GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, Madam Vice-President, Article 159 of the Treaty states that the European Union will take account of the objective of economic and social cohesion when drawing up its policies. The second report on cohesion has shown that aid currently provided by the common agricultural policy favours producers in the more developed agricultural areas rather than those in the less developed ones. It would therefore be a mistake not to alter a system of aid which values production above other economic, social, environmental and land-related issues. Ladies and gentlemen, the latest proposals presented by the Commission contained in the mid-term review and the reform of the common agricultural policy could exacerbate still further the differences between the more and less developed rural areas. All the necessary impact studies must therefore be carried out before these reforms are implemented. At present, rural areas account for 80% of the European Union, and this percentage will increase following enlargement. The negative effects of the common agricultural policy, which has not fulfilled initial expectations, will therefore be even greater. We cannot do away with the functional model which has to underpin our agricultural policy. Nonetheless, we need to define new aid for small farmers, and policies to redistribute resources more equitably. Environmental conditions have to be mainstreamed. We should link agricultural and environmental polices and coordinate them. We must ensure our policies do provide for cohesion. Otherwise they could have a devastating effect in rural areas and cause a huge exodus from the countryside. There should be specific support for young farmers to establish themselves, and support also for small farmers who guarantee rural sustainability. Parliament’s Committee on Agriculture has concluded that enlargement will increase regional disparities and that targeted measures and an increase in structural funds will be needed to counter this. Enlargement and its negative effect on statistics will exclude a large number of regions which currently meet the criteria for Objective 1. For this reason we need to set a transitional period for these regions. We also need to devise a new classification system that takes account of the specific disadvantages of each region. I have in mind depopulation or the relief of the land. Enlargement does not just pose a challenge for Objective 1 rural areas. We must also remember that a kind of hidden enlargement is taking place as a result of Association Agreements with third countries to the south. Above all, there is one principle that we should re-define, namely Community preference in the general context of cohesion.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, I am pleased to support this report. I have spoken several times in this House about the recent loss of 3000 jobs in Wales when the steel company Corus announced massive redundancies. When the Employment and Social Affairs Committee held the hearing in April this year and workers' representative from Corus European works council told us that in many ways it was a model works council. It met twice a year, it provided excellent training and it enabled experts to attend meetings. Yet it failed to tell the workers that they were about to get rid of 6000 jobs even when there was massive public speculation about these job losses. This report states that the main goal of the directive is to remove obstacles to information, consultation and communication with the workforce to enable dialogue to take place. This is vitally important. It must be more than paying lip service to consultation. There must be a definition of consultation to ensure it is meaningful and comprehensive and carried out in good time, as others have said. In other words this must happen before decisions are made and not after and there must be sanctions against those who do not comply. I agree with Mr Menrad that we need a revision of the directive to prevent repeats of the Corus experience and to look at other issues he identifies such as the involvement of women. I hope that this debate will help achieve that.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, my group has always defended the principles of respecting and protecting freedoms, human, social and national rights and rights to sovereignty and democratic development. We must always work from an objective point of view and nobody in this House can deny that Cuba has achieved a high level of social, economic, scientific and technological development, which is objectively verifiable and indisputable, despite its international isolation and the asphyxiating blockade by the United States, which it has been suffering for almost half a century. This development has been demonstrated by the indicators in the most advanced and reliable studies and investigations by numerous United Nations bodies. This development also includes fundamental aspects of daily life, such as education, culture, sport and health. I regret that certain Members of this House are still expressing fury at the Cuban Government in such an irresponsible way and with so little objectivity, while refusing to condemn very serious situations in other parts of the world, resulting from the orders of Washington, that is to say, restrictions of freedoms, interference in the politics of other countries by the United States, as well as the prisoners in Guantánamo, about which you say nothing and whose subhuman situation you do not condemn. Their human rights are not recognised, because the United States has decided that they are in no man's land, but this territory belongs to the United States, it is on Cuban territory and Cuba is a sovereign country. We cannot have two different yardsticks when it comes to applying human rights at international level. It is highly regrettable that certain groups in this House continuously condemn the situation in Cuba in terms of political prisoners, opponents of the Cuban Government but, nevertheless, avoid debating the horrendous conditions of the five Cubans jailed in the United States, who are denied family visits and fair trials. Our group has been condemning this in this House and nobody has spoken out on behalf of these prisoners. And I ask myself, do the prisoners in the United States, Guantánamo, the 10 000 in Iraq and other countries not deserve the same consideration and treatment by the European Parliament? My group considers human rights to be universal, and we defend freedom of expression, the recognition of family visits to prisoners and respect for the government of each country, without political interference from other countries.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr Prodi, even though you are new in the job, you have already succeeded in creating a powerful impression. I have been following especially closely your statements about economic policy after the introduction of the euro. I should like to ask you whether, in your view or in that of the Commission, there is any type of taxation which will not require a common policy or some form of harmonisation following the introduction of the euro and the integration which that will set in motion.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, I was interested to hear the President-in-Office mention the four priorities which the Presidency-in-Office envisages for the future in the field of foreign affairs and defence. Two of these priorities also concern the resolutions, namely the selection of tools which are needed to achieve this and the development of the common foreign and security and defence policy itself. Commissioner Patten, the Vice-President of the Commission, reacted to this in his own way and remarked that the European Union is in fact extremely resourceful. The lion’s share of aid – two-thirds in fact – originates from our European Union. Enlargement is on the agenda and he also mentioned the promotion of stability, at which point I started to have my doubts. When he then mentioned the fact that the EU should have its own identity on the world stage, I thought: I would love to share this objective with him but in a way which would take account of European responsibilities. Needless to say, this identity can only find expression in true European policy. European responsibilities can certainly not be divided among fifteen to thirty or perhaps more Member States. This does not mean that there will be no Foreign Affairs Ministers in the Member States. They will certainly be kept on, just like the Ministers for Economic Affairs or certainly those for Education. Once European responsibilities are identified, they should in any event not be divided up and they should also be truly based on a European vision and European values which we share here in this Parliament. This is not about a simple bureaucratic division of powers between institutions or a power-crazed Parliament or such like. This is about a practical solution: how can we solve the problems we have encountered? This is about the fact that our policy was unable to prevent the suffering in Bosnia, which claimed hundreds of thousands of victims. That is what this is all about! We need to ask ourselves how we can prevent this. This is when we say as a Parliament: we need European policy; otherwise we will not succeed.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I am in favour of anything that leads to the standardisation of safety regulations in air transportation. The creation of a European Aviation Safety Agency, in place of the current informal collaboration between the fifteen Member States, would be the least that could be done to establish common rules in the field of aviation. It would however have taken, according to the report, twenty years of bargaining for this measure of simple good sense to be taken. In spite of the euphemisms used, the report recognises that the length of negotiations is due to the difficulty of reconciling EU Member States’ national interests, and behind these the various, even opposing, industrial interests. Thus, the report brings to mind the principle of subsidiarity relating to the functioning of airports, and insists on the necessary confidentiality of enquiries made by the agency with regard to legislation on industrial property. The fact that the differences in interests between the industrial groups concerned have not disappeared augers badly for the authority which will be granted to this agency to impose all the measures useful for the safety of passengers.

Political group: GUE-NGL
I have abstained from voting in the final vote on the resolution, which was adopted by 211 votes to 58, with 34 abstentions. The reason is that I object to paragraphs 25, 35 and 37. According to paragraph 25, the European Parliament wishes to have a review of ‘the open method of coordination between Member States in areas such as pensions, healthcare and education, to ensure that the European Parliament is fully involved in the work of the Council and Commission in these areas’. Parliament thus brings open coordination into question as a method and wishes to introduce a process that abandons intergovernmental decision-making within these fundamental national areas of legislation in favour of the Community method and supranationalism, with the European Parliament as co-decision-maker. As a Swedish Christian Democrat, I object to that development. Paragraph 35, concerning Zimbabwe, should have been much more vigorous in condemning the widespread violence to which the opposition MDC movement has been exposed during the election campaign at the hands of President Mugabe’s regime and of those who perpetrate outrages on its behalf, as well as in condemning the killings, including the continued, racially motivated murders of white farmers. Paragraph 37, concerning Gibraltar, makes no mention at all of the people of Gibraltar and of their expressed political will. Citizens are fundamental to a democracy. Two days ago, they manifested their clear and unambiguous rejection of attempts by Great Britain and Spain to decide the fate of Gibraltar without listening to the people. On this issue, the European Parliament is forfeiting the perspective of the people, and that is a serious matter. ***

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I am speaking today on behalf of my colleague Mrs Echerer, who has worked hard to secure the acceptance and recognition of sign language. Today we have heard many minorities speaking up for themselves. It is unfortunate that we do not have today interpretation into sign language, as we did with the Lynn Report. I am grateful to the rapporteur and also to the Committee for finding room for sign language in this report and in this programme, which opens the door to its being recognised. Several Members have expressed the view in this debate that sign language should be promoted as a health resource. I think this would profoundly violate the rights of the deaf minority. Sign language is not a crutch or a wheelchair. Not only is it a language used by 15 000 people, but we should also bear in mind that it is the only language in which these 15 000 people can carry on a conversation. For recognising them as a linguistic minority and acknowledging that their language also contributes to the diversity and richness of European languages, I am grateful to all who have had a hand in this report.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, I want to raise a point of order on a very serious matter dealing with Scotch whisky. A year ago, this Parliament selected two whiskies to be put on sale to Members of Parliament, to visitors and to people visiting our shops in Brussels and Strasbourg with Parliament's own label and own brand placed on the bottles. The College of Quaestors has agreed all of the conditions necessary for having these whiskies placed on sale in our shops, yet the Administration is still blocking their sale in our shops. This is a serious matter because it raises the question of who runs this Parliament – the Members or the Administration? I would ask you, Mr President, to intervene in this matter to ensure that the request of the College of Quaestors taken on behalf of the Members is carried out and that these branded whiskies are placed on sale in our shops. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I voted for the Colom i Naval report as well as the one on the budget. The Commission representative said in conclusion: “this is a wonderful position to be in for Christmas”. Well, I hope that next year too we will vote on the 2001 budget a few days before Christmas, with at least an equivalent increase with regard to this year’s budget. Let us therefore hope that this type of Christmas present will become a tradition. - 2000 Budget

Political group: PPE-DE
With the proposal for a directive addressed in this report, the Commission is seeking to supplement the Statute for a European Cooperative Society with regard to the involvement of employees. In addition to the legal and institutional issues involved in this entire process, we need fundamentally to adapt its content on reconciling employee participation and rights in European Cooperative Societies. The rapporteur broadly accepts the Commission’s proposals and confines himself to tabling a limited number of new elements, specifically concerning: gender balance, Corporate Social Responsibility and the level of protection afforded to employee representatives, which must be the same as that afforded to employee representatives at national level. There is also a proposal to remove the clause that would allow Member States not to implement the system of employee participation in the event that a European Cooperative Society is established by the merger of two cooperatives, which would clearly call employee rights into question. It is therefore appropriate to remove this clause.

Political group: GUE-NGL
The EPLP has voted for the Van Lancker report on the social agenda because there are many positive aspects to this report on the European social agenda and this text will inform the Nice summit and the Commission work programme, but is not legislative. However, there are several areas of concern where new legislative measures are being proposed. In some, these relate to tasks which are best tackled at Member State level, or are premature in that legislation recently passed has not yet had time to bed down and be evaluated. In a number of places – Paragraphs 14a, 14b and 14c – the EPLP could not support the call for 'tax and legislative measures' and 'directives' for the reasons stated above. On the right to strike, the EPLP has abstained. The EPLP feels that this is already dealt with by Member State legislation and is also covered in the Charter of Fundamental Rights. The EPLP could not support the call for a legislative arrangement for worker participation in the framework of the European Company Statute as the industrial relations dimension is dealt with in other legislation. Finally, the EPLP feels that the new directives in the field of combating discrimination under Article 13 have not yet had a chance to be implemented or bed down. Therefore the EPLP has voted against the proposals for new vertical directives, as further legislation would be premature. - Biarritz informal European Council

Political group: PSE
Mr President-in-Office of the Council, thank you very much for the detailed information you have given me on the result of the Ulysses project. One aspect which perhaps you have not highlighted is that, as a result of the division into two phases, while the first phase was strengthened in the Western Mediterranean, immigration in the Atlantic increased, and when the second phase took place in the Atlantic, immigration in the Mediterranean increased. I put this question in relation to a new project which is apparently going to be implemented very soon – Neptune – which would involve the central Mediterranean. Does the Presidency-in-Office of the Council not believe that we should coordinate actions so that the pressure on one side does not force immigration to be diverted to other entry points, at least by sea?

Political group: PSE
Madam President, Commissioner, Mr Swoboda’s report on the Stability Pact for South-East Europe has two essential objectives, one being to make the Stability Pact more stable, and the other to take Parliament’s views into account and involve it in the process of appointing the special coordinator. On this I am in full agreement with Mr Swoboda. Hitherto, the Coordinator has been appointed for only six months at a time, but now he is to hold office for a year. We regard this as progress. Parliament’s involvement in the appointment process as a budgetary and political authority is also to be welcomed. It would be desirable if this process of appointing the coordinator of the Stability Pact each year were to be a speedy one, and what the Commissioner has said leads me to believe that there is the will to make it so. In every instance, the parliamentary dimension must be built up, and in saying that I am referring not only to the European Parliament, but also and especially to the regional parliaments in the countries to which the Stability Pact applies. We can never do enough to involve members of the regional parliaments in the important work of stabilising the Western Balkans. The Stability Pact and its present coordinator Erhard Busek have already had a great effect – something that has been noted with appreciation, and rightly so – on both trade and investment, or in the use of several infrastructural measures to combat crime. Much, though, remains to be done, and I believe that the Swoboda report, to the content of which we will be giving our full support tomorrow, will make an important contribution to this.

Political group: PPE-DE
Madam President, in September the Hong Kong Government tabled a proposal for a new law threatening freedom of expression, of the press and of religion in the region. This law, known as Article 23, is aimed at protecting Hong Kong from foreign and internal threats, but at the same time involves Hong Kong legislation’s being brought into line with China’s. In that way, organisations and movements banned in communist China will also be banned in Hong Kong. In common with Christian churches not approved by the Chinese Government, the Falun Gong movement would acquire the same illegal status in Hong Kong as it has had since 1999 in China. The law would increase the authorities’ powers to control and thus to censor everything printed in newspapers, as well as other media and other published material. Such material as was considered damaging to the region and to China as a whole would therefore be censored, and it would be a punishable offence to possess it. The vote is planned to take place in Hong Kong on Christmas Eve. Let Christmas be celebrated through the withdrawal of Article 23.

Political group: PPE-DE
We think the report is very good and are therefore voting in favour of it. We do not, however, share the rapporteur’s absolute conviction that, basically, the only way of bringing about sustained compliance with human rights in the European Union is to introduce the Charter of Fundamental Rights into future treaties.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, Mr President of the Commission, it is therefore clear, as you rightly said, that the entire process must be followed from the beginning right through to the consumer. In so doing, we have known for the past few years now that cattle fodder is one of the weak links in the food chain. I can remember that when the dioxin crisis began in Belgium, in my country that is, people said: how could we have detected that? Nobody had ever imagined that something like that would end up in cattle fodder. I now ask myself if there are still a number of things which we do not suspect of being able to enter the chain but which do, in fact, end up there. And so I think it is time to set to work on a positive list and, as Mr Florenz said, to ensure that we know what is allowed to be in the food chain and what is not. That is my first important point. A second important point is this: after months of hard work, my country’s faith has been restored in the European Commission and so, we are starting work using a system that is stringent and that is very expensive, it is true, but that is worth the effort nonetheless; it is one of stringent supervision and stringent standards. The tests on cattle have shown that there are a number of cases which do not derive from cattle fodder but do derive from contamination, dioxin contamination, caused by industry and by incinerators. We are aware of this in Belgium because we have carried out a great many tests, but what is the situation in the rest of the European Union? Is it not the case that efforts should be made to monitor this in other EU countries as well, and a number of other things too? Was there not a report on incinerators by the European Parliament and should that not be in the hands of someone in the Council? Could we, at long last, be allowed to know what stage we have reached? I had wanted to ask the Council something else and I think it is a pity that they are not present. We note that the Commission wants to be strict, not just towards Belgium but also towards the others. I hear that there are a number of countries that are nowhere near as enthusiastic and that are putting the brakes on. I would certainly like to know who these countries are and why they are taking this line. Am I right in thinking that certain Member States no longer want to go as far as the Commission’s proposals? I feel that as the European Parliament we must support the Commission when it takes rigorous, rapid and explicit action. Its White Paper certainly must not be used as a delaying tactic.

Political group: ELDR