kfajdsl/voxpopuli huggingface dataset:
as consumers we should be confident that the clothes we wear have not put someone's life at risk wherever they work and i welcome what has been done by our delegation in bangladesh and in other countries to improve labour standards and make sure that everybody is safe at work.
i now urge the pakistani government to take similar action.
basic safety and health standards must be respected and more needs to be done in this respect.
more also needs to be done to fight the endemic corruption that we see in the inspection system and not just in the inspection system but also in the claims made by the brands the multinationals in terms of their corporate responsibility statements.
i am firmly opposed to simply depicting multinationals or any companies that trade with bangladesh and buy in these garments as evil entities.
i think it has shown that we are all determined to ensure that we do everything possible to prevent a repeat of the tragic events of last november. i think commissioner barnier has covered a lot of the ground very well so i do not want to
it is important to point out from the council's perspective that we are committed to using trade incentives as a means of encouraging beneficiary countries to respect the key international human and labour rights environmental protection standards and governance principles
in particular as i mentioned in my introductory remarks through the eu gsp framework.
so rather than repeating what has already been said i just want to say that we have touched in our discussions today on a range of ways of promoting effective links between trade labour and the environment. the eu clearly has a key role to play in this area and all of us all the eu institutions have to work closely with the ilo and the other multinational organisations
but in order to anchor expectations on the long term perspective of the euro to ensure its sustainability we need to pursue the profound rebuilding of economic and monetary union. the commission presented a road map to this end in our blueprint for a deep and genuine emu' in late november.
but for the benefits to be achieved it is indispensable that the risks of moral hazard are addressed first.
i cannot understand why we are even discussing the concept of mutualising sovereign debt when the current proposals on banking union are at such an early stage.
the three pillars of banking union are far from fully erected.
while we sit in hours of trialogue over the single supervisory mechanism to give the ecb supervisory powers over some eurozone banks the work being done on recovery and resolution plans is going slowly and coming up against any number of legal roadblocks erected by different member states.
the deposit guarantee scheme proposal has languished for council for months and months three pillars requiring less sharing of sovereignty proving difficult to deliver.
this report is calling for the mutualisation of debt through common issuance of bonds and goes much further than any of the banking union proposals that we are currently discussing. therefore it is disingenuous for this parliament to vote it through tomorrow.
the victim of this blackmail is the eurozone and its much needed fiscal discipline.
in doing so we lose momentum and are at the same time letting petty politics take the upper hand.
our responsibility is not only to think about what is best for our member states as opposed to other member states nor is it to think about what is best for the european parliament as opposed to other institutions.
our responsibility is to think about what is best for europe in the long run.
with that in mind i want to give my support to the rapporteur while underlining the long term nature of the current suggestion.
these are programmes that the uk government has indicated that it may well wish to participate in in the future and therefore i welcome those increases if they are indeed increases. because the problem we have here is that an independent analysis of those figures by the parliament has suggested that the figures presented by the commission are not in fact the case and i don't think we've had any kind of response to that yet. now i regard this as very serious because when you come to a parliament
you need to be confident that the figures you're presenting are accurate and there are only two reasons why they wouldn't be one is mendacity and one is incompetence and we need to know which is which because we deserve better than that.
i think that i have succeeded in responding to the three questions and in conclusion i have to say that in the weeks and months to come we will have a lot to talk about.
in this context the presidency has started work immediately on the commission proposal so as to advance work as much as possible and the next presidencies are committed to working intensively as well.
concerning the timeline i have to underline that the leaders discussed the calendar of negotiations at their informal meeting in february. they decided that we would advance as fast as possible with this file but it was also clear from the discussion that the possibility of an early agreement was very much dependent on the proposals put forward.
in the past you managed to bully the danes you bullied the irish you bullied the greeks into submission.
the eur forty billion that ms may has agreed to pay over the course of the next few years must help and of course as we speak she is desperately scrambling to get us back into a whole series of eu programmes in your next budgetary period and no doubt will pay more for that.
they question what the euro has done to their economy they feel they are a victim of the european union's immigration policies and as a result of all this they voted in a new government only to find that bullying and hectoring from the european commission has been listened to by the italian president.
i can only assume that if that effectively means full membership for a further two years that eur forty billion would now become eur sixty billion.
i would like your confirmation that extended transition will mean a bigger bill.
perhaps what is even better news commissioner is that the prime minister now wants a two year extension of the transition phase.
there are signs that in italy voters are tiring of paying that money.
italy of course has been mentioned and they are net contributors to this budget;
in the last forty eight hours their democracy has been traduced.
for this reason as soon as we receive the proposals from the commission my prime minister wrote to president tajani to establish proper ways of communication.
the discussion will seem to be about money but in fact it will be about shared priorities.
we look forward to more frank and fruitful exchanges with your representatives in june on the margins of the next general affairs council.
but work doesn't stop in the council.
the first step will be to understand what the commission proposals really mean.
i gather that there were questions in parliament about the figures presented by the commission.
in the meantime the presidency started working at full speed on the mff package.
this is about the future of europe.
as agreed in february once all the sectoral proposals are available the european council will return to the issue of the mff and the timeline for the negotiation.
it is already clear that we will have to find the right balance between the new priorities and the traditional policies. the policy choices will determine the structure the size and the resources of the next financial framework.
behind the figures the debate will be about our policy choices and where we expect the european union to act in the next seven years.
this will be key to making sure that we understand each other's expectations and constraints.
the presidency is fully committed to giving a dynamic start to the examination and the discussion of the proposals.
after a first political discussion at the level of ministers on fourteen may experts now meet every week to review the proposals in detail.
but challenges are equally high and let us not forget the need to achieve unanimity in the council.
this discussion will take place at the june european council meeting.
for that we need clear information from the commission.
the file is considered a top priority by this presidency working in close cooperation with the future austrian and romanian presidencies.
before i conclude i would like to add a word on the substance of the mff debate.
it was very important for us to get the process off to a good start.
we have to be proactive throwing money alone will not solve anything. we need to see real political will to move forward but funds are needed.
more flexibility means being able to respond effectively to unpredictable geopolitical realities.
this cannot be ignored when it comes to eu funds.
let's be bold and reaffirm our european ideas and there's no better place to do that and start than from erasmus.
on regionality we have to make sure no citizens are left behind.
i am referring specifically to islands like gozo where economic growth has not matched malta's.
doubling the funds is good but it's still not enough for our flagship programme that shapes hearts minds and futures of young europeans.
the tripling in budget is an important sign that we stand ready to address this challenge. it will help to both manage our borders with an additional ten zero border guards and respond to those in need of protection.
what is the rationale behind the numbers? if we want the european union to be the frontrunner in implementing the un sustainable development goals why is there no clear commitment to that end in the mff proposal?
instead of that and with the exception of some limited improvements we have a budget proposal that cuts spending in crucial eu policies and falls short of ambition both in volume and in content.
well mr oettinger you and the european union must have adopted abba's song as the new eu anthem as the uk leaves the eu instead of cutting the budget you increase it by one hundred and ninety two billion to.
instead of closing the borders in two thousand and fourteen you increase now the cost of immigration and asylum to europe by.
it is this lack of economic sense that will bring down the eu and the euro.
three hundred and ninety two the eu's problem is that you think there is a magic money tree there isn't. if you don't spend less maybe the eu and other countries within the eu will adopt another song by abba or like the.
they made a choice of a democracy to have their own government make their decisions for them.
the italian people spoke for themselves when they decided to vote for the five star movement and lega nord.
any institution outside of italy that infringes their own democratic rights are wrong but it is up to the italian people to make the choice of what they want and they should listen to their own government not the president acting on others' behalves.
would mr olbrycht agree with me that allowing the united kingdom to continue to participate in the galileo system after brexit not only improves the security of all twenty eight but will also allow the eu to make better use of its resources in the next financial framework?
i suspect that he has come here to annoy and provoke you and to damage the interests of the united kingdom.
and seeing that mr farage is in his seat can i ask colleagues here not to be provoked.
would you agree with me that now the italian president is taking his orders from the european union and italy is a vassal state of the european union would you not say it's high time the italians and the two parties who are now hoping to take government that it's high time they went for italian exit as we are?
of course we need to address the challenges but we need absolutely to keep a budget which reduces social inequalities and keeps the opportunity to invest in the future.
look to the situation we now have in italy.
the solution we need to have is to reform the eurozone to make it a space where people can invest in the future and have again confidence in the future and we social democrats have a full plan for this and will be criticising all those who are opposing this necessary reform.
so the commission has this opportunity.
we need to have a fiscal capacity able to support investment in the future to support upward economic and social convergence and to protect people from shocks.
this is the moment to send this message because we cannot play with fire.
i suspect that actually two italian political parties that want to stay inside the european union but want to change immigration rules and their ability to control their own budget are actually an even bigger problem for a centralised europe and as history goes on once the british have left you'll think gosh they were really easy compared to this italian government'.
and now we want to reform the entire financial system.
so the g twenty leaders get together and they say what is the solution?
i will close with the words of my late countryman mr justice asprey reform?
madam president we propose very seriously to exacerbate it. the cause of the financial crisis was excessive state intervention first in the sense that interest rates were deliberately kept too low for too long a political rather than a market decision one in which all the central banks were complicit and then in the sense that as recently as last year legislatures were urging lenders to make more cheap loans available.
more state intervention.
there are fundamental causes of this crisis and we really need to look at those causes systematically and radically.
competition to the logic of justice.
madam president i supported this report because i think that there is a need for a new paradigm in the world a new paradigm in which we shift from completely money and profit centred decision making to human being and community centred decision making and from the logic of
madam president may i congratulate you on the deft adroit and sensitive way in which you have exercised the prerogatives of the chair.
for fifty years european trade and agricultural polices have caused preventable poverty in the third world.
then we have tried to salve our consciences by massive aid programmes which have not served to ameliorate the conditions of those countries but on the contrary by breaking the distinction between representation and taxation have served to retard democratic development across much of the world.
here is one thing we could do tomorrow that would have an immediate benign and transformative effect in the countries that we are talking about we can abolish the common agricultural policy.
two thousand and eleven this will enable the commission to make appropriate proposals on policy actions.
and i am convinced that a solution similar to free allocation under the emissions trading system can be included in the etd revision.
however this instrument merits further analysis and discussion at technical and political level;
as you know the commission is preparing an in depth impact assessment on instruments for the taxation of the financial sector to be delivered by summer.
in addition we are also scrutinising the cumulative impact on financial institutions of new regulation bank levies and taxes and will present the results later this year.
if we continue down this route britain will have lost its biggest single industry.
maybe if we vote for this tomorrow it will be so bad that it will be really rather a good thing for ukip and our view that we should not be part of this massive socialist experiment.
i am sorry but we are living in a global economy. if we become uncompetitive through tax or regulation people simply move and they can do so in the space of twenty four hours.
the biggest foreign exchange market in the world the biggest financial sector in the world is in london.
i think the time has come when the city of london and britain's financial markets are going to rise up against membership of this european union.
in two thousand and ten as a result of the aifm directive one in four hedge funds left the city of london.
in two thousand and six a written declaration calling for this ban was overwhelmingly backed by members receiving four hundred and twenty five signatures with studies by veterinary experts clearly showing that seals are killed with terrible suffering often skinned whilst still conscious.
moreover our vote tomorrow will be a decisive step forward in the global campaign to ban the trade.
even in those countries in the eu where a small amount of traditional seal hunting takes place the trade is not supported by the public with seventy against in sweden.
i know that this will be applauded by the citizens of europe.
after a forty year campaign against the trade europe has the chance to introduce a ban in all twenty seven states.
on behalf of the majority of canadians who are opposed to the hunt thank you for the leadership you are taking on this issue.
i have here a letter from a canadian senator written to president pttering saying your vote to ban the trade in seal products will help the vast majority of canadians who watched in admiration as the russian federation ended its bloody seal slaughter last month to force their politicians to look beyond political expediency to what is right and to end this inhumane hunt once and for all.
the committee rejected the commission's mixed proposal for a partial ban and labelling;
that means that we as citizens now have the opportunity to ban this cruel trade.
the public no longer tolerate the trade and we as their representatives have the power to end it.
madam president i think we are forgetting that it was this parliament which first took up the campaign for an eu wide ban on the cruel trade in seal products.
and of course in our daily existence we know there are hundreds of thousands of animals that we are happy to have killed either to eat them or to use their products in other ways.
we are happy to have fish dying after hours of suffering on hooks and in nets and we do not complain about that.
so are we voting and are we deciding with our hearts rather than with our brains and our heads on this?
madam president as one of the other co sponsors of the original written declaration nearly three years ago which called for this ban i should like to congratulate everyone who has worked to bring this draft proposal forward.
four hundred and twenty five members of this house signed that declaration reflecting the strength of feeling about the issue not only among meps but also among our constituents.
today nearly one million seals are slaughtered annually in commercial seal kills around the world and when we vote on this package tomorrow we will be helping to end one of the most vile examples of animal cruelty.
i am very glad that compromises like the proposed labelling system have been strongly rejected so that we can fully meet the demands of millions of european citizens.
a positive vote will be a vote for ending cruelty.
it will also be a vote and a victory for all of us who have refused to take no' for an answer.
i well remember many meetings with commission officials when we were told that a ban would be simply impossible. well this just shows that when we can galvanise sufficient political will and i pay tribute to the ngos which have helped us to do so then impossible things become possible and i am delighted that they do.
we possibly have before us tomorrow a first reading agreement.
for my part as rapporteur in this parliament i would say that this has been a very difficult file a very difficult journey. however we have arrived at a position where i hope we will respect the wishes of those members of parliament who signed the written declaration on this subject and we will have respected the wishes of many citizens in many of our countries across the eu who tell us that they do not like what they see of the commercial seal hunt and that they wish to have no association
with the trade that results from that hunt.
we have respected that wish; we have dealt solely with what we can deal with within the confines of europe's internal market the circulation of goods in the market that arise from the commercial hunt.
following this piece of legislation if it goes through tomorrow our consumers should be assured that nothing from the commercial hunt will be sold on europe's market.
but of course there are exceptions.
seals are very beautiful marine animals in fact i have realised during this process that they have great pr but to some they are the rats of the sea.
that is how they are perceived by many fishermen an adult seal gets through an enormous amount of fish on a daily basis.
therefore there will remain the need for seals to be hunted to ensure the sustainability of fisheries in some area.
but what we have not done here is to regulate hunting.
if people in any of our member states wish to hunt they can still continue to hunt.
what they cannot do is take commercial gain from the results of that hunt.
but it should be the case that the results of the hunt can be used and i hope particularly that those parts of seals that can be used by the medical community will be able to be used. the most difficult aspect of all of this has been the place
in it of the arctic traditional communities the indigenous people of the arctic.
we say we have an exception for them but how will being associated with a banned product actually affect their lifestyle and their economy?
the arctic is not some sort of theme park or museum it is a living breathing community with its own modern economy and at the heart of that is what is taken from the seas.
i hope that those communities will be able to continue to exist in the way that they always have.
but i have my doubts and i know that those doubts were behind the decision of the arctic council last week to refuse to give the eu permanent observer status.
this file has been for me a conundrum.
i have wrestled with the clash of liberties i have respected the vote in committee and i have tried to respect the views of those i represent at home.
but i share only this with you today i had a delegation from the nunavut community come to see me.
after our exchange of views we were all in tears.
i will support this package tomorrow but i hope it will turn out to have been the right thing to do.
what people have indicated so far is that this is the beginning of a process and not an end.
the issue is the inhumane way in which seals are being killed and the inability of professional hunters to deal with that.
the exemptions are well balanced because they reflect first of all the importance of supporting traditional hunting in communities.
diana wallis is right in saying that has to work and that means that products from those communities need to be on sale and need to be presented in an appropriate way.
yet these countries play by the rules and all they are trying to achieve is to manage natural resources and provide employment for their people.
this proposal destroys people's lives and their communities in remote regions. it destroys business opportunities on both sides of the atlantic and seriously harms good relations with important trade and strategic global partners.
furthermore this proposal violates wto rules.
with this ban we are failing in both areas.
slapping a ban on overpopulated seals is madness and a complete failure of our values.
madam president i think the debate tonight well illustrates the difficulty of this issue and it also illustrates therefore how wonderful it is that we have been able to reach some form of compromise.
as with all compromises somebody or everybody will perhaps be a little disappointed by something or other.
i guess what i wanted to emphasise is what we have tried to say throughout our negotiations that what we have dealt with is what the internal market can deal with and that is the trade.
we cannot deal with the hunting from here not the hunting that occurs in third countries. it has been difficult;
many of us still have questions about how things will be implemented and commissioner i am grateful for the reassurance you have given with regard to how the indigenous communities will be dealt with that will be something which will be important to many and something that we will have to watch very carefully.