Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, if I may, I shall fulminate and also express a demand and a regret. I shall begin with the fulmination: company closures, brutal and inhumane restructurings, mass redundancies, sudden relocations; these are the unexpected and, I hope, incidental aspect of Europe’s somewhat savage capitalism. This is what happens, Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, when books are written and proclamations are read about a new business culture and when there is so much discussion of business and entrepreneurial ethics. People even talk about the social ethics of companies, about ecological ethics and I have even read, heaven preserve us, about the Kantian ethics of businessmen, when in fact many of them appear to be more set on disproving the ideas of the 19th Century thinker, Karl Marx. Some businessmen behave like real predators, indifferent to the social crises they cause, to the tragedies that they create for individuals and families and to the crises they produce in local economies. There is even a new specialised area of business, which consists of obtaining the maximum subsidies possible from European Funds only then, at the first opportunity, to leave the companies, which have been subsidised with European funds, on the brink of bankruptcy or even bankrupt. We have to react against this ignominious scenario, which is not in keeping with the modern business market and with the type of prosperous and social economy that we have in Europe. My demand is this: since this is a European phenomenon and, therefore, one that must be combated on a European scale, we must emphasise the special dimension that the phenomenon of company relocation and closure has taken on in recent months in Portugal, where various companies, most of them multinationals, have announced their intention to shut down operations and to transfer their activity to other places. Some of them have received substantial financial aid to set up in regions such as Aveiro, Coimbra and Leiria, and to that end signed contracts with local authorities committing them to maintain activity there for a certain number of years. All of this represents a huge disaster for these Portuguese cities, towns and regions, where hope abounded when the initial investment was made and has now been painfully dashed. My regret echoes the words of Mrs Bastos concerning the delay in the Commission’s response to this phenomenon, which was announced a long time ago in various European countries. I also agree that the Commission should have acted more swiftly, not only by ensuring that its legislative machinery and the various directives in force were implemented, but also by drawing up a programme of action for a crisis situation such as this. Nevertheless, to conclude, I also wish to offer my congratulations, on the fact that the Commissioner has defined a doctrine and a strategy that in principle warrant support, for responding to situations of this type, at the legislative, financial and social levels. I also wish to congratulate this Parliament and all the political groups on having united over this serious situation, thereby demonstrating that the European Parliament is not turning its back on the citizens’ problems and that it can put this communication to the benefit of society and of Europe’s citizens. Such action also ennobles and dignifies the European Parliament. I therefore hope, Commissioner, that we will still be able to provide encouragement for those workers who are today without hope and that we can provide a practical response and an alternative to these situations. And on that note, Mr President, I shall obey your gavel.

Political group: PSE