GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Madam President, the van den Burg report deals with the Commission report on the regulation of taxation of second-pillar pensions, that is, occupational pensions. We know that there is the EET system and so on, that is, tax is paid either on the contributions or on the interest on the invested capital, on what is received for the occupational pension, or tax is paid on the pensions themselves. Speaking on behalf of the Pensioners’ Party, I propose the EEE system, in other words: exemption from paying tax when the pension contributions are paid; exemption from paying tax when the capital so received is invested; and exemption from paying tax when the occupational pension is redeemed. If we really want to improve and enhance the possibility of saving through pensions – occupational, company and voluntary – the Member States should give up levying tax on them. When we are young and think about our future, we should think that one day we shall be old and nobody will think about us, except we ourselves with our pensions.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I should like to give my express support here to those fellow Members who said earlier in this debate that one of the important reasons that this Directive – this compromise – is unacceptable to us is the whole arrangement regarding self-handling. The fact that the compromise gives the Member States freedom of choice as to whether or not to introduce authorisations for self-handling – this form of subsidiarity – makes the whole authorisation system a hollow shell – this much is now clear to everyone. After all, if a Member State is not obliged to introduce an authorisation system, pernicious competition will inevitably follow, which will have a negative impact on working conditions, on the social protection of dockers, on safety in ports. Shipowners will very quickly seek out those ports that do not have an authorisation system. By that I do not mean ports in Italy, because they have an authorisation system, nor those in Spain, because they, too, have an authorisation system, but ports that have a rather casual approach to job protection and safety. I think that, if we want to open up port services to competition on the internal market, we must firstly and most importantly lay down rules for social and ecological etiquette that apply to all countries without exception. Secondly, there is the fact that this Directive gives the Member States free rein to cast pilotage services, too, onto the market. That is going much too far, in my opinion. Pilotage services have an essential safety function. This compromise will be responsible for pernicious competition via social dumping, and unsafe working environments in our ports. In addition, it is a slap in the face for all those dockers who have demonstrated against this Directive several times and who, furthermore, just this morning handed our own President of the European Parliament more than 20 000 signatures to make it clear that they disapprove strongly of this Directive. I therefore call on all those fellow Members who are still in two minds – from the Netherlands or Italy, perhaps – to reject this Directive, this unsatisfactory compromise, and to set to work on a satisfactory arrangement, one benefiting not only the ports, but especially the dockers. (Applause)

Political group: PSE
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, first of all, my compliments to Mr Wijkman for his excellent report and its tangible contribution to the fight against poverty-related diseases, a report, moreover, adopted by the unanimous vote of the Committee on Development and Cooperation. This is further confirmation of the need to speed up the adoption, which seems to be possible at first reading already, of this proposal for a regulation so that it can be swiftly implemented, in line with the European Union’s responsibilities to developing countries. This is certainly a substantial contribution – albeit not to a large enough degree – to the recently constituted Global Fund to Fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, a fund strongly called for by the Italian Prime Minister too during the G8 Summit in Genoa and – I would add – which was made available in record time compared with the time which these things usually take. I am afraid, however, that the situation is still alarming and there is no time to lose: we still can and must do much more. I will not tire of repeating, once again, that we need a coordinated approach between policies on development cooperation, research and health in the fight against these diseases, including through developing third countries’ health systems. Everyone is aware of the facts, and among these I would highlight this one: each day, between 12 and 14 thousand people contract the AIDS virus throughout the world. As Mr Deva rightly said, this is a disease which has now also arrived on our doorstep: just think of the thousands of children in Romania who have contracted this virus. Therefore, although this is a global problem, it nevertheless affects developing countries in particular. So while the budget represents the main obstacle to the adoption of this proposal for a regulation as amended, I would like briefly to consider a key element: the issue of drugs, their cost and access to treatment and medicines. How can it be that, even now, only 10% of both public and private research is dedicated to studying these diseases which are responsible for a good 90% of disease in developing populations? I wonder what became of my request, which I submitted along with Mr Tajani more than two years ago, which called in this very forum for the urgent drafting of a common plan, in conjunction with the pharmaceutical manufacturers, that focused more on combating poverty diseases. Given the scale and cross-border nature of the phenomenon – now on our doorstep – these poverty diseases call for a systematic response from the whole international community.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, one of the founders of the current European Union said that, if they were to begin European construction again, they would start this time with a consideration of the people and their cultures. But the European Union, far from rectifying the situation, seems to abide by the theory expounded by Livy, that is to say, it forgets what has happened and therefore can complain but cannot put anything right. In the texts which have been proposed for the reform of the Treaties and the next IGC, not even with the most powerful magnifying glass can we find a sentence which refers to the European peoples and regions and the role that they should play in the Europe of the future. It is time for the regional question to occupy the place that it deserves. The European parties which are stuck in the past have shown that they are incapable of overcoming the short-sightedness which makes them blind to the internal national and regional realities of the current Member States. When will we talk about nations such as Scotland, Wales, Galicia, Catalonia and the Basque country, which are not even allowed to sit together with the Governments on the Council? What is going to be done about regions such as Andalucia – with 7.5 million inhabitants – which is treated like a second class country, while representatives of Member States which are a twentieth the size sit in the Council? New countries are going to join the Union, some of which are very small and we are in favour of their accession, but if it were not for their recent emancipation, they would not be candidates for Membership. The accession of these new countries, Mr President, will mean the under-representation of internal nations and regions of the current States. García Márquez said that wisdom comes when we no longer have any use for it. Let us hope that this is not the case with our political vision and sensitivity towards the role of the nations and regions of Europe!

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, I should first like to thank the Commissioner very much for the White Paper that she has presented. It is not a radical reform, but it will have far-reaching consequences for future transport policy. I should also like to thank Mr Izquierdo Collado, a Spaniard who has worked on this White Paper with a thoroughness of which one would usually attribute only to a German, and who has invested a great deal of energy in his report. As always with such compromises, however, there are of course a number of inconsistencies that I should like to point out. paragraph 9 states that there should be some degree of shift to rail, but that under no circumstances should this negatively affect the competitiveness of road transport. It therefore needs to be stated that what we have at present is unfair competition, which needs to be redressed, precisely because certain costs associated with road transport – and in particular environmental costs – are not taken into account. Neither is it a question, as it says in paragraph 10, of forcing modal shift. In any case, the shift will only affect certain sectors. Of course we need heavy goods vehicles too. But the point is that, precisely when roads are under excessive pressure and environmental costs are not being taken into account, unutilised capacity on rail should be used better. Already today I can say that even in the case of the Brenner Pass – which is so controversial – there is unutilised capacity that could be used, and that this would make a contribution to improving the environment. Finally, let me address the issue of cross-financing. I believe that it is right to refer in paragraph 75 to the fact that what the Commission is proposing is the right way forward. This is not about an arbitrary subsidy either, but about compensating for the existing disadvantages and about strengthening a mode of transport that has unfortunately suffered in recent decades from the fact that the priority has been to consolidate the position of road transport. This is therefore simply about redressing the balance and this should be stated here. Once again, I hope that this report, if it is adopted now, will be of genuine help to the Commission in implementing the proposals in the White Paper.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, unlike Mr Bourlanges, I am not frustrated by this procedure but I must say that this must be the most mind-numbing budget I have known in the Committee on Budgets for years. Whilst there are so many underlying problems, there is relatively little evidence of this in this House, which might be unfortunate. It is perhaps a kind of transitional year, a year wedged between last year’s nerve-racking events and those which may lie ahead next year. In any case, not a great deal has happened. There is, of course, one crucial event, namely that a start has been made with category four and with looking at ways how we will deal with it, but it is not yet entirely clear whether we have managed to resolve this, partly because the Council refuses to have sufficient input in the attendant thought processes. The guiding principle has always been Berlin, Berlin, Berlin, but listening to the Minister, it appears that Berlin is out of the frame. In fact, it is not in the picture ... or even in the credits. It is as if Berlin never happened at all. In addition, as Mrs Dührkop already pointed out, there is the fact that there are indeed problems with payment credits. The Minister simply had his facts wrong. We in the Social Fund have had problems with payment appropriations. We should not forget that we are still in the initial stages and that a problem with payments will always occur later on. Agricultural policy is also working out in our favour, because the euro is so low, which always leads to certain benefits. It could well be the case that next year or the year after, we will all of a sudden have an enormous need for payment appropriations. And then I will be interested to see if the Council is prepared to make the necessary credits available or if they will come up with a different excuse why it cannot be done. This is the risk, in my view. The system assumes that the payment appropriations more or less simply follow the spending patterns, but the Council adds its own mechanism, and it is that mechanism which threatens to undermine Berlin, despite the fact that Berlin is under way in real terms. I would like to add one more thing. I do believe that the Committee on Budgets should be careful not to intervene too often or too horizontally in proposals put forward by the expert committees. In my view, things have got somewhat out of hand this year and serious deliberation is what is now needed.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, as Mr Sánchez García has just reminded us, this resolution comes within the scope of the decision taken by the Conference of Presidents to send an ad hoc mission to Venezuela to assess the tragic consequences of December’s floods in that country. This issue of Venezuela is serious and urgent. It is serious because the losses have not yet been sufficiently quantified – but this tragedy has caused the deaths of more than 30 000 people. It is urgent, Mr President, because the European Parliament’s mission took place last February and so far we have not been able to reach any final conclusions. I believe this Parliament is stretching the bounds of its credibility. I would like to take advantage of the presence of the Commission to ask the Commissioner how it has fulfilled the mandate which it received from this Parliament in the resolution adopted in January to assess the Community’s response to the tragedy in Venezuela. I hope the Commission is capable of mobilising the necessary human resources to deal with the priorities indicated by this Parliament and I am sure that, if the Commission, as it has proposed in its preliminary draft budget for 2001, is going to be able to spend EUR 815 million in the Balkans, it will also be able to spend EUR 50 million in Venezuela. Mr President, this issue raises a problem which goes much further than the resolution on Venezuela. The problem involves the preservation of Parliament’s capacity to respond to this type of situation. We have to make it very clear what we want. Do we want a real Parliament or do we want a cardboard cut-out Parliament? Do we want a Parliament which fully assumes its duties or do we want a Parliament which simply endorses the priorities of other institutions? Do we want a Parliament which does its duty or do we want a Parliament which simply signs cheques relating to the commitments of other institutions? This is the debate surrounding the 2001 budget and it was the debate surrounding the 2000 budget. Mr President, I simply mean that where there is a will there is always a way and that this resolution demonstrates a decisive commitment on the part of this House to show its will to help and cooperate. It aims to show that the European Union wishes to cooperate with the Venezuelan people and society. Mr President. I am convinced that, on the basis of this will, we will find in this budget, which consists of EUR 100 000 million this year and will involve a similar amount in subsequent years, a way to provide for the needs of the victims of this tragedy.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr Lamassoure’s report to Parliament is extremely low on social content and, far from correcting this omission, the votes cast this morning have basically exacerbated it. The report says nothing about a guaranteed high level of social protection for one and all, nothing about the implementation of a coordinated approach to pay rises, nothing about quantified, verifiable objectives in the fight against poverty and exclusion. The majority vote therefore takes no account whatsoever of the demand – the broad-based and rightly exacting demand – of our citizens for the social situation to be improved and for real economic and social government to be created in the Union. The European Parliament barely even defends what is an unsatisfactory social status quo and has confined itself to perpetuating the image of a bureaucratic Europe in the pocket of major financial interests. In doing so, it is sending out a revolting signal to the Convention on the Future of Europe. My colleagues and I refuse to have anything to do with this despicable exercise.

Political group: PSE
Madam President, the procedure in question is clearly important and we all agree on this point. The Council common position offers the basis for an acceptable compromise and yet sufficient account was not taken of some of the areas that were debated and adopted by Parliament at first reading. Therefore, I too believe that this balance should be improved upon, in light of the fundamental objectives of this regulation: health, consumer safety and environmental protection. The amendments that were re-tabled by my group, with the agreement of the rapporteur, seek to guarantee that these objectives are achieved, in the interests of the key principles of the environmental strategy: the precautionary principle, the ‘polluter pays’ principle and the substitution principle. Limiting the scope of the regulation to just the biodegradation of surfactants contained in detergents does not run counter to these principles. In fact, I believe that anaerobic biodegradation, biodegradation of main non-surfactant organic ingredients and the use of phosphates – this in particular – should be subject to special control as a substance that is subsidiary to the detergents regulation. The committee is almost unanimous in its call for a new legislative proposal to be presented that seeks to gradually ban these substances or to limit specific use to three years from the publication of the current regulation. This is what has been agreed in advance by the representatives of Parliament and the Council in view of the attempt to conclude the legislative process at second reading, a package that I consider to be reasonable, above all for swift adoption of the regulation. I therefore believe that adopting any other amendment that moves away from this compromise offers a rather narrow margin for improvement, if it does not jeopardise the entire regulation. I therefore agree that Parliament must not deviate from this balance, and it would be ironic if it were to do so when reviewing the environmental significance of the provision. All that remains for me to do, finally, is to congratulate the rapporteurs and the shadow rapporteurs from all the political groups for their willingness and their commitment.

Political group: PSE
Thank you, Commissioner for your reply. However, our current situation is as follows: at 11.3%, we have the second highest unemployment in Europe, which was not previously the case, we have the biggest increase in unemployment, we spend less than anyone else on the unemployed, i.e. less than 1% of GDP, while other countries, such as France, Belgium and Germany spend 3-4%, and it is not clear how the money received from the Social Fund has been used, inter alia, to combat unemployment. You tell me that you, as the Commission, have made recommendations. I understand and welcome that and I hope that the recommendations will be adhered to. However, my question for a very long time has been this: what happened with previous policies? Did anyone find work? How many people found work? If you cannot tell us for this year, then last year and the year before. What has been done about training? Is the purpose of the famous training centres to provide jobs for instructors or trainees? Do we have any figures? In other words, do we have ways of checking what is happening with this government policy in Greece?

Political group: GUE-NGL
Madam President, I have three points to make. Firstly, you have conducted this vote extremely well. Thank you for having made the effort to preside when your state of health should have kept you in bed. You have seen this vote through and will sign the budget for which I thank you on behalf of the whole House. (Applause) This vote illustrates once again that a difficult procedure can lead to an easy vote. The more difficult the procedure is, the better the solutions reached by the time we come to the vote. This has been true in this case and I must say that all those who participated in this procedure are experiencing some amazement at the ease of this vote given the conciliation difficulties. On the substance, I believe that Parliament has gained about 75% of what it wanted. As we represent 50% of the budgetary authority, this seems a reasonable percentage! I must say to the President-in-Office of the Council and the Commissioner that, given the difficulties and problems in the procedure, I am profoundly grateful for the efforts made by their institutions, and also by ourselves, to achieve this result. It is the result which counts and we can be satisfied at having reached an agreement. Finally, I would repeat what I said at the conclusion of the first reading. We all have deep respect for the services of the Committee on Budgets which expended all their energies in both the first reading and the second reading. This House owes them a great debt of gratitude.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Madam Vice-President, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank both rapporteurs. After months of work, Mr Watts and Mr Larrea have succeeded in reaching consensus on both reports in the Committee on Regional Policy, Transport and Tourism. We had a united stance at the first reading and we will be united again for the second reading tomorrow. For this reason, I do not want to say very much at all about the information they have presented on this matter, but will move straight on to procedure. I regret, however, that the Council again rejected our offer to carry out an informal conciliation procedure so that the Erika I package could be concluded with regard to these two directives in the next few days. Our offer was to seek a compromise prior to the official second reading in Parliament and then jointly conclude the dossier in the next few days with the confirmation of the Council. I think it is a pity that this cannot be achieved. There are two remarks I would like to make here: first I would like to mention that I had to negotiate hard with Mr Gayssot, the French Transport Minister, like my colleagues on the railway package, but at least he was available and we were able to speak. The Swedish Presidency was not there at all. As the European Parliament, we should pass a resolution that unofficial three-way discussions should only be agreed to if the minister participates. After all, we do not send our conseillers to an informal conciliation procedure; we try to bring our own personal weight to bear. The second practical point concerns what the Council offered us twice as a compromise, which in fact was an insult to our intelligence, since it was not a compromise at all. I only hope that the Council, and the Swedish Presidency, may yet think better of it. We are prepared to continue negotiating until the end of June, after this resolution and after the Council has passed a resolution on this matter, in order to reach an outcome quickly in a Conciliation Procedure. I have an important request to make of you, Madam Vice-President: we as the European Parliament represent the concerns of the Commission in this matter, as the Commission too wants to introduce a voyage data recorder. However, as Parliament we are very much afraid, no, we are sure, that the Council is always putting the brakes on us and delaying this matter so that we cannot move on to Erika II. If the Commission is in favour of voyage data recorders, it should support us in the Watts report. The same goes for the Ortuondo Larrea report. We are on the side of the Commission, which has proposed maximum limits. When we suggest as a compromise setting minimum and maximum amounts for the financial liability of classification societies, then this is a fair compromise. Mr President, I hope that the Commission not only has its eye on the Council, but that it will honour its promise, bearing in mind that the Commission and Parliament are natural allies.

Political group: PPE-DE