Mr President, unfortunately I must begin the debate on my report with the sad news of the tragic deaths of eleven immigrants off the coasts of Lanzarote. Too many words have been said, and they have not yet been able to stop this terrible tragedy. Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I must say that only a miracle would allow my group and myself to vote in favour of the report with my name on it, since some of the amendments introduced in committee and others which are being presented again in this House make it very different from my initial ideas. Unfortunately, I believe that neither the Group nor the , which I understand even less, are up to taking responsible, rigorous and serious positions in the face of the phenomenon of immigration and asylum. It will therefore be very difficult for all of us to comply with the objective of implementing the mandate of the Treaty of Amsterdam on the communitarisation of the asylum procedure and, worse still, for Parliament’s views in this area to be taken into account by the Council, since they reflect party interests which do nothing to help resolve the serious problems which economic immigration and asylum pose for European society at the moment. Ladies and gentlemen, frivolity, demagoguery and a lack of realism have very negative effects in certain societies which, like France, may leave the path free to parties or persons which, through their radicalism, may lead to dangerous social confrontations. Furthermore, it is the case that the current legislative process in relation to asylum is being carried out in an illogical and disordered fashion. This leads to the incongruous situation of our examining proposed directives which, like this one, regulate minimum rules for conditions for accepting asylum seekers, when much of their content depends on others which are still being dealt with in the Council, as in the case of the directive on procedures or the status of refugees, which is beginning to be debated by means of the Lambert report. To put it in a nutshell, we are beginning to build the house from the roof downwards. We must, however, move forward in any event, and Parliament accepts this disorder and wishes to cooperate, despite external and internal difficulties, as demonstrated, for example, by the fact that all the groups in committee have agreed to remove all references in the proposed directive to subordinating conditions for acceptance or medical treatment at the different stages of the procedure. Amongst the difficulties faced by my group in supporting this report is, firstly, the scope of the directive. My group and I believe that the persons included in the scope must be, as proposed by the Commission in its original text, those refugees defined in Article 1 of the Geneva Convention, leaving to the Member States the possibility that they may, by extension, be given other forms of protection. This makes sense, especially at a time when – and I will use the same words as Anna Terrón in committee – this Parliament is debating the Lambert report, which will give its opinion on the status of the refugee and subsidiary protection. If the Group wants to be consistent, it should support the thesis of the rapporteur and not be led by the , which, together with the , intends to impose the extension of the directive to other forms of protection. With regard to schooling for minors, I believe that it should not go beyond what the Member States can guarantee for their own citizens. Certain Liberal and Green amendments – such as Amendments Nos 47, 48 and 50 – propose going further by obliging Member States to provide schooling, to guarantee nurseries and reduce the time limits for access to education. This is not realistic. Furthermore, access to the labour market is a point of conflict which I cannot understand, particularly because the Group accepted in committee, in its own amendment, the period of six months as a time limit within which the Member States must provide access to the labour market. To reduce it to four months, as the has proposed, and as approved in committee, is entirely inconsistent. It is logical that the Member States should have the room for manoeuvre laid down in the original text, and that they should be allowed to assess the situation of the labour market. With regard to the family members of asylum seekers, a compromise with s and Liberals has lead to the agreement of a formula which is a departure from my group’s traditional position, for the sake of global consensus. What we will not accept under any circumstances is Amendment No 115, which the Group of the is presenting once again, which goes much further than those commitments. Despite all of this, I would like to end, Mr President, by expressing my satisfaction at the references that appear in my report, thanks also to the opinion issued by the Committee on Legal Affairs, to the effect that the terrorist activity of asylum seekers should be a cause for a restriction of their right to acceptance. Mr President, I hope that later on in the vote, and as a result of the views expressed in this debate, the miracle I referred to at the beginning of my speech may take place. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE