GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, Mr President-in-Office of the Council, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to follow on from Commissioner Patten’s opening remarks in which he thought aloud about such things as Interinstitutional Agreements and political will and underlined their importance. Whilst we should, in this House, debate matters in greater depth, I do also think that Interinstitutional Agreements can help to unite political will and enable it to achieve a result. This is why the opinion of the Committee on Budgets reflected its particular interest in the question that the President-in-Office of the Council raised at the end of his speech, that of how we handle the European Union’s budget, and of how things stand as regards Parliament’s right to be informed – not as a purely technical question, but because we need these debates on political priorities. We can have such debates only if we get at a very early stage all the information in the Council’s possession, which is to be discussed in the Council’s working parties and from which a result is to emerge in the course of many stages, rather than having to wait until the Council has taken its decision and all that remains to be done is to rubber-stamp it. I am grateful to you for your undertaking to make these items of information available to Parliament. We deal with different partners depending on the matter in hand, and this is an issue on which Parliament and the Commission very often work together. In matters of external relations, Parliament, as an institution, always tends to support the Commission in its work, and also tends to be willing to provide more money. In the Budget procedure as elsewhere, the Council sometimes slows things down, and so I believe that this is where a new triangular relationship can be achieved. You then referred to the subject of the United Nations, and the Commission used to take a very technical approach to this and supported its projects, but there were no policy debates. Indeed, the Commission even managed to produce a document on the European Union’s relationship with the United Nations that made no reference whatever to Parliament as the budgetary authority. I think that we have now reached a new stage of dialogue with Commissioner Patten. In our relations with the United Nations, too, we need to set political priorities, and these need to be discussed by the Council and Parliament in their respective budget procedures. That is why this annual report, along with the High Representative’s statements, represents a good step forward.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, as the parliamentary rapporteur on Iran, I should like to emphasise the cross-party disquiet about political developments there in the run-up to the elections. Representatives of the two largest groups and of one of the other groups in this House recently paid separate visits to Iran. I can see that the groups are largely in agreement in their assessments of the current situation and in the political conclusions they have drawn. Sadly, we are compelled to note that the process of democratisation has received a severe setback, in that this forthcoming election will be less democratic than the previous one. The President and the majority of members of the Parliament in Tehran agree that this cannot be regarded as a free and fair election. We share their view. The electorate, whose frustration is so deep that they are not even supporting the reformers, are likely to vote with their feet and stay at home on election day. This really benefits no one, not even the usual suspects in Iran, although they are delighted and are already canvassing European governments to do business with them and forget the reformers. I have to ask the Commission whether, in view of this setback, it simply plans to turn its attention to other matters. On behalf of the Group of the European People’s Party , let me say that we must now intensify our political contacts with the Iranian institutions but also with all the political forces and civil society in Iran. We must not only talk to those in the reformist camp; it is also particularly important that we seek dialogue – and it will be a difficult dialogue – with those who exercise power in the judiciary and in the Council of Guardians and make it clear to them that, if they continue to pursue their present policies, they will make poor use of their country’s potential, obstruct progress towards a Trade and Cooperation Agreement with the EU and, above all, thwart the hopes and expectations of the Iranian people. Also, any sustained attempt to govern against the people is doomed to failure, as events of recent decades in this world have shown. That is why I make this appeal to those who hold power in Iran: change; turn about, before it is too late. Perhaps you can indeed put the domestic dialogue back on track, so as to foster the growth of democracy in Iran.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, in recent days, I and my colleagues have been inundated with e-mails and faxes containing urgent calls to vote against Mrs Van Lancker’s report because it would be an invitation to legalise abortion throughout Europe. This is the result of an extremely disturbing false information campaign launched by the right, which must be firmly condemned. The report addresses the sensitive issue of sexual and reproductive health and rights, women’s reproductive health and the dissemination of contraceptive practices, it focuses at length on a policy of health and sexual education policy for young people, and, of course, it is also concerned with unwanted pregnancies and abortion. This issue is, however, addressed in the context of the recommendations made to the Member States and the candidate countries with the aim of safeguarding women’s reproductive health and rights. The rapporteur makes numerous recommendations regarding prevention. The governments of the Member States and the candidate countries are called upon to endeavour to implement a health and social policy which will reduce recourse to abortion, particularly through the establishment of a network of counselling and family planning services. The report proposes that impartial, scientific information should be provided on reproductive health, including the prevention of unwanted pregnancies. It stresses that interrupting pregnancies should not be promoted as a family planning method and recommends that, in order to protect women’s reproductive health and rights, abortion must be legal, safe and accessible to all. In any case, the experience of the countries which have legislation in place on the interruption of pregnancies reveals that fewer abortions take place if they do not have to be carried out illegally but can be performed in safe establishments under strict medical control without risks to health. In Italy, for example, the abortion rate fell by 40% between 1980 and 1998. Mrs Van Lancker does not undermine the principle of subsidiarity in this extremely balanced report. She does not suggest that the European institutions should take over the competences and responsibilities of the Member States, but recommends that they adopt a policy of prevention – sexual education – and reminds us all that sexuality and reproductive health are, first and foremost, women’s rights.

Political group: PSE
We know what an impact noise emissions can have on the daily life and the health of our fellow-citizens. But Europe must not come along and act as a kind of noise extinguisher to make up for mistakes in land use planning. I am not calling the general objective into question; but if our action is to be effective, it must be pragmatic, like the action we took on air quality. It is not up to Europe to introduce unilateral standards and impose them on everybody throughout its territory with no regard for specific local conditions. Europe is already intervening in relation to tyres, aircraft engines, road surfaces... It is important for the measures to take account of these territorial disparities. Europe must do more to make the Member States aware of their responsibilities here, it must urge the local authorities to take the necessary measures on the basis of the local situation, rather than deciding on their behalf. In this case I subscribe to the principle of subsidiarity. Let us take airports as an example: it would be ineffective to set uniform noise limits for all airports. Conditions vary widely from one airport to another. Each airport is unique (runway configuration, distribution of traffic and so forth). The impact of aircraft noise differs from one airport to another and it would make more sense to take measures to reduce noise emissions at national, regional and local levels. Moreover, it seems quite incredible to find no distinction drawn between international and regional airports! Nor should we forget that airports are important to the area concerned. Air transport infrastructure is a vital factor in industries' choice of where to locate their plant, and therefore vital in terms of jobs too. Let me also remind you that the title of the directive is 'Noise evaluation and management'. So evaluation comes before management. How can one think of fixing limit values without first carrying out a precise, horizontal study, based on agreed, common evaluation criteria? Furthermore, the first stage would be to set up a system for evaluating noise levels in the different Member States and to draw exact noise maps region by region. Only when this information is available should Member States be encouraged to formulate an effective action plan, working together with all the local authorities and elected representatives.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the Temporary Committee on Foot and Mouth Disease has had some important observations to make on the handling of last year's crisis. It has defined necessary strategies for the future, which also incorporate important suggestions for the legislative work on which we are about to embark. Taken as a whole, this is a good result for cooperation across group lines, for which I wish especially to express warm thanks to the rapporteur, Mr Kreissl-Dörfler, and to the committee chairman, Mrs Redondo Jiménez. There is no doubt that the primary and principal requirement in animal husbandry, to be adhered to in the areas of breeding, veterinary health, hygiene and prophylaxis, is that keeping a system of animal husbandry as self-contained as possible can make an important contribution to the protection of animals and also to their health and to that of human beings. I do believe, though, that public debate must also pay closer attention to the need for a distinction to be drawn between epizootics that endanger human health, and epidemics in which we are exclusively concerned with the health of animals and with their welfare and with the protection of valuable stocks. Despite last year's crisis, let us not forget that it was in the control of epizootics hazardous to human health that past decades saw great successes achieved by dint of massive economic efforts on the part of all concerned. In fact, it was and still is absurd that the practice of vaccination against foot and mouth disease was stigmatised in the public eye at the same time as prophylactic measures, including treatment and vaccination of animals, are in daily use as part of the necessary repertoire of modern and responsible husbandry of many animal species. What are we supposed to do if the worst comes to the worst? Are we supposed to use protective emergency vaccination at the right moment? I would add flexibility in ring-vaccination. Vaccination and testing should, in principle, be the primary option and should become standard practice. The trade restriction should be reduced to three months at most, as advised by the Scientific Committee as long ago as 1999. I will add one very important point, quite without reference to the forthcoming legislative work. If all the participants in the market could agree among themselves that infected farms that wanted, and were obliged, to avail themselves of these new tools, would not be left high and dry and would not end up enduring the scorn of the market if they used this strategy for the future, then we could save ourselves all this bother. I believe that what is needed is to achieve social consensus on the part of everyone involved. If that is done successfully, we will have been able to develop a strategy for the future capable of encompassing the protection and health of animals and enjoying acceptance on the part of society.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I would just like to say that our group fully supports Mr Wurtz’s proposal and wishes to add Argentina to the topical and urgent debate. We must, of course, discuss Argentina since it is an urgent subject and urgent subjects do not always take the form of a speech. Events have occurred that I, for example, do not see in the same way as Mr Wurtz. Events have taken place, complaints have been made about what has happened in Afghanistan, and it is Parliament’s role to discuss these and to try to clarify the situation. I therefore feel that it is absolutely necessary to open up the debate on both Argentina and Afghanistan as soon as possible, instead of postponing this subject until September. If, at the end of the debate, we need to put a question to the Commission or the Council, all well and good: we will continue the debate in September or October with a question to the Council and the Commission.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, could I perhaps invite the rapporteur to present his oral amendment to 335? It was agreed with the rapporteur that the word ‘and’ would be replaced by ‘or’. That is an extremely minor oral amendment, and I know that the rapporteur is in agreement with this.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, every time there is a disaster of this kind people say it must never happen again. In reality we can never stop accidents happening at sea, but it is incumbent upon us all to learn the lessons whenever an incident of this kind takes place and apply those lessons to reduce risks in future. The 'Erika' incident was serious especially for the people of Brittany most closely affected, but it was devastating for the wildlife of much of Europe. Some say that it is the worst accident that has ever befallen the bird life of this part of Europe. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds believes that as many as 400,000 birds, perhaps mainly guillemots, may have died. The pictures many of us will have seen of oil-soaked birds being put down by veterinary officials were both distressing and tragic. We all want the highest standards for ships whatever flag they may be flying. We need to enforce the regulations and ensure that the 'polluter pays' principle is applied so that financial penalties and some incentives are used to put pressure on both ship operators and oil companies to ensure that best practice is introduced. I agree with every word the Commissioner said in her remarks, but the question is, how long will it take to ensure that measures are introduced to deal with the problem in the way she proposes? As a politician she needs to remind her officials how difficult it would be were she to have to come back to this Parliament in a year, were a similar incident, just as devastating, to take place, if some of the measures she has proposed today were simply still remaining as fine words and she had not had the chance to put them into practice. The thought of an incident of this kind occurring in the near future should concentrate her mind and the minds of her officials wonderfully.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, I am speaking today on behalf of Mr Evans, who is the shadow rapporteur for the Group. He very much regrets that he cannot be here today. We have presented some amendments to these reports, with the general aim that they should provide more encouragement for free trade. In the last few years, the European Union has rightly focused on the need for greater competition and consumer choice and has often used its powers to great and beneficial effect. Increased free trade and the reduction of unfair subsidies have been a most positive result. Just as policies of this kind produced handsome rewards for businesses and consumers when my country, under a Conservative government, rediscovered and pioneered these practices in the 1980s, they are now doing the same in the rest of the European Union. Encouraging greater competition is an enormous task. For the first three decades after the Second World War, state aid and protectionism were less controversial. It is still difficult to combat these traditional ideas and entrenched interests, especially in a climate where the opponents of free trade often have the catchier slogans. We are most fortunate that we have, in Commissioner Monti, someone who is convinced that the opening of markets and the freeing of trade is in everyone's interest. We are most grateful to him for his persistent and hard work in combating anything, be it cartels or subsidies, that impedes the operation of a fair market. The report by Mr Herzog concerns the newly-introduced scoreboard for state aid. This is a most useful tool. We fully support its introduction and are anxious that it should be used enthusiastically. It is most encouraging to note that it points to a decline in state aid, although we would like to see a further decrease. The disparities between countries show that some Member States provide up to three times as much state aid as others. It is our hope that the scoreboard will serve as an encouragement to Member States to continue and accelerate their reforms and that the scoreboard will also assist the reforms of the new Member States after their accession in 2004. Mr Lipietz's report focuses on general competition policy and we are pleased to see that it reflects many of our concerns. In particular, the report highlights the lack of progress in the liberalisation of the gas and electricity markets and urges action in the opening up of European markets in energy, transport and postal services. The report rightly congratulates Commissioner Monti and his staff on their approach. We in this Parliament should urge him further along the path he has chosen to take. I would like to conclude by commending the continuation of the European Union's policies in these areas to Parliament. I hope Parliament will support our amendments and I look forward to even greater progress in the years to come.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, the representatives of the country holding the Presidency have stated, in various connections, that we shall be adopting the practice of qualified majority decision-making on the subject of a common foreign and security policy also, and, evidently, since Cologne, on a common defence policy as well. I would ask the Minister how the country holding the Presidency is preparing for the adoption of the practice of qualified majority voting in the areas of foreign and security policy and defence policy.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, the role of NSAs – non-state actors – in helping development has been acknowledged and I agree with Commissioner Nielson in what he said. If you look at the United Nations, there are 72 000 registered NGOs drawing EUR 7 billion every year. Certainly, the NGOs have got their act together. They know what to do, where to go and source the founds. On the other hand, private companies – and they are non-state actors too – do not enjoy the same status, privilege or funding. I am very much in favour of tilting the balance to established private corporations with a good track record in development and in developing countries, so that they may also receive aid that would be very well utilised. We also have two categories that the EU has never considered. I know they are slightly off-track and perhaps Parliament has discussed this. One of them is service clubs, such as Rotary Clubs, which do a fantastic job at a very low cost. Others are missionaries, particularly in Africa. Very selective use of mission work in developing countries can bring substantial benefit to the very poorest in these countries for very low sums of money. I have personal experience of both Rotary Clubs and missionaries working in East Africa for very little money. They provide substantial support for local communities. But today I am going to focus on accountability. It is known that a large percentage of money received by non-state actors, particularly NGOs, is spent on administration, including high salaries, first- or club-class fares, and bills for expensive hotels. There are so many seminars which now, with information technology, are totally unnecessary. Transparency International is supposed to monitor the role of such bodies, but it has not done the job it is supposed to have done. I am pointing out these things for this Parliament and for Commissioner Nielson to put at the back of their minds because much has already been said and will be said. But I want to highlight one thing and I hope Commissioner Nielson will take note of this. Whenever the EU gives any aid to any poor country, please let us inform the population what we are doing: how much money we are giving for each sector and to which actors or players or stakeholders this money is being given. Because the poor will be the best invigilators, the best inspectors, the best reporters to our EU delegations if they find that this EU money is being misused. If money has been given to the government through budgets and not spent in an appropriate manner the people will know and will report. If money is given to NGOs and it is not utilised people will know. But if they do not know what the EU gives, for what sectors, there is no inspection, there is no vigilance and there is no feedback. I want to say one last thing. There is aid fatigue and it is important that whatever the EU gives, which is very generous, it is spent well. I wish Commissioner Nielson much luck in what he is doing. He has my full support.

Political group: PPE-DE