GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I am particularly pleased to be able to speak today in the presence of a group of visitors from my lovely constituency, whom I welcome very warmly. (Applause) We are continuing the debate on the report by Mrs Villiers, whom I want to congratulate very heartily on her report. She has managed to reconcile the different opinions across the committee, so I believe this report represents a real step forward. In particular, it is important that she managed, by achieving a very broad majority in committee, to ensure that the requirements of the small institutions – the savings banks, the cooperative banks, the small and medium-sized businesses – are also given due consideration in this important legislative project and that what is called internal rating, i.e. the internal assessment of credit risks, will be given the same status as external rating, as proposed by the Basel Committee. I regard that as major progress. I believe it is also important in terms of the public debate to make it clear that it is not the Basel Committee, a non-elected body, that will be deciding the definitive directives, but the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers, by the codecision procedure. In that public debate I keep finding people referring to the Basel Committee. In fact, the European Parliament will decide on the final legislative text jointly with the Council of Ministers, and we should make people more aware of that. But for me the question now is the procedure that will apply. The banking sector is very keen that we decide by a fast-track procedure. I, too, believe that Parliament should play its part here and, if possible, take the final decision at first reading. However, we must create the necessary conditions to ensure that the European Parliament's rights are in no way weakened. If possible, by one means or another, we must ensure that Parliament and the Council of Ministers can reach agreement at first reading on the legislative text that is then finalised. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, this morning I take great pleasure in conveying a message of thanks to you this morning. Last week in Prague I had the opportunity of meeting Mr Ivan Pilip, a Member of the Czech Parliament. Mr Pilip was detained for 26 days in a Cuban jail for having established links with dissidents. He is now back in the Czech Republic, is in good spirits and thanks the President and also the Members of the European Parliament for their efforts towards his release. Mr Pilip remarked that the Czech public also felt great satisfaction in the friendship forged for his benefit between the European Parliament and the Czech state and Czech members of parliament. He is convinced that our intervention in particular played a significant role in securing his release. I would like to make it clear that I personally played very little part in this process so I am all the more delighted to be able to pass on his thanks.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Cambodia has been through a black period, a bloody period, a period in which nearly three million people were sacrificed to Marxist ideology. During this period, there were two people who personified the hope for freedom, Son San, the important democrat, who often visited us here in Strasbourg and who has since died, and King Sihanouk, who is now an old, ill man. That is why this country needs to be renewed from the roots upwards and young, democratic forces need to be supported. This can only be done through the communes, it can only be done through democratic local elections from the roots upwards. That is why it is so important for us to support and back the numerous candidates in the communes, for us to ensure that fair local elections are held, for us to monitor efficiently, for us to ward off, prevent and correct any jiggery-pokery during registration. As for the Criminal Tribunal, we must state quite clearly that this is not a question of revenge, it is a question of law. We must state quite clearly to future offenders that acts of violence, genocide and mass murder will be ruthlessly punished on the basis of the rule of law, irrespective of who is responsible. That is why we need the International Tribunal to have a large Cambodian contingent, so that it is seen not as a foreign court but as a court of the Cambodian people.

Political group: PPE-DE
Parliament's Agricultural Committee voted unanimously on the CMO for ethyl alcohol of agricultural origin. I reject any COM in agricultural alcohol and call for a ‘lenient regulation’. I therefore support, on the whole, the proposed compromise brought in by the Spanish presidency of the Council, that is, without the articles on subsidies. If the present German regulations were to lapse and new promotional opportunities to be created by granting area payments, that would constitute a completely new approach, one that would be neither of equal financial value nor capable of being an effective promotional instrument. The production of agricultural alcohol currently provides an additional income for many family-run farms, which thus see it as a secondary means of support. This is indeed about fruit and caring for cultural landscapes – it is also about the many small and medium-sized enterprises that need the distillery on the family farm for the important additional income it provides as a secondary means of support. I therefore ask the Commission to take on board the Spanish proposal for a compromise and Parliament's position. – Joint motion for a resolution on the preparation of the European Summit in Seville (B5-0327/2002)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, animal by-products which are suitable in principle for human consumption must also continue to be available as animal feed once they have been properly processed. I cannot understand why anyone would want to impose a permanent ban on this valuable source of protein. I do, however, support the present temporary ban on the use of meat and bone meal in animal feed. The current rules and checks must be strictly applied. Once this is guaranteed, it should be possible to use meat and bone meal once again. Another specific point concerns the use of overs from large restaurants and catering establishments. For decades these overs have been used to produce a highly nutritious pig feed. This must remain possible in future, which is why I support Amendment No 102 as tabled by the . Finally, let me say a few words on the avoidance of cannibalism in the feeding of animals. I believe that the separation by species of material for processing into meat and bone meal would be very difficult to achieve. Pigs, hens, fish and so on have no scruples about eating their own kind. I am at a complete loss to understand why animals are now being expected to comply with human ethical standards. I hope we shall remain realistic on this point, because the proposed compulsory separation of by-products by species will not enable us to prevent cannibalism among animals.

Political group: PSE
Commissioner, thank you for clarifying those points on your reform plans. I would agree with Mr Swoboda when he says that the staff currently feel great concern, despite your attempts to reassure us by telling us that it is only a minority. However, if I have understood correctly, the negotiations are going to start now, which should make it possible to bring the plan in line with the principles you advocate: merit, modernity and training. I should like, therefore, to ask three questions. In your plan, how do you intend to take account of the multicultural reality of the situation of European Union officials who do not all have the same traditions in terms of administrative management? How do you think it will be possible for everyone to manage? Secondly, even if the implementation is a lengthy process – you have just mentioned the year 2002 – do you not consider it essential to put systems in place rapidly or, in other words, to phase in the implementation in order to restore confidence in the working methods and the motivation of Europe’s officials. Thirdly, I feel that there is one area which we have failed to take into consideration and that is how do you take into account the priorities determined by the expert working group, which specified that two interfaces had to be reformed as a priority? This was the interface between the work of the administrative staff of the Commission of the European Union and, I would say, the decision makers, Directors-General and Commissioners. The second interface concerns the relationship between the administrative work of the Commission and those to whom we provide money or working methods, the methods of intervention of the European Union. What plans do you have in this respect?

Political group: PSE
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, we are all aware that overbookings, cancellations and delays are particularly frequent occurrences in the summer months that lie before us, and so the news we convey will be understood by all. It is that, in future, passengers will have greater legal certainty. When these things happen, they will get substantially better assistance and twice as much by way of compensation, not only on regular services but also on charter flights and in respect of various services offered by travel operators. It is, unfortunately, only next summer that this good news for passengers will be for real. While this is, on the one hand, attributable to the difficult situation in which airlines currently find themselves, it also represents an opportunity – an opportunity to supply all passengers, in good time, with comprehensive information, comparable, for example, to the charter of passengers’ rights displayed at all airports. Perhaps the airlines will get together and set up a desk at each airport, one that would be readily recognisable and at which passengers could make claims. After all, the best laws are of no use if they are not known about and if they cannot be implemented in a consumer-friendly way. We are grateful to the rapporteur for the work he has done. He has always sought compromise, and has worked well with all the political groups. We nonetheless have two points of disagreement with him. One has to do with package flights, where it is not quite clear what he really wants. We are convinced that they do not belong in the regulation, as they are covered by their own directive. The second has to do with how compensation for cancellations is to be handled, where we will endorse the Council’s approach, which is more consumer-friendly than what the rapporteur has proposed. The amount paid by way of compensation should depend on the time of notification and on the extent to which the alternative flights offered differ from the original travel contract. What might the side-effects of the regulation be? The best thing would of course be if the cases described were to be drastically reduced in future. If they are caused by unforeseen circumstances, additional competition between airlines might help to make them more user-friendly. This might also mean that, in addition to the areas already referred to, indicators could also show the reliability of baggage handling and the subjective perceptions of the quality of the service that the airlines provide. For that reason, there is a need in Europe for a ranking of user-friendliness, such as exists in the USA. As a number of Members have said, it is indeed the case that we could do with comparable rules for all carriers, but the fact that we have not yet been able to come up with rules for other carriers is not a reason for dispensing with them in air travel.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, this resolution expresses solidarity with the democratic forces in Spain fighting for human rights. All the Spanish democrats wounded by what is happening in their country have our full and complete support. It was not only immigrants who were the victims of atrocities; the democratic system in Spain has been held up to ridicule, despite having demonstrated its tremendous capacity to evolve over the last 20 years. Employers would be lost without immigrants. Working conditions are so hard and so deplorable that no Spaniard will accept them. Low wages, the lack of housing – some are living in cardboard huts – the lack of access to social services and the de facto system of apartheid are abominable and unacceptable and are not worthy of the respect which every human being deserves. What happened at El Ejido is the result of inadmissible racist and xenophobic practices in Europe today. For four days, the immigrants were collectively hounded. Women and children were beaten. Fleeing from all quarters, hundreds of immigrants took refuge on a hill on the outskirts of the town. We are right to blacklist Haider’s Austria; but we cannot allow little local Haiders to practice policies of racial exclusion and merciless economic domination. What happened in Spain could happen in any country in the Union if we are not careful. We all have a duty to put our own house in order. I support this proposal for a resolution, especially the points which refer to the application of Article 13 of the Amsterdam Treaty, and point 11 of this resolution establishing a link between the Structural Funds allocated and the fight against exclusion. It would be to our credit were the European Parliament to roundly condemn these events and support all proposals tabled in order to ensure that the rights of immigrants in Spain and throughout the Union are respected.

Political group: PSE
Madam President, almost a hundred years of history shows us Europeans that whenever our continent has been in trouble the United States of America has always come to our rescue. In the First World War that became the deciding factor in preventing the expansion of imperial Germany. In the Second World War the US contribution was decisive in delivering Germany and France from Hitler’s yoke and the rest of Europe from his aspirations to power. When the Cold War ended in the break-up of the Soviet Union and the liberation of countries that had been under the yoke of Central European communism and the Soviet Union it was decidedly the result of President Ronald Reagan’s arms race, which the Soviet economy and its social system could not bear. When we say today that relations between the United States and Europe have reached a crisis it is more about a crisis in Europe’s internal relations and a crisis in relations between certain individual countries and the United States. The way certain countries go in for unilateralism in EU internal affairs shows we are still light years away from a common foreign and security policy in crisis situations. Most of the 25 European countries supported the approval of the UN Security Council regarding starting a war with Iraq. Most do not accept America’s insistence on being able to take up a position outside the international organisation in matters of war crimes. We disagree over the importance of the Kyoto Agreement and each day there are talks to resolve differences of opinion on economic matters. All this notwithstanding, the basic values we tend to share and considerations of security common to us both, where Europe is becoming more and more the recipient than the provider, are a firm basis for looking to the future and supporting the transatlantic partnership and genuinely constructing the kind of action programme that my colleague, James Elles, just mentioned. We in Europe can no longer catch up with the United States in the area of defence technology; and perhaps we do not need to. We can and must, however, resolve our differences and aspire to a common foreign and defence policy. Only in this way will we be a worthy partner in matters that unite us and in those we disagree with the United States over, a partner that is sufficiently strong for our views to be heeded in the United States, whose largest trading partner we are, as we heard concerning US investment in Europe. That shows that for the United States the positive development of our relationship is important, but for us it is vital. We can accept the boycott on French wines in America if as a counterweight America places an order for a hundred Airbus planes, as was the case just a week or so ago.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I hope I will not strike too discordant a note, but it seems to me this debate has been excessively self-congratulatory so far. When I picked up the agenda and read the phrase ‘Year of Lifelong Learning’ it seemed to me that this was an oxymoron similar to the phrase ‘military intelligence’. A year seems a short time for the project. The question is: how valuable are these ‘Year of ...’ enterprises when applications for funding have to be submitted within three months and everything will have to be carried out in one year. I have been at the receiving end of such systems, both as a university teacher and when I was involved in an educational and social charity. From the point of view of people trying to do the job, these challenges, at very short notice and with very little explanation of how applications are to be made and what criteria are to be applied, can do at least as much harm as good. One can always point to the fact afterwards that the money was spent and other money came in and that good things have been achieved; but could things have been done better? Both the Committee reports – the Committee report and the subsidiary Committee opinion – draw attention to the fact that the assessment methodology used by the Commission was not very exact and the criteria set were not particularly clear. This is not to say we should not do these things, but we should do them better and reflect very carefully on what can best be done at Community level and what at lower levels, not even at Member State level or in autonomous regions within the Member States, but right down at the level of schools, colleges and universities. My constituency has just come through a serious crisis in its educational assessment, partly due to a lack of proper consultation with classroom teachers. Grandiose ideas issued from on high and not adequately and rigorously tested at the sharp end will always fail, sometimes with damaging consequences for individuals and for society. Subsidiarity matters, especially in a field like education and lifelong learning, and we forget that at our peril. Networking can be useful in disseminating ideas for best practice, but we must not delude ourselves that a Year of Lifelong Learning will make a real difference. That can only come from the commitment of the people on the ground. Those are the people we must respect and encourage and support. We are all in favour of lifelong learning, but let us not be too self-congratulatory when the evidence is so thin.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, the Commission's two proposals have to do with political dialogue and cooperation agreements rather than with an association agreement. That is why we regret the lack, in these proposals, of attention to an integrated economic and social development strategy, which, needless to say, is what that region deserves. First of all, a partnership-oriented agreement on cooperation with the Andes countries can help defuse the explosive political and social situation in the region. I would mention Columbia as a case in point. Over the past fifteen years, more than two million people have been driven out of their homes in that country, and there is an enormous humanitarian need. We need to step up our efforts in order to find a solution, with political means, for the armed conflicts, and to restore peace and social justice. The social situation in the Andes countries deserves more attention. Many of their inhabitants are still living in abject poverty. Two extremes: in Columbia, the so-called richest country, a quarter of the population has to manage on less than USD 2 a day. In Ecuador, the region's poorest country, this percentage is even higher than 50%. In the Central American countries, on average, a third of the population has to live on less than USD 2 a day. In Nicaragua, only four years ago, 10% of the poorest Nicaraguans accounted for less than 1% of total consumption, while 10% of that country's richest inhabitants took up more than half of total consumption. Malnutrition has been a serious problem for years in those countries, and it has got even worse in Guatemala. In the political dialogue, the Commission remains focused on the governments and their machinery. That is necessary, but it is, in fact, of huge importance also to involve the region's parliaments and civil society in the dialogue. This will benefit human rights, democracy and transparency more than if we focus only on diplomatic channels. Consequently, the EU should not only broaden the scope of the political dialogue by adding more partners, but should also complement it by integrating social and economic strategy as a priority.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, I have two questions. The first is about securing our external borders. I very much welcome the programme and proposals with regard to enlargement, and particularly the fact that you want to have uniform responsibilities. The question is this: when do you think the new Schengen manual will be available? We will have common training programmes. When do you think this common training system will be operational? What I would also like to request is that we should consider the compatibility of the technology being used and that we should also get Europol to carry out the proposed risk assessment as soon as possible. When do you think the system will be operating? My second question is about migration. Our objective – and on this we agree – must be to create viable legal immigration mechanisms and prevent illegal immigration. However, the problem that arises here relates in particular to the area of asylum, where, although the Commission has made proposals, final decisions remain to be made in all areas. But we need decisions to be made quickly so that genuine refugees – who make up about 10% of applicants – can be helped swiftly and so that repatriation can be arranged for the remaining 90% that have to be rejected. Commissioner Vitorino, how do you intend to ensure that a system of this kind can finally be made operational and that we can secure Council approval?

Political group: PPE-DE