GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, since it is already after 10 p.m., I will get straight to the point without any preliminaries. We Social Democrats have repeatedly said, over these past months, that the priority for us – over and above the media’s one-day wonders such as calls for resignations – is the issue of how to bring about structural changes in the Commission and in relations between the Commission and OLAF. In my view, this position remains fundamental to our policies. Of course we can discuss the Commissioners’ individual political responsibility – I have no objection to that – but in light of all that we have learned from the Eurostat affair, we have to recognise first and foremost that we must put the Commissioners in a position to exercise this political responsibility in the first place. After all, what we encountered in this particular instance were hair-raising conditions as regards responsibilities, structures and information processes. One thing I am pleased about, although I do not endorse it politically: I am pleased to see that it establishes clarity. Admittedly, there is the amendment proposed by the Liberals – I can assure Mr Mulder that I would be happy to talk about this – which, as it were, flies the flag for political responsibility. At the same time, however, I welcome the clarity with which the Liberals propose a deletion, namely of the very paragraph in the Casaca report which calls for the directorates-general to answer to the Commissioners at long last. That is a clear alternative. Structural changes are needed so that we do not face the problem, every five years, of which Commissioner we call upon to resign, while the apparatus is allowed to carry on blithely as before. That is not the alternative that we Social Democrats want to see, to put it bluntly. That does not mean that all that glitters in the Commission is gold, however. Frankly, the opposite has generally been true. The things we have witnessed there: we have been presented, to great fanfare, with a proposal which now finally states in writing that the officials must inform the Commissioners about any landmines that might be lying around. Well, that is wonderful, I must say. I was under the impression that this was already standard administrative practice. If we have to put this in writing from the outset, what does that say about conditions in place? That is one thing that has absolutely astounded me – although perhaps I should not have been too surprised. I think we really have to say that there must be an end to the Commission always coming up with too little too late. We are fed up with it; Mr Bayona de Perogordo has already mentioned the 2002 discharge. By then, if you do not mind, you have to come up with the goods. As I have said before, if you fail to do so, we can look forward to some entertaining days together between now and the end of your term in office!

Political group: PSE
Madam President, this is exactly what we feared when the Friday sitting was done away with – that we would no longer be able to do our work on Thursday afternoon either. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE
Madam President, given that the Chairman of the Joint Parliamentary Committee is present, I should like to respond immediately to my fellow Member by saying that we are indeed going to hold a meeting of the Joint Parliamentary Committee this week, and I shall immediately contact the Ambassador, who is scheduled to visit us on Thursday, to see if he can offer some response to these questions as early as the Thursday sitting, and I am perfectly willing to invite my fellow Member to take part in our proceedings on Thursday morning.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, my group certainly welcomes this report and will not be supporting the alternative resolution. We consider it to be a thorough and wide-ranging piece of work that highlights many positive points about the state of human rights within the European Union, even if many parts of it make extremely uncomfortable reading. As others have said, it is essential that we look at ourselves very critically, at least as carefully as we have been looking at accession countries and indeed third countries. We are critical about the human rights records of other governments, but seem very unwilling to criticise when it comes to the European Union itself. I want to pick out some examples, such as the treatment of the Roma people. My country sees no problem in sending the Roma back to their countries of origin. It threatens to break up families. It lays on special chartered aircraft in order to deport them en masse and there is no follow-up to see what happens to them when they get back to their countries of origin. And yet we have criticised accession countries heavily for their treatment of the Roma people. Mention has already been made of the asylum issue. When you read the comments in the explanatory statement, about my own Member State and others, many of them are critical. The UK Government, for example, recently introduced a human rights act. All proposed legislation is to be benchmarked against that act. Yet virtually everything that comes through is stamped as being fully compatible, even though it is obviously not. I hope that in Conclusion 9, where we refer to the Commission's decision to review its own legislative proposals against the criteria of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, the Commission will be more rigorous in this than some Member States. The comments about the accountability of police services make very uncomfortable reading, particularly when we are concerned with the core standards that people should expect across the European Union in, for example, the implementation of the European arrest warrant. I know that this report will be at least a recognition of some of the battles being fought in my own country by organisations such as INQUEST, where families are still trying to find out after many years what exactly happened when family members died in police custody, yet nothing is being made public and there is no proper retribution. We welcome many of the recommendations in this report, particularly Conclusion 5, where we are looking at this report being incorporated in future into an early warning system on Articles 6 and 7 of the European Union Treaties, picking up petitions we have also had in the Committee on Petitions.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, I thank Mr Solana for his extremely interesting statement. But reading between the lines, as one should, it is fairly clear that not much progress is being made to reform the Council. Perhaps it is quite unrealistic to think that there could be progress before the problems are dramatised with the presence of 25 or so ministers at the table. But, frankly, I find it extraordinary that Mr Solana and Mr Blair and several others can float the idea of creating an executive committee formed out of the Council presidency without referring to the role of the European Commission. It would be best to be blunt here. The imposition of a board of directors of the Council would steal the Commission's right of initiative and destroy its critical role in identifying and expressing the common interests of all the Member States. It is only the Commission that can ensure the equality of all the states. As to the question of the presidency, no debate could be complete without considering whether it would be the proper thing, in the end, to let the Commission chair the ordinary meetings of the Council, while letting Mr Solana chair the Foreign Affairs Council, preserving the routine six-month circus for the European Council itself. That might be the most appropriate approach to ensuring tight coordination and continuity within the Council. Finally, we should refer to the Byzantine tangle of comitology. The efficiency of the Union will be greatly improved as soon as the Commission is granted sufficient executive authority to act without the constant interference of the Council. So reform has much further to travel before the Convention will be satisfied that we have grappled satisfactorily with all the important questions.

Political group: ELDR
The adoption of the European Parliament resolution on the European Commission’s report on enlargement – the progress report – provides strong positive support for Europe and actively follows up the conclusions of the Laeken European Council of December 2001. This resolution provides a balanced view of the impact of enlargement on agriculture and small and medium-sized businesses and industries. The votes have also made it possible to reject amendments designed to separate Turkey from normal accession procedure. We should welcome these votes, which safeguard Turkey’s chances of joining the European Union.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, an error has crept into the printed Swedish version of Amendment No 5. In the phrase meaning, ‘shall provide the experts with all the assistance necessary’, the word for ‘provide’ has disappeared. In the English version, the wording is correct. It would therefore be valuable if the English text were to form the basis for this vote.

Political group: ELDR
I wish to start by congratulating Mr Imbeni on the quality of his report. This report is fully in keeping with the philosophy of our institution, which has always made its voice heard in the least well off countries, through its opinions, its resolutions or specific action to improve and develop humanitarian aid. Since the European Community Humanitarian Office (ECHO) was created at the beginning of the 1990s, Europe has taken its place as the biggest donor in the world. However, despite legitimate efforts driven by historical links between certain European countries and developing countries, we are forced to admit that poverty is increasing throughout the world. Today, half the world lives on less than two dollars a day. This is unacceptable! Has the money released been squandered? I do not think so. Without the emergency aid provided by ECHO in order to deal with the natural disasters or serious crises which regularly hit the most vulnerable people on our planet, I hardly dare imagine the situation which we would have to deal with today. Nonetheless, humanitarian aid needs to be rationalised. In this respect, I welcome the fact that the House is calling for more coherent, more coordinated help and for greater collaboration between the various partners, such as the executive Commission, the Member States, the various associations or even the United Nations. In addition, apart from humanitarian aid proper, we need to find ways of improving conflict prevention because 25% of the African continent is still being torn apart by war. Finally, even if the problem of development is a multi-dimensional problem and the European Union does not have all the answers, we still need to continue and step up our action in order to lay the foundations for sustainable world development and help eradicate poverty. In any event, this was the concept which inspired the work of the Committee on Development and Cooperation, which is why I voted in favour of the report presented today by Mr Imbeni. ***

Political group: PSE
The Swedish and Danish Social Democrats have today voted against José Maria Gil-Robles Gil-Delgado’s report on closer cooperation. We agree with the general principles laid down by the report, to the effect that closer cooperation should be developed within the European Union’s institutional frameworks and that the political and legal conditions established by the Treaty of Amsterdam for introducing closer cooperation are aimed at limiting the risk of a breach of the ties of solidarity between the Member States and the risk of a disintegration in the common legal area. We recognise that, where the pace and scope of European integration are concerned, a certain degree of differentiation within the process may be useful in so far as the common objectives are preserved and the differentiation is perceived as a tool used on an exceptional basis, in a transitional period and with due respect for the fact that it is entirely up to those countries which are not a part of the enhanced cooperation process to decide whether – and, in certain cases, when – they wish to accede to those areas covered by closer cooperation. If we cannot vote in favour of the report, it is because we cannot support the proposed changes to the political and legal conditions required for closer cooperation. Removing the conditions which state that closer cooperation must remain within the framework of the Treaty and removing the right of veto and the opportunity for bringing the issue up in the European Council would constitute a breach of the quite fundamental principles according to which European cooperation in the EU operates.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, I would like to support my colleague Nuala Ahern's comments that physiological products should of course also be included. However, I welcome the fact that vitamins and minerals are classified as food products, as I believe that we should give responsible consumers the option of using them. But I also believe that the Commission should be asking why food products are losing so much of their vitamin content, for example why broccoli has lost 80% of its vitamin content over the last 10 years. I would like to make a particular appeal for labelling not just of ingredients but also of production methods. There are vitamins which if naturally produced are more effective then when they are synthetically produced. I believe that consumers also have the right to know whether or not they have been produced using genetic engineering. I would like to pick up one last point relating to what Mrs Sandbæk said. I particularly wish to call on the Commission to make sure that this report is not misused to support 'functional' foods, because I agree with Mrs Sandbæk that traditional foods should not be artificially enriched with added vitamins. But I wish to stress that we welcome consumers being given the option of taking additional vitamins.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, Mr Lisi’s report concerns the control of major-accident hazards involving the circulation of dangerous substances, particularly where the mining and transport of these products is concerned. I certainly could not vote against the report and so I voted for it, but I wonder and I put it to Mr Lisi: might not the euro be a dangerous substance which ought also to be classed as a dangerous substance against which we need to be protected when it is circulated? Without wishing to shock you, Mr President, I am afraid that, in Italy, the circulation of the euro has brought an increase in the expenditure of all the workers and pensioners because its cost is significantly higher.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, firstly I should like to thank the rapporteur, Mr Ferber, for all his work and, indeed, thank the Commissioner for his work. Some of you might find that a little surprising, as it is well known that Commissioner Bolkestein and I have not seen eye to eye on this matter all of the time. However, what we have from the Council is the result of some good work all round. I want to highlight what we as a Parliament asked for in the first reading and what we actually got. We asked for controlled and gradual liberalisation. Did the Council agree with that? Yes, they did. We asked for codecision for the European Parliament for any future steps to full liberalisation. Did we get that? Yes, we did. We asked for special services to be taken out of the directive. Did they agree with that? Yes, they did. We also asked for the universal service to be guaranteed. Did they give us that? Yes, they did. The one thing they did not give us was the starting point of 150 grammes for that controlled and gradual liberalisation. As the rapporteur said, they came up with a compromise of 100 and then 50 grammes. That is not bad going for a European Parliament to put five demands to the Council, get four of them in full and half of the other. Therefore, I would like to make those people who wish to stick to the 150 gramme level aware of what their actions will lead to should they pursue that particular policy. If we go for 150 grammes it will lead to a failure of the agreement. The Council common position will unravel, and collapse. All our gains, including codecision on future moves will be lost and the Commission will then move in under Article 80 – as I am sure they are keen to do – and give us full liberalisation sooner rather than later. If ever there was a classic case of cutting off your nose to spite your face, it is that of those people advocating 150 grammes. Finally, through this Chamber I wish to make a plea to Postcomm, the British postal regulator. You now have an opportunity, through this directive, to end your self-declared war on the British Post Office and the British people. We have all been impressed by your macho image, clearly learned from watching too many World Wrestling Federation bouts. But Europe has showed you how to maintain a viable post office offering a universal service of excellent quality at an affordable price. So for God's sake, Postcomm, get off the battlements and see sense!

Political group: PSE
Commissioner, I speak on behalf of the Committee on Women’s Rights and Equal Opportunities and I have three comments to make that are obviously intended for the next budget and not the last one, because that is in the past. First, the Commission and Parliament decided a long time ago that gender budgeting would be applied to the budget. I note that this did not happen in 2002. There is a good report by Mrs Ghilardotti, that gives a proper technical explanation of what gender budgeting could be. It is already being applied in a number of states, so it should also be possible for the European Commission to apply it. A second point is that I am pleased about the fact that the women’s programme has been thrown open to the accession countries. We would like to see an evaluation of what has been done in connection with this programme in the accession countries, and that gender budgeting be also applied in all community programmes intended for the accession countries.

Political group: PPE-DE
Madam President, I would like to thank Mr Antonione for remaining with us thus far. I have to say that this debate is not adding anything new to what we already know because, although it is true that there is a general problem where sustainable development is concerned, the fact is that, in this period, we are on the eve of enlargement – partial but major enlargement. There will be 25 countries in the European Union and we must equip ourselves so that we can achieve closer relations between the Member States. Closer relations mean more traffic and more cultural, economic and commercial exchanges, for exchanges involve the transfer of knowledge and wealth, which enables Europe to open its doors to successive enlargements, the ultimate goal being to achieve the full unity of our continent. That said, I have to note that this evening’s debate is based principally on the work of the Van Miert Group and, in particular, on the priorities which have been set according to criteria which, in my opinion, need to be analysed in depth. I cannot list them all, so I will confine myself to mentioning the 10 major trans-European corridors planned and the fact that these infrastructures have essentially been assessed, first and foremost, with reference to the present European Union rather than the future EU, in the sense that a great deal of pressure has been exerted by the countries who are already Members while those who are, in any case, already knocking at the European Union’s doors had no bargaining power, with the result that we are now essentially in a position where we do need to consider their needs. I would mention, not by chance, by way of example, corridor 8, one of the two corridors which concern Italy. On the list of these priorities, it has been given almost the lowest urgent status, whereas a large bridge is to be opened providing a link with the Balkans, whose peoples, despite the effects of the recent war, are already displaying an accelerated growth rate and are a model example of how communities such as those of southern Italy, an area inhabited by 20 million citizens who, precisely through relations with the Balkans and the East, can play a major role within Europe, can become leaders in development. Madam President, pending the arrival of news which we have not received, please would you forward my observations in the form of recommendations, at least, and, perhaps, concerns.

Political group: PPE-DE
In the discussion of the Menrad report, a lot of important questions concerning equality were taken up. I support the proposals which emphasised that young women in particular should be taken into account when educational initiatives for the information society are planned. Because I, for reasons of principle, oppose quantitative objectives as part of the employment strategy, I could not, however, support the objective of reducing the difference in wages by a certain percentage within a period of five years (Amendment No 22). Quantitative objectives, especially within the EU, give a false picture of the options actually open to the European Union when it comes to employment, nor are they compatible with the principle of subsidiarity. It is good that the Member States should be urged to strive for best practice, but this is not to be achieved by means of quantitative objectives. Nonetheless, it is pleasing that a lot of attention is being devoted to the aspect of equality. – Internal Market (B5-0204/1999)

Political group: PSE
During this debate it has at times been difficult to distinguish heat from light. As politicians we have a duty to inform ourselves before being dogmatic and proscriptive on matters of medical and scientific research, albeit with the regulatory tool of the precautionary principle for areas of scientific uncertainty available to us. We must allow research to continue in order to relieve the suffering of the millions with serious diseases and spinal injuries, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, motor neurone disease, diabetes, cancer, heart disease: the list is endless. However, the proper regulation and licensing of research in the scientific community is a matter for all of us, at Member State, EU and international level, and the present state of that regulation is of some concern. Let me be quite clear. I draw the line under reproductive cloning, eugenics and the deliberate creation of embryos for research. But even the Vatican does not ban all embryonic stem cell research: it accepts it on material from spontaneous abortions. To those who would say that it is only a semantic distinction between therapeutic and reproductive cloning, I say: I have a butcher's knife in my hand, I can cut up your steak with it quite legally, or I can cut your head off with it quite illegally – proper sanctions, proper penalties. We have so many examples of that in life today. To not allow public funding for research which is legal in a Member State is a curious sanction: nobody is forcing any Member State to make any type of research legal. Either the research is acceptable and respectful of human life and the dignity of humankind or it is not. How it is funded hardly makes it more or less ethical. Let us regulate and license research in this most sensitive and important of areas with commensurate penalties for the exceptional rogue who would put self-glory above the common good and the destiny of humankind. Wherever you find him or her, may God direct the hands, hearts and heads of the scientific, political and medical communities at this exciting but frightening and bewildering crossroads in time as we test the frontiers of knowledge.

Political group: PPE-DE