported in principle proposals to move to a multi-annual, multi-species and ecosystem approach to fisheries management and my views are broadly in line with the Commission's on structural issues. But I believe that all of the positive potential of CFP reform could be in vain if the Commission does not show itself to be willing to really listen to those who are actually affected by fisheries policy. Our fisheries policy must be understood and not just perceived as something being arbitrarily handed down by a European Union which claims to know better but cannot really prove it. Certainly the CFP to date has not exactly been a resounding success, as we have all acknowledged. That means that the scientific advice has to be up-to-date, it has to be verifiable, it has to be independent and it has to be able to be proved to be so. The cod crisis that has been looming over the North Sea for almost two years has seen fishermen already being subject to real-time closures, to swingeing cuts in fleet size and a variety of technical measures including increased mesh sizes. Their efforts have borne at least some fruit in that the improvement of stocks of cod is only approximately 3% short of the target set by recovery plans. Now, these same fishermen are faced with drastic cuts and a total loss of any confidence in the Commission and its scientific advice, with measures being proposed which could totally devastate already fragile fishing communities. I think the Commission must take into account the specific nature of this cod crisis and not tie its hands with political deadlines. The forthcoming December Council will be the forum for finalising reform proposals and it should not be used for rushing through panic measures for cod and associated species. I urge the Commission to transform its words into real action. Why not establish urgently the first pilot regional advisory council – or management council, as I would prefer – and give it the task of helping to devise measures to save the stocks of white fish in the North Sea. In that way, faith could be restored in the process at the same time. I call on the Commission to think again too when it comes to open access to the North Sea as part of a future CFP. The present crisis only underlines the fragility of that sea and the key stocks in its mixed fishery. Your own words, Commissioner, in a written answer to me said: ‘very little is known about the abundance and status of non-quota species in the North Sea but fishing for non-quota species would almost certainly incur by-catches of species subject to quotas’. I say let us get reform right and then use it ... (The President cut off the speaker)

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, every year, in the context of public health provision, we consider tobacco subsidies, which are, basically, nothing other than direct income support for the interested parties. It can be done another way. So, as every year, we urge progressive reduction of tobacco subsidies and their replacement by increased aid for rural development with a view to alternative forms of income, which could benefit workers upstream and downstream in the regions. The same thing happens every year, yet so far nothing has changed. But we must always hope. As regards the NGOs, we are always advocating support for them. We want to know, though, what is done with the money that is granted to them, which is only right and proper. We therefore demand that information on them be made accessible to the public on a regular basis. Only then will we have a chance to check whether our financial support for them is justified. Believe me, we already find it extraordinarily difficult to get any kind of overview on what organisations we are supporting. Equally opaque, though, is the Commission's decision to stop funding the environmental organisation ‘Globe’. This is quite unjustifiable and so seems positively wilful. It must be added that the funds accorded ‘Globe’ in the current budget year were not paid out. Yet even NGOs need to be able to plan ahead with certainty in order, for example, to be able to carry on paying their office staff. The Commission's action in this regard is anti-social. Where there is political will, Commissioner, one can find a way, or another budget line for the future. As regards the agencies, it does indeed appear as if some agencies had already developed active lives of their own a long time ago. They simply exist. So we finance them; more money every year, irrespective of output. That seems to be all that matters. This cannot go on, for this money is needed elsewhere. Our task is to ensure that the organisations we support work efficiently. Efficiency and effectiveness are not achieved merely by blindly piling-up resources, but by regular observation and monitoring, on the basis of which any necessary adjustments can be made.

Political group: PPE-DE
I wish to thank the Council of Ministers for its answer. I also want to express my thanks for the work that has been done in this important area. My question concerns the remaining problems, as mentioned by the President-in-Office of the Council. These relate partly to the court system and partly to a number of other areas, for example the languages in which the work is to be done. Are there proposals for solutions or progress in other areas – over and above that of the court system – on which the Council has worked, areas in which we now see that progress has taken place in the negotiations in the Council of Ministers?

Political group: GUE-NGL
Commissioner Lamy, when I asked you about this earlier this year at a previous Question Time you said this was not possible for a further five or six years. Can you explain what has changed your mind? There are many cynical people amongst the developing countries who see this simply as a way of trying to buy them off in future WTO negotiations. Are you being sincere in trying to help developing countries? Can you comment on the analysis given by some NGOs that the least-developed countries, without capacity-building measures, without a change in the sugar price, given the fact that they are net sugar importers, may not be able to exploit what we are offering? Finally, can you comment on whether this was discussed within the College of Commissioners today? If so, what was the nature of that discussion and would you expect any movement on this issue before you come before our committee on Development and Cooperation next Strasbourg on 16 January?

Political group: PSE