GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, trafficking in human beings is a serious violation of human rights which is akin to slavery. It is a form of slavery which, however, mainly affects women, as Mrs Fraisse has already stated. It is not only about enforced labour, but mainly about the granting of sexual services and forced marriages. It is therefore to be welcomed that the EU’s Framework Decision, following the UN’s Palermo protocol, contains a common definition of trafficking in women which is as broad as possible, thus covering all forms of trafficking in human beings. However, we do not achieve anything with a common definition on paper if no concrete measures are put in place to trace the perpetrators and accessories, and to offer the victims the necessary legal protection. What measures? First of all, it is necessary for the victims of trafficking in human beings, once they have reported their case, not to run the risk of being evicted from the country prematurely because they are residing there unlawfully. Actual legal protection and personal support can only be brought about when they obtain an interim residence permit which enables them to take part in their trial. Secondly, it is necessary for a specific deterrent to be put in place to combat the complicity of officials on duty, such as police and customs officers, since they play a key role, whether they turn a blind eye or effectively fight the trafficking in human beings. In short, the Framework Decision to fight trafficking in human beings does reflect the political will of the Member States to tackle trafficking in human beings, but it remains to be seen whether this problem is granted sufficient priority in practice on the agenda of both national and European cooperation at judicial and at police level. I would therefore call for periodic reports from the Council and the Commission to this Parliament, so that we can keep a finger on the pulse and can highlight in good time the need to intensify that policy. Finally, I should like to comment on Mrs Karamanou’s report on child pornography. I remain in doubt as to whether the definition is worded correctly since it is inadequate in the legal detailing and is too broad, and therefore opens the way for a witch-hunt approach. I am therefore seriously considering abstaining from voting on this matter.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, I wish to begin by congratulating both the Commission and the rapporteur on a really excellent report on a very important subject. Without doubt, there is a lot of xenophobia and racism in our societies or, in any case, a fear of that which comes from outside. There is extensive mistrust. It is believed that people from other countries will come and take our jobs when, in reality, the situation is quite the opposite. Those who come from other countries have, to the greatest degree, contributed, and go on contributing, to the prosperity we enjoy. I can speak from my own experience. I was born after the war and grew up on a housing estate whose residents mainly came from Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Finland. Approximately half of my neighbours had arrived as immigrants from other countries. They contributed to Swedish prosperity, just like everyone else. We should not have had the prosperity we enjoy today if these people, together with the rest of us, had not contributed to it. We are now in another position. We have, firstly, a refugee policy and, secondly, an immigration policy. We must develop the refugee policy together, and it must be based upon international conventions. Europe must be a refuge for people being persecuted and in danger of being killed in other countries. We must have a humane refugee policy for which we take joint responsibility. Immigration policy is something else. It concerns people who are not in danger of being killed in their own countries but who would like to come to Europe, both to obtain a better life for themselves and to contribute to our societies, as they, in actual fact, do. It is something they do already, and there will be a greater need for them to do so in the future. We know how demographic developments look, and we need growth, employment and prosperity in Europe. We need to increase employment in the future, and we need people to employ if we are to be able to cope with health care and the care of the elderly. We need people, including people from other countries, together with those who are already here. Unfortunately, the fact is that people who at present come from other countries become, in large measure, unemployed, and that is something we naturally should do something about. I am convinced that we need an immigration policy. Immigrants must be integrated as soon as possible. Integration policy is important, and employment comes with education. That applies especially to women, as Mrs Dybkjaer mentioned. It is important both for women’s own sake and in order that the next generation might be integrated into society. Allow me also to say one thing about the issue that has created some kerfuffle, namely voting rights. I have experience of the euro vote in Sweden where we applied the same rules as in local elections; that is to say, people from other countries were allowed to vote. They went to the polls in very large numbers. If they had been able to decide the outcome of the Swedish vote, Sweden would today have had the euro as a currency. They were supporters of the euro and were more European than other Swedes. Thank you.

Political group: PSE
I have to tell you that the situation in Afghanistan, especially for the Afghan refugees, is tragic. If we close our eyes and think of the impact this situation will have on millions of people, we, as the European Union, should really take action. I believe it is of the utmost importance for the Council too – and I am addressing Mrs Neyts at this point – together with Parliament, to consider the question as to what we can do to make more resources available. Mr President, if our humanitarian aid efforts do not run smoothly, we will create a new breeding ground for the Bin Ladens of this world. It is therefore crucial to get it right. I would like to denounce the statements made by Commissioner Bolkestein. It is now the umpteenth time that he has acted beyond his remit. He makes statements and gives an analysis in the Volkskrant of 29 September in which he says that the Arab world is indignant and feels weak vis-à-vis the West, partly as a result of the Gulf War. But they are quite welcome to supply oil, he says. Mr President, this analysis is not shared by Mr Patten. Mr Bolkestein goes on to say that the EU’s asylum policy is not coming off the ground. In my opinion, that is a direct attack on Mr Vitorino’s policy. I would like to ask Mr Barnier to consult the President of the Commission, Mr Prodi, on the matter of Mr Bolkestein adhering to his remit, being the internal market. We cannot end up in a situation where the Commission as a whole would ultimately be harmed because it is judged on statements by Mr Bolkestein. That is inopportune under these circumstances. I think it is useful and necessary for the President of the Commission, Mr Prodi, and Mr Bolkestein to hold a discussion, with a view to the latter concentrating on his own task.

Political group: PPE-DE
I gladly agree with the rapporteur here. Yesterday, on behalf of the Group of the , I argued in favour of being able to give out this signal. I am convinced that the citizens of Europe would not be able to grasp why, however well-meant our intentions, we are today approving an agreement when the Russian Federation is bombing Chechnya and even preventing helpless refugees from fleeing. Madam President, I gladly subscribe to the rapporteur’s point of view and I hope the other groups will do the same.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, the continued persecution of the indigenous minorities from Vietnam's Central Highlands has to be deplored. There is a major problem with the Cambodian authorities who are reluctant to grant political asylum to them. They wish to close the refugee camps and to force the occupants to seek asylum in third countries, particularly the United States. The decision by the Cambodian and Vietnamese governments to attempt to implement the repatriation agreement bilaterally has to be of great concern, as is the refusal by the Vietnamese government to permit the UNHCR monitoring teams to visit the villages of potential returnees. The withdrawal of the UNHCR from the tripartite agreement means that asylum-seekers are exposed to even greater risk of being influenced, intimidated and coerced into returning to Vietnam. The Cambodian government must uphold its obligations as a signatory to the 1951 Geneva Convention, in particular by ensuring that any repatriation is conducted on a voluntary basis, and by guaranteeing that asylum-seekers arriving in Cambodia are not denied their basic right to asylum. We must stop the Vietnamese persecuting people who, it seems, have been forced to go back against their will.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, I do not want to delay the House, but it would inappropriate if I did not mark that particular announcement on behalf of the whole House. Lord Bethell has been a popular and hard-working Member of this House for very many years. His service has been appreciated by all sides of the House. We recall his work on human rights in the Soviet Union when it was at the height of its powers. He brought the plights of Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov to widespread public attention. This Parliament's Sakharov Prize is something he played a key role in instituting. He also had a direct role in air liberalisation, so he has had a direct effect upon consumers throughout the European Union. I believe that every politician would hope to be in a position in which, in their lifetime, they could have made at least some difference on behalf of their constituents. For the people of Europe, Lord Bethell can say that he has been a politician who has made a difference. He will be greatly missed by all sides of the House. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I want to speak on the linked issues of data protection and parliamentary accountability. The joint supervisory authority responsible for data protection is composed of a Member from each Member State. It is supposed to ensure that Europol respects the Convention's provisions on data protection. It has to review the activities of Europol in order to ensure that the rights of individuals are not violated by the storage, processing and utilisation of data held. It must monitor the permissibility of the transmission of data originating from Europol. It submits regular reports to the Council. The Convention itself, in several Council acts, lays down rules on the use of data and the communication of that data to third states and bodies. But to judge from the evidence given by the UK Member of the joint supervisory body to the House of Lords European Select Committee, we have reason to ask if we can have total confidence in the thoroughness with which the joint supervisory authority is doing its job. I therefore fully support the recommendation in the reports we are debating that this authority should report to both the Council and Parliament and should be available for questioning before the relevant committee, which would be the Committee on Citizens' Freedoms and Rights, Justice and Home Affairs. The evidence that worried me was given last November. Mr Francis Aldhouse, the Deputy Information Commissioner in the UK, was responding to questions about the Europol-US agreement on exchange of personal data. He discussed the difficulty of evaluating the adequacy of data protection in the United States – because they have no federal law or data protection authority, but rely largely on case-law, judicial supervision and audit. He expressed concern at the very wide provisions for transfer of data and the potential for abuse in the Europol-US agreement. But then, abdicating any responsibility for being vigilant and active, he concluded: 'I think we ought to take the view, particularly as between Western European countries and the United States, that here is a set of countries which take a pride in abiding by the rule of law and will honour their agreements. I share the view of my JSB colleagues that this is acceptable.' – i.e. that we trust the guys. I do not believe it is responsible for him to abdicate responsibility like this, and he is the UK Member on the joint supervisory body. The House of Lords was not impressed either and urged the body to adopt a robust approach to the protection of personal data in third country agreements. By requesting accountability to the European Parliament we can help ensure this, although we must also have partnership with national parliaments. A joint committee of European and national parliaments would be an excellent way forward.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, it has recently been brought to my attention that the Maltese Labour Party has submitted up to 1 600 petitions to the Constitutional Court in Malta, the effect of which is to disbar Maltese citizens temporarily abroad for work or study from voting in the coming European elections. Should this be the case, this seems to be against the letter and the spirit of both EU law and convention, in that many of these nationals are outside of their home territory for perfectly legitimate reasons. If this is true, this seems to be behaviour that is not consistent with the democratic process which this House would accept as the norm for a country which is shortly to become a Member State of the European Union. I ask you therefore to investigate whether an attempt is being made to gerrymander the electoral process in Malta and to report back to this House with your findings.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I feel that the guidelines for the Community EQUAL initiative, especially the four actions described in it, will result both in complicated bureaucracy and, paradoxically, a non-transparent structure. For example, one wonders how a development partnership will prove its cooperative spirit or its representative capacity, as required by action 2 in paragraph 33 of the guidelines. At the same time, the obligation to engage in transnational cooperation, the complicated demands of the plan and the implementation of a development partnership inevitably require large structures, as these are the only structures which can meet such demands. However, this contradicts the stated aim of the general objectives for decentralised action plans at the level of local authorities and rural areas. However, at the same time, participation by those actually discriminated against, such as asylum seekers, immigrants and so on, is rendered impossible or merely symbolic. Finally, if you consider the overall amount, which is on the small side, – EUR 2.8 billion for 15 Member States – and how ambitious the objectives are, I am afraid that all we shall succeed in doing is to prove that unemployment is a bad thing.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Agricultural aid is a heavy burden for the European Union. It is indispensable to undertake a radical review of this aid, especially when enlargement to include the Eastern European countries is to become a reality. I am very pleased that the first step to be taken towards such a review entails a long-term plan for a certain reduction in agricultural aid. It is problematic, however, that there is not the courage to engage in a full and candid discussion of how our agricultural sector is, in the longer term, to cope under quite different conditions and with a quite different aid scheme than that which is in place at present. We are forced to reduce aid to the absolute minimum, and we should have the discussion now. On the other hand, the reduction in agricultural aid should be gradual and carried out at such a pace that there is no risk of EU aid being replaced by national schemes designed to compensate for its disappearance. It would also be problematic if the Commission were to withdraw aid from agriculture with a view to using the resources for another purpose. Aid should not be reduced for the wrong reasons. - Schierhuber report (A5-0124/2000)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, the Wynne report we are currently debating represents an initial response to the Communication from the Commission on the new Financial Perspective. There is no intention of arriving at a definitive response during this final plenary. That said, I believe the response provided by the Committee on Budgets is too ambiguous. I feel the European Parliament is missing yet another chance to make a clear statement on its positions concerning key budgetary issues. Parliament already missed the opportunity provided by the Convention. We Socialists always advocated deepening European integration because we believe it is beneficial to all the citizens. More Europe means more benefits in everything and for everyone. In our view, being part of such a Europe is a win-win situation. The Socialists favour a citizens’ Europe rather than a Member States’ Europe. This is why we have argued repeatedly that citizens should pay the contributions, not the Member States. Members of this House will remember Joan Colom. He was forever saying that he felt it was unfair for a rich Spaniard to pay fewer taxes to Europe than a German manual labourer. This is what actually happens under the present system of own resources. We also believe that the fiscal principles applied in our countries must apply also at Union level. I should like to make it clear that for both the reasons stated we shall be voting as a Spanish Socialist delegation in favour of the amendment tabled by the French Socialists.

Political group: PSE
I am sorry that our proposals seeking to clarify aspects of the report have been rejected. As a result of the amendments tabled by the Group of the European People’s Party in the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs, these proposals were watered down, specifically those that: - note the adverse consequences that the Stability Pact’s implementation has had on employment and social expenditure, which would justify revising the Pact, taking account of changes in the economic situation as well as employment and training criteria; - call for economic and social policies to be redrafted so that they are focused on meeting social needs and not on company profits; - consider that economic development, high-quality public investment and public services, specifically in education and vocational training, promoting the creation of high-quality jobs with rights and reducing the working day are means of combating unemployment and social exclusion and of ensuring the welfare of all.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, the package under discussion concerns the EU’s accounts for last year, own resources and next year’s budget. I would like to express my sincere thanks to the rapporteurs, Mrs Haug, Mr Ferber and Mr Costa Neves. Last year’s accounts are astonishing: they show a surplus of more than eleven billion euros. This is because revenue was EUR 3.3 billion more than was estimated and expenditure EUR 8.5 billion less than forecast. The increase in revenue is a good thing. However, the saving in expenditure is deceptive, based, as it is, mainly on the lamentable under-utilisation of Structural Funds. A good 20% of payments were not taken up, amounting to EUR 6.5 billion. These payments will be carried over to the years following, meaning that no real savings have been made at all. The main reason for under-utilisation was that new Objective programmes were slow to be approved. Only half of the EU Objective 1 programmes came to be approved in 2000, almost two years after the Agenda 2000 decision taken in Berlin. Just 8% of the Objective 2 programmes were approved. No money at all was spent on new Community initiatives for the second year in succession. Administrative payments are in a pitiful state. The Commission must improve its ability to pay considerably. It has to bear the responsibility for seeing to it that matters are dealt with efficiently and on time. The present omissions will be reflected as backlogs in budgets in the years to come. The other peculiarity in the accounts is the reduction in the refund made in respect of the United Kingdom’s contribution. It is odd that amendments should be made to this supplementary budget that go back to the budgets of two and four years ago. Why were these amendments not made at the time? Mr Costa Neves’s report provides a good basis for discussions next year. According to preliminary estimates, administrative expenditure of the institutions under heading 5 will exceed the financial perspectives, which is mainly due to the increase of more than 9% in the Council’s expenditure, which, in turn, is the result of a rise in CFSP expenditure. Parliament must strongly insist on its demand that a separate plan showing a structure of the posts involved in the administration of this policy should be put forward. This expenditure is not part of a gentleman’s agreement between Parliament and the Council according to which the institutions do not interfere in one another’s budgets.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, the death of the Nepalese royal family rocked the world. We would like to tell the people of Nepal that they have our solidarity. King Birendra, whom I met once as Vice-Chairman of the SAARC delegation, was very popular and very well liked. His espousal of democracy, of a majority party system, gave a great deal of hope to this country, a country which – as Reinhold quite rightly says – is so bitterly poor economically but so rich culturally. The tragedy in the royal palace in Kathmandu, in which King Birendra, his wife Aishwarya and other members of the family died, leaves a vacuum. The curfew and the ban on meetings can only go some way towards calming the situation; there have already been quite a few violent attacks. The first positive sign was when the new King Gyanendra said he would sign the old Nepal constitution, his brother's constitution, in order to continue the democratisation process begun by the family. Setting up a committee of inquiry was also important as a first step towards winning trust in the face of huge reservations on the part of the people about the new ruler. The committee is chaired by the head of the supreme court, which is neutral enough, but the committee will only win credibility if members of both the government and the opposition sit on it together, of course, with international observers. So if a delegation is to take part, it must be the SAARC delegation of the European Parliament. The Maoist underground rebels have tried to grab this opportunity to destabilise the country still further. The government and the opposition must finally realise that they have to meet each other half way and reach some sort of consensus. They must remove the conditions in which terrorism and subversion thrive and that requires a common approach, not personal ups and downs. The Group calls on the king and the politicians responsible to do everything in their power to relieve the people of their anxiety and concerns and the EU, Commissioner, must send out a suitable signal. I again call on the European Commission to open an office in Kathmandu, where the SAARC secretariat-general has its headquarters, which we can use as a base from which to implement the excellent cooperation agreement between the European Union and Nepal. This agreement is an excellent basis, as acknowledged by the European Parliament several years ago. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I appreciate that in a debate like this the Commissioner has many, many questions to get to in the summing up, but my questions were specific, in particular in relation to relative stability, which was not mentioned in the summing up. The document 'Summary of Chapter 4' says 'relative stability should be maintained, however, the method of allocation of each stock should be decided by Council in order to make the application more transparent'. What does this mean? Does it open the possibility that the allocation keys could be ... (The President cut off the speaker)

Political group: Verts-ALE