GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, by means of the White Paper ‘A new impetus for European Youth’, the Commission has presented us with a comprehensive outline of the European Union's youth policy for the future. Although a step in the right direction, it is a concept capable of further development. During consultations with the Commission, European youth associations clearly expressed the view that this White Paper should give a higher profile to gender-specific issues. I incorporated this concern in my opinion for the Committee on Women's Rights and Equal Opportunities and put it forward emphatically. Equal opportunities and the gender issue do not only affect us adults – quite the opposite, in fact. It is precisely in schools and in youth work that choices are made about the self-evidently equal rights of girls and boys, of women and men. European youth policy, too, must attach great value to this. I welcome the report's proposals for greater participation by young people at every political level, for better provision of information of specific relevance to them, for the promotion of voluntary service by young people and for the highlighting of their interests in the Convention and in discussions on the constitution. However constructive the proposals may be, though, we must not lose sight of the principle of subsidiarity. Youth policy is primarily a task for the nations, regions and municipalities, but it is Europe that can create the framework for it. I take a very critical view of the open coordination that is proposed in connection with this, which, in the form proposed, comes across as incapable of definition and diminishing the role of Parliament. The family, too, is a focal point in life as it is really lived by Europe's young people, something of which the White Paper and the report take insufficient account. The family, too, is a youth policy, and must be protected and reinforced. I see the White Paper, taken as a whole, as having a good approach and as giving Europe's future youth policy some impetus, but we must take dialogue with the younger generation further and invest a great deal of commitment in pushing for what results from it to be implemented. Only then will this initial impetus become the forward-moving process that Europe's young people have every right to expect.

Political group: PPE-DE
Madam President, I have to say that I abstained from the vote on Mr Lund’s report. I abstained because I noted that in this report, just like many others, insufficient attention is paid, and an inadequate commitment made, to research. Such is the case with this report, which aims to combat endocrine disorders. In my home city of Bergamo, many people are suffering from a thyroid disorder the cause of which is still unknown. This money should be spent by bringing into line and coordinating expenditure on research policy in all the 15 Member States of the European Union. We have to tighten the purse strings and only spend what is necessary.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, may I first of all thank the Chairman of the Committee on Fisheries, Mr Varela, for a particularly good piece of work on these reports. In principle, those of us in the Group of the European Liberal, Democrat and Reform Party support the EU’s having fisheries agreements with third countries, but I should also like to point out that what we in the want – and this is why we have tabled a number of amendments – is for the fishermen or ship owners to make more of a contribution to financing the fisheries agreements. It is, of course, only right that they should be involved in financing those agreements from which they themselves benefit more than anyone else. The fisheries agreements are extremely important for certain regions in which, in addition to employment in the fisheries sector itself, there are a range of associated businesses wholly or partially dependent upon the fishing industry. By means of the fisheries agreements, the EU is able to develop its activities in this sphere and exchange fishing rights with third countries. The effect of the EU fleets upon fishing resources – in terms of structural policy and the financial situation – ought to be analysed much more than it is at present. I want to conclude by asking the Commission to provide the Committee on Fisheries with a report on what for third countries are the positive and negative consequences of the EU’s fisheries agreements.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, the Parliamentary Committee on Constitutional Affairs has followed the progress of the Intergovernmental Conference month by month since it started in February, attentively and with commitment and confidence, confidence particularly in the French Presidency. It is now the eve of its conclusion and we are aware of the progress which has been made, the partial results which have been achieved, but frankly, over almost ten months of a major Intergovernmental Conference, there has been no rapprochement of the positions, Mr Védrine, and no definition of agreements, not to mention the fact that some of the topics indicated by Parliament in its resolution of 13 April, ranging from the regulation of the economy to the institutional implications of the common defence policy, have not even been debated. All this is serious cause for reflection on the tortuous and sterile nature of the method followed, a lengthy, repetitive, predominantly technical dialogue lacking the more weighty clarifications and negotiation endeavours at political level which did not take place until much later, in October, and then only on one occasion, at the Biarritz Council. The experience of this year has convinced us that, looking beyond Nice towards the future of Europe, the process of constitutionalising the Union must not be carried out by means of the – now dysfunctional – method of negotiations between government representatives. Nice must not be the occasion for the announcement of another Intergovernmental Conference, for this would generate misunderstanding and alarm rather than agreement and hope. The Committee on Constitutional Affairs has made its contribution in the form of the resolution adopted on 21 November, which draws attention to certain points which are truly vitally important if the outcome of the Conference is to be successful, and I will not go back over them. I will simply say that these points are deemed absolutely essential by those who believe that it is necessary to advance integration into a larger Union and not to dilute or paralyse it. We are starting to doubt whether anybody, even at the highest levels, is fully aware of what is at stake. Recently, Mr President, we have, in fact, witnessed the emergence of an increasingly clear, worrying contradiction which very few governments appear to want to avoid: the contradiction between the courageous decisions which have already been taken, such as those on the single currency, common defence and the major, historical enlargement of the Union, and the reluctance to accept the institutional implications. If this contradiction is responsible for the negative outcome of the Conference, it will mean a crisis for European integration. Therefore, it would be better and healthier to have a clear-cut crisis arising from the failure to reach agreement at Nice, than an ambiguous crisis caused by deception aimed at concealing the Conference's failure to deal with points which are vital for the Union's enlargement. (Applause)

Political group: PSE
Mr President, last Saturday I took part in a rally called 'Rights Now' by disabled people in Trafalgar Square in London, where disabled speakers told us how hospital consultants denied them medical treatment because their quality of life was not equal to that of able-bodied patients. The new charging policies for social care services effectively stop them from benefiting from those essential services. Whereas sexism and racism are well-known terms, disability discrimination is barely referred to in public discourse. I start my speech with this bleak assessment because in our proper desire to support the Commission in their barrier-free Europe communication, and Mrs Hermange, in her excellent response, we risk forgetting the very real exclusion from every aspect of public life which is the daily reality for disabled people in our societies. In the strong consensus we have achieved in supporting the bulk of the proposals let us remember we will encounter real conflict in delivering on the aims agreed. We welcome the European Commission's proposal to make 2003 the year of disabled citizens but its impact will be diminished if the Commission does not, during that same year, publish a general disability discrimination directive which offers comprehensive civil rights to disabled people in Europe, similar to the American Disabilities Act, on the other side of the Atlantic. We are pleased that the Socrates Programme offers additional support for disabled participants, but point out that there is a long way to go before the extra costs of disability, the provision of specialist transport, personal assistance and sign language interpreters are provided for in all mainstream European programmes to make equal participation a reality. I welcome the sign language interpretation taking place in both the Chamber and the public gallery. I only wish we could see it regularly in the European Parliament. We emphasise that the specialist and mainstream provision can go hand-in-hand and can complement each other, that the loss of the tied aspects of the research and development programme were not fully replaced with mainstreaming and that a specialist disability section should be allocated in the sixth framework programme now being discussed. We point out that fine words about free movement can never be fully realised until difficult issues for Member States, including the protection for social security benefits for disabled workers crossing our borders, can be tackled. We watch carefully when talk about interdepartmental cooperation in the Commission, on public procurement for example, shows steadfast opposition by DG internal market against awarding public contracts with full reference to companies' equal employment record. We ask the Commissioner for Employment to identify a clear timetable for binding disability access standards to the built environment to be established, and, equally, to ensure seamless access by disabled persons to all modes of public transport.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, Commissioner, Mr Jarzembowski, European industry needs efficient maritime transport. That is something which the proposal for a directive on market access to port services, in the form in which it appears in the Council common position, is well placed to promote. If adopted, quite a few of the changes now proposed by the Committee on Regional Policy, Transport and Tourism at second reading, will, unfortunately, crucially undermine the directive’s ability to contribute to just such more efficient maritime transport. That particularly applies to the amendment to Article 4.9 whereby the provision that would give industry the option of self-handling using land-based personnel would disappear from the directive. If this amendment were adopted, owners of consignments would, in the future too, be prevented from loading vessels using their own skilled and authorised personnel and their own resources. If this and other unnecessary, and unnecessarily detailed, amendments were to be adopted, antiquated port structures would unfortunately persist, to the detriment of maritime transport’s competitiveness. We Swedish Moderates believe, moreover, that all port services, including pilotage services, should fall within the directive, for this could be a positive development for European trade, for an efficient, safe and competitive shipping industry and for better options in terms of transferring cargoes from road to water. Many people want to achieve this, but extremely few are working towards doing so. One step in the right direction would be to reject all the amendments that limit competition and to support those which really are aimed at promoting it. That is something I hope Parliament will do.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, my first speech to this House fifteen years ago, which I remember, took place during an evening sitting at around 11.45 p.m. My last speech, fifteen years later, is also in the evening, before an almost equally reduced audience. I am nevertheless pleased to be able to make this speech on this important matter of the rail package and everything that it implies. I would like once again to say on behalf of my group and also personally that we think it is very important to maintain and particularly to develop a quality, tight, diverse, secure European rail network, providing a public service to all the citizens of Europe and contributing to a balanced use of land in Europe. In our view, the rail package and what underlies it are an example of a Europe that we no longer want, a Europe which has given priority to free competition, very often over any other consideration. It is true that thanks to the fight by the unions in the sector and by a party in Parliament, not forgetting the real pressure of public opinion that is increasingly sensitive to our arguments, the points that were most dangerous for the future of rail have been removed or deferred. But in our view, and in my view, the result is still not acceptable, in particular with the Jarzembowski and Sterckx reports, despite the Savary and Ainardi reports which we consider to be positive. Ultimately, the overall result is still too negative in our view. To conclude, I would like to express my hope that in future there will be more forces that wish to construct the other Europe that we want, a social and citizen’s Europe which we think is much closer to the dream of the founding fathers of Europe than this Europe of a big liberal market that years of liberalisation decisions have finally led us to.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Madam President, I have asked for the floor in order to protest vehemently against the extremely serious allegation made against the Italian police force. This accusation is completely unfounded and unjustified. Clearly, the Member in question is unaware of how things really are and I would therefore ask that his comment be removed from the Minutes or that the European Parliament considers, in this House, the consequences of such a serious statement, which I do not feel should have been made in this Chamber. (Protests)

Political group: PPE-DE
Madam President, Commissioner, I would like to start by thanking the rapporteur very warmly for his work and for the prompt joint implementation of this directive. It is of great importance to the European financial market, to the internal market, and to financial services. In particular, we have to see to it that there is no recurrence in Europe of cases of the magnitude of Enron or World Com. It makes a fundamental contribution to the stability of Europe's financial markets. The success of a regulation of this sort is in the financial institutions' own best interests. The conglomerates are of course houses offering services in the fields of securities, insurance and banking. We, the Group of the , tabled a number of amendments, relating in particular to the choice of methods of calculation available, but these were subtle distinctions. At the end of the day, we are very satisfied with the draft as a whole, which should be adopted in this form. I would, though, especially like to point out an innovation in this directive, one that is of great importance to us in terms of the overall discussion of financial supervision in Europe. I refer to the role and structure of the so-called coordinator, who is in future to be appointed for a financial conglomerate. An increasing number of such conglomerates are coming into being, for example, in my own country, Germany, by the buying-up of Allianz Versicherung by the Dresdner Bank, thus creating a classic conglomerate which is also active right across Europe. This coordinator is expected in future to be part of a country's own supervisory authority and to make sure that the work of Europe's various supervisory authorities is coordinated, and that accounting standards are the same. He is to ensure, on the one hand, that unnecessary bureaucracy is avoided, but also, on the other, that information concerning this conglomerate is exchanged, thus enabling a better grasp of the conglomerate's complexities. I believe that the good and important thing about this is that it gets us closer to answering the question of what shape financial supervision in Europe will take in future. Being myself at present unable to feel at all at home with the idea of a European super-authority to deal with financial supervision, I believe that we should extend this idea and concept beyond financial conglomerates to other fields and thereby gain useful experience before we give consideration to an overarching authority. I believe that the Conglomerates Directive can, in this respect, lead the way and give a good example. Therefore, speaking on behalf of the Group of the , I can tell you that we will be voting in favour of this directive.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I was happy to vote for the Ferber report on the budget for the financial year 2001, but I am not very happy with the minimal amount of space, money and European Union funds it allocates to supporting activities benefiting pensioners and the elderly. I do not mean that we have to allocate to pensioners, the elderly and their problems the same proportion of our budget as they occupy of society, i.e. approximately 32% at the last count. I am not saying that 32% of our budget should be allocated to activities related to the elderly, but I would, nevertheless, be very happy with at least 3%, or even 0.3%.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I should like once again to raise the issue of the Greek student, Mr Dousemetzis, who was arrested in the United Kingdom and then remanded in custody by the court. The only evidence against him are a number of comments about terrorist organisations on his website and in the papers for his dissertation. He was arrested a fortnight ago; the Greek Government was told nothing about this, his family was not told and I think that the Bureau of the European Parliament should express an interest.

Political group: GUE-NGL
draftsman of the opinion of the Committee on Industry, External Trade, Research and Energy. – Mr President, the first point the committee would like to make is that current arrangements disadvantage EU providers of these services: software, data processing, and computer services, web hosting, web design and information. We would like to add educational services to that. They disadvantage people inside the EU because they currently pay VAT for the supply of these services whereas those outside the European Union do not. This is why we believe that this directive needs to come into force with some urgency, particularly those of us who believe that there will be a rapid rise in e-commerce. The Industry Committee adopted a number of proposals by thirty-nine votes to three. We asked for registration in a single Member State. We called for the European Commission to monitor to ensure that there is no distortion of the market and to report back to the Council and to Parliament. We asked them to report, in the meantime, on a number of aspects: ensuring equal treatment of companies, looking at the choice of location, harmonising of international regulations and the possibility of establishing a clearing system, as was suggested by the rapporteur. Another point we made, that was not made elsewhere, was that, as many may recall, Al Capone was gaoled not as a gangster but for tax evasion. We see an unfortunate boom in aspects of e-commerce, in the growth of pornography, paedophilia and race-hate material. The Industry Committee believes that registration for VAT will enable us to subject the companies concerned to the rigours of EU law on these matters. This in itself may make the directive worthwhile.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, firstly, I regret the tone that has crept in here, even though we are discussing some very promising and highly detailed work. I would not wish to sink to the level that some of those present have opted for. Parliament postponed the discharge for the 1998 financial year in April, but with no intention whatsoever of provoking a trial of strength with the Commission or even working towards a refusal of discharge. There was a need for further clarification, which would take time and effort, and it was always my aim, as Chairman of the Committee on Budgetary Control, to complete the discharge process by the summer recess. As these reports show, the past few weeks have been used to answer questions – albeit not all of them – and consequently, although our recommendation in respect of the outstanding discharges may not be unanimous, it is a positive one. I welcome with open arms the fact that the Commission is willing to work towards a reduction of errors in budgetary management, with a view to receiving a better statement of assurance as soon as possible. I detect a certain candour where the so-called old cases of suspected fraud are concerned. We have never held the new Commission responsible for these cases as such, but would still like to know that the right lessons have been drawn from the past through reappraisal, so that these cases do not come back to haunt us one day. There is something I would like to ask you in this connection, Mrs Schreyer. When are the legislative proposals for a comprehensive legal and judicial area for the protection of the Union’s financial interests to be submitted? We agreed, on the basis of my report in January, that they were to be submitted by 30 June. It is 4 July today. If there is one thing all those involved should be clear about where the impending grant of discharge is concerned, then it is this: We are not talking about a certificate of non-objection here. In future, the institution must be more willing to cooperate and provide the Committee on Budgetary Control with the information it needs to do its work, promptly and without evasion. If we build up confidence, reduce the amount of bureaucracy and exercise democracy openly – and this applies to so many areas – then I believe we will get back to being able to grant discharge on time each April.

Political group: PPE-DE