GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner, having started in April 1997, we have now reached the third reading of the Resale Rights Directive. I should like to take this opportunity to thank the members of the conciliation committee and Mr Zimmerling for their efforts. But unfortunately, I shall have to adhere to my old point of view. The vast majority of my group are still not happy with the proposal. We are concerned here with the difference between the English term ‘copyright’ and the Dutch word ‘auteursrecht’, for what is at issue here is the sale of a work of art. Should an artist’s heir be able to exercise his or her rights seventy years after the event? I do not think so. A sale implies that all rights and duties are waived, and that is what the financial compensation is for. The suggestion to increase the minimum price to EUR 3 000 is an improvement. Anything lower would seriously hamper budding artists. This brings me to my next point of criticism. Our main objection to this proposal is that it is diametrically opposed to the principle of subsidiarity. The Commission has been unable to demonstrate that discrepancies in legislation in the Member States will, in the long run, have a direct, negative impact on the internal market. Furthermore, it is quite likely that the European modern and contemporary art market, which is of particular significance for London, will be moved to Switzerland. This was, in fact, already evident a few weeks ago at the Basel Art Fair. The art market could, in fact, move outside Europe altogether, where this right does not exist. Surely that cannot be the aim of the exercise. It appears from the proposal that that is a problem. Provision is made for all kinds of unnecessary exceptions. Harmonisation has therefore gone out of the window. Is it not a contradiction in terms that, whilst attempts are being made to harmonise resale rights worldwide, the opportunity is being created for the Member States to abandon the minimum price at will via all kinds of loopholes? Then there is implementation. In addition to the red tape which is involved in keeping track of the different sales and purchases of a work of art, exceptions complicate the matter even further. Artists do not welcome this either. If the sale takes place between private persons, resale rights do not apply. Would you not agree with me that the trade in art between private persons will experience a dramatic upsurge? That is not the only example I could quote. Finally, the directive does not offer all artists the same treatment, except in the case of sales via galleries and auction houses. The directive is unclear and is not fraud-proof. It is also superfluous, for there is no distortion within the internal market. My group does not welcome legislation of this kind. The citizen experiences this, in fact, as unnecessary interference from Brussels. My group has voted against it twice. It deems the changes and improvements in respect of the proposal to be insufficient and will therefore be voting against it for the third time.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, let me begin by thanking Mrs Klamt and Mrs Karamanou for producing such good reports. The sexual exploitation of children, child pornography and trafficking in human beings are appalling crimes which are assuming alarming proportions. Their proliferation is facilitated through globalisation and modern telecommunications technology. These problems can no longer be resolved through national measures. The European Union and its Member States must adopt a joint approach in cooperation with the third countries concerned. As regards the trafficking in human beings, a clear distinction must be made between two areas: sexual abuse, and the exploitation of labour. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, there are more slaves in the world than were trafficked from Africa in the previous centuries. The United Nations estimates that worldwide, around 200 million people are exploited as slaves. Trafficking in human beings is conducted via well-organised criminal and in some cases international networks. The Framework Decision is an important step towards better cooperation between Member States. The harmonisation of Member States' legal provisions will establish a basis for better cooperation between judicial authorities in order to enable Europe to combat this trade in human beings. The same applies to the Framework Decision on combating the sexual exploitation of children and child pornography. All the preventive options must be expanded further. In order to take effective action against these criminal networks, we need targeted training for the police and law enforcement officers. These problems must be considered in the accession negotiations with the Central and East European countries. With regard to the trafficking in human beings, for example, some accession countries have now become countries of origin, transit countries, and even target countries. On the European Union's borders, prostitution, sex tourism and the sexual exploitation of children have become a sad reality. Swift measures are therefore required in these countries to combat crime in these areas and strengthen cooperation with the EU.

Political group: PPE-DE
Madam President, I am one of those Members of this House whose cultural background is not exactly Christian. There was a statement recently by a statesman, who should speak in a statesmanlike manner, but who, when speaking about Muslims and Christians, actually, in my opinion, dropped something of a clanger. I deeply regret that we were unable to deliver a joint response, but had to have a discussion instead. I greatly regret this, because we should be counteracting escalation. A dialogue is urgently needed specifically between Muslims and Christians. The Italian Prime Minister's spoken contribution added nothing, but was highly counter-productive. For this reason, I greatly regret that we were unable to counter it with a common response.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, resistance to antimicrobial agents now causes hundreds of thousands of deaths the world over. Diseases that we thought were under control, such as tuberculosis or the plague, are re-appearing and are posing a serious threat to human health, particularly in developing countries. We acknowledged, by voting in favour of the Khanbhai report, that resistance to anti-malarial agents was one of the causes of malaria-related deaths. But we now know that one of the true causes of the current situation in Europe is the incorrect use of antibiotics and over-consumption, not only in the field of human medicine but also in animal feed. Reports on GMOs also indicate this...

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, firstly, I voted in favour of the last motion and the amendments thereto. That was the formal declaration of vote. I would like to rid certain people here of the misconception that those who took the initiative for quorum counts are no longer present. It is true that some have left. But I am one of the people who took the initiative and I am still here, just as I am here every Friday. I have noticed that some people say that there are people who are after a four-day week, but I am certainly not one of them. I am, however, of the opinion, that we need to work a proper five-day week, which is not happening at the moment, if the number of MEPs in attendance today is anything to go by. And this is why the problem has arisen. If Fridays were like Tuesdays or Wednesdays, then it would not have been necessary to have this debate and the counts here today. This will now have to be carried through to the moment at which Fridays either run in the normal way or, due to a lack of interest, they are abolished, which is once again a likely scenario.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, I too welcome the movement at long last on these dossiers and the work of the rapporteurs involved, and of those who have worked hard to put forward their opinions. Like others I regret the legal base chosen. The arguments are totally unconvincing, in so far as we have actually heard any. One of the few things we can say about what we have got in front of us is that we have at long last got some sort of parity here with the company statute. That parity of status in a modern economy is extremely important at a time when many people are looking for added value. I do not see that we should actually be advocating or allowing an advantage to one particular form of company organisation while, as it were, putting barriers in the way of a different form of organisation. It is important that we safeguard cooperatives and their parity of status, particularly at a time of increased competition and threats of globalisation, when there is a considerable threat of undermining the cooperative ethos and its way of operating. We have heard that this is an important sector, not least in terms of the employment opportunities outlined so ably by Mr Hughes. It is also a question about democracy and participation and the feeling of being in control of either your workplace or indeed the company with which you are dealing. Cooperatives are particularly important when we are talking so much – or indeed today so little – about corporate social responsibility, when we are looking at companies which have a great deal to teach, at major corporations that already operate across borders, in terms of their responsibility towards staff. I welcome many of the amendments put forward in terms of employee involvement and greater safeguards there, responsibility towards customers, wider society and indeed, for many of them as well, the investment they make in ethical finance, which again has a lot to teach major corporations.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Madam President, I am totally convinced that the Union in its entirety lacks the political, moral and educational authority to talk about the quality and safety of food. Nor is it a coincidence that the President-in-Office and the Commissioner refrained from mentioning the main source of all of these problems in the food chain, which is, of course, the common agricultural policy itself. Parliament has voted half the budget to be spent on encouraging production. Today’s modern farmers are not what they produce; they are what they are able to produce whilst maintaining quality and safety. But you are not helping them to achieve this! I say this because you only help large-scale producers and, as a consequence, you spend a large part of the budget on encouraging these very problems! These problems and those that will follow! You do not, however, want to accept the principle of doing away with animal feedingstuffs that contain the remains of other animals... We have already discussed the United Kingdom and Portugal in this Chamber and now we are discussing France. I am now waiting for the Commissioner to announce the next case, because we will have reached this point within a year with another country and further cases. The fundamental issue is that the President-in-Office and the Commissioner must accept that a policy guided by post-war principles is no longer possible today and is no longer acceptable. You must end all aid for production and instead help to bring about quality, food safety and the conservation of resources. Otherwise, we will not have a food chain that can provide guarantees for consumers. We will be perpetuating the fraudulent treatment of both farmers and consumers.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, I welcome this report by Mrs Langenhagen, the contents of which I am very happy to endorse. The Court of Auditors’ report on the FAIR Programme, from which the rapporteur’s report arises, was only published in March this year even though the sector letters regarding the audit were first sent to the Commission in December 1998 and February 1999. As the rapporteur suggested, this is simply unacceptable. It is too long a delay and undermines the relevance of Parliament’s work in considering such reports. This delay results from the contradictory procedure between the Court and the Commission which precedes the publication of every Court of Auditors’ report, whereby the Commission has the right to have its reply published at the same time as the report. As a result of the delay in this case the rapporteur quite rightly questions the continuation of the contradictory procedure in its current form. This is something I will certainly be exploring in the report I will be bringing to Parliament in December. It is sufficient to suggest that we need to look at the whole procedure again, not just in terms of the Court’s annual report which will be published tomorrow, but also in terms of special reports such as this one. The Court of Auditors’ report found a number of significant problems with the management of the FAIR Programme during 1994 to 1998, including a lack of quantified objectives for the programme, making it difficult to fully measure the results, insufficient transparency in selection and evaluation procedures and the management of measures under the programme by three DGs. This meant that the management of the programme lacked clarity and homogeneity. We hope that as a result of the reform of the Commission currently taking place we will see a huge correction of this in future. That we do not have clear targets, that we cannot measure output, is really unacceptable and would not happen in any other institution. This is very old hat. We know the change is coming, but we want to see it very quickly. One problem which remains is the EUR 3.4 million still to be recovered, 92% of which is accounted for by three files which have been under examination by the Commission’s legal services since July 1996 and August 1997 and whose due dates have expired. It is vital that the Commission follows that and gets its money back. We will be following this report’s recommendations in future so we encourage the Commission to put things right as soon as possible, otherwise you will see reference to this and other special reports within discharge procedure reports.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, first of all, I should like us, through our fellow Members from Toulouse who are with us today, starting with the President of the sitting, to express our condolences and our solidarity with all the victims of the tragedy in Toulouse. I, like other speakers, would also like to pay special tribute to the marvellous chain of emergency aid workers, both professional and voluntary, that was put together in Toulouse and, in particular, to the enormous dignity shown by the people of Toulouse in these extremely difficult circumstances. What happened there is unimaginable. The death toll is indeed terrible, but is much lower than it might have been, given the unbelievable force of the explosion and the huge damage caused by this explosion in a heavily populated area. I agree with Mr Onesta when he says that, since there is no such thing as zero risk, especially in industry, we must now take stock and change our approach. In other words, we must apply the precautionary principle in land use planning. This means, whenever possible – and it will, unfortunately, only be possible in very limited cases – relocating businesses that are at risk, whilst protecting jobs. This is a concern that other speakers have also expressed. It would be particularly unfair for workers in industry to face an added risk – a social risk, that of losing their job – in addition to risks at work. The problem is also, and, perhaps, mainly, one of controlling urban development because, and we must be honest about this, in many cases, residential areas have merged with industrial areas. Near to the site in Toulouse, there was a major shopping centre. In my municipality, which has a factory just like the one in Toulouse, building permits are still being issued for communal housing, less than 800 metres from the site. Mainly, Commissioner, I would say that the draft amendment to the Seveso II directive must take account of these problems of urban growth, not least by increasing the responsibilities of businesses but also of the elected authorities that issue building permits. Lastly, I should like to echo the feeling of helplessness that I experience as a Member of the European Parliament every time that we have the misfortune to encounter this type of event. The European Union does not do all it can when faced with disasters of this scale. Every time we give the commitment to move closer to the citizens of Europe, we must remember that we are not there when they go through distressing or intensely emotional times. I asked Commissioner Barnier this question after the storms in 1999, and it has come back to haunt us. I know that the credit line has been discontinued, but since this is the case, let us at least imagine the Utopia, as Mrs de Veyrac said, of a Eurocorps for civil defence, which is happening for the army. In other words, a rapid action force could also quite easily exist in the field of civil defence.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, first of all, I should like to congratulate rapporteur Wiebenga on his report. With the mass influx of immigrants who escaped the conflicts and the attendant dangers in former Yugoslavia, Europe was, for the first time since the Second World War, faced with forced migration on a scale which was, both qualitatively and quantitatively, outside the range of our experience hitherto. The draft legal framework for temporary protection in the case of mass immigration has been developed in the past decades and varies from Member State to Member State. They apply different social rights schemes which people enjoy during temporary protection. Some Member States recognise the right to work and family reunification, others do not. The new Commission proposal includes all the conclusions of the Treaty of Amsterdam’s implementation and reproduces the discussions in the Council, as well as the response of the Member States to the refugee crisis in and around Kosovo. The proposal forms part of the recent Commission initiatives with regard to the asylum policy on account of the new Convention. However, the NGOs have expressed concern that a temporary protection scheme might undermine the international policy for the protection of refugees if no guarantee is given that sufficient precautionary measures have been taken to prevent misuse. The Commission recognises this risk when it states that temporary protection is a responsibility which is of crucial importance to the European Union, but it needs to spell out that it does not intend to undermine the protection of refugees. We therefore share the rapporteur’s opinion that the proposal for a directive contains a considerable number of improvements on the previous two proposals. The sharing of the burden among the Member States is no longer separate from the stipulations. Despite this, I would like to quote a critical example: let us not forget the refugees in Sangatte and Calais, who are desperate for temporary protection provision for displaced persons.

Political group: Verts-ALE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I rise to speak not about fish and frying pans, like Mr Fatuzzo, but about a very serious issue in connection with the Lambert Report. The SPD Members of this Parliament have voted for this report although we can understand the difficulty that a number of our fellow Members had in supporting it. I would like to mention one key point that persuaded us to give this report our support, although we would have liked it to be structured differently. I have in mind here the fact that Mrs Lambert's directive makes no legal distinction between refugees, that is people who are victims of political persecution, and people who require the European Union to offer them temporary protection. When the question is what care and benefits these groups of persons should receive in the EU Member States, this is quite justifiable. Indeed, we do not want people who have fled from a country to be treated differently. What is, however, at stake here is that a qualifying distinction needs to be drawn between someone who is a victim of political persecution, such as a member of a resistance movement against a dictatorship who goes into exile and needs protection, and on the other hand people fleeing from a temporary situation such as, for example, a civil war, who therefore only need temporary protection, or, as defined in the Geneva convention on refugees, subsidiary protection. Mrs Lambert's directive covers all these groups of persons. Our view is that a distinction ought to have been made. We also make this distinction in German constitutional law as a matter of principle, because Article 16 of the German constitution defines a legally obtainable right to protection against political persecution, but not a legally obtainable right to subsidiary protection. We German Social Democrats have therefore voted in favour of this report despite all these misgivings, partly because it would not have got through otherwise and this House cannot fail to deliver an opinion when consulted by the Council. (Applause)

Political group: PSE
Mr President, this debate comes at a very timely moment in the history of Indonesia, given the very grave situation in the province of Aceh. The decision by the Indonesian authorities to extend martial law and carry out a military crackdown is deeply regrettable, and there has been very heavy-handed military action. An estimated 45 000 troops have been sent into the province against 5000 rebels. As ever in these situations, it is the civilian population which is paying the price, with reports of disruption to food supplies, infrastructure and schools being destroyed. Tens of thousands of civilians are reportedly displaced. These are only estimates, of course, because the Indonesian authorities are not allowing observers in to monitor the situation. This has to stop. There is no point in the Indonesian Government complaining when the international community, the United States, the EU and Japan, draft a resolution expressing their concern if they in turn are not prepared to allow international monitors in and are not prepared to allow humanitarian organisations into their country to bring assistance to the civilian population. Our joint resolution makes a series of demands on the Indonesian Government and I hope very much that it is listening and that it will heed those concerns. It is vital to get both parties back to the negotiating table as quickly as possible. Time and time again we hear people telling us that military action is the answer, that it will be a quick military action and that once it is over everything will be sorted out. We have heard this so often, but often been disappointed. So often we have seen a high price paid in human lives. So both sides, the GAM and the Indonesian Government, must get back to the negotiating table, stop the fighting and resume the talking. I am grateful to the Commission for what it is already doing as regards Indonesia, particularly Commissioner Patten, who has always taken up issues about Aceh when we have asked him to do so. I hope the Council and the Commission will now do everything possible to assist Indonesia in getting back to the negotiating table with GAM and get those talks started as soon as possible. This is a matter of some urgency and I am very grateful to colleagues in this Parliament for agreeing to have today's debate and for supporting this resolution.

Political group: PSE