kfajdsl/voxpopuli huggingface dataset:
first like us you call for progress on pending legislative files.
i know that commissioner barnier is committed to considering a further extension after an initial period of implementation.
member states themselves have the information needed to apply the criteria.
as you know the commission is currently studying the national reform programmes submitted by the member states.
in this field.
it is a question of our collective resources adding up to the collective deficits of all our member states;
mr president despite all the goodwill speeches and statements the pressing issues of growth and unemployment especially youth unemployment have yet to be properly addressed.
one thing is clear though the austerity only measures have failed economically socially and democratically.
it is time for member states to understand that these measures are much more than spending.
it is an investment for the future for our youth and for the millions of european citizens facing growing social distress.
mr president could i just say that the obsession with the length of time of this council meeting disturbs me somewhat?
there are two very real issues on the agenda for this short meeting of two hours but that does not mean that great progress can be made.
that will be a huge challenge but i also want to add to it the issue of fuel poverty and the cost of fuel for low income households.
others have mentioned the need to look at an energy and climate policy that address both those issues. i am not sure we have got that balance right but i think that tomorrow's meeting should at least start and perhaps reach some conclusions on that particular point.
on the second issue on the agenda tax fraud and tax havens tax fraud is a crime.
if we want to detect crimes we need good policing so we need good financial policing to detect these frauds within our member states and across the european union.
there was some schoolboy sniggering here about olive oil.
let us be clear on that particular issue that is about fraud a food fraud and i think that the measures taken on that are required.
the third indicator is an unwillingness to exchange information and we know that that is crucial with tax administrations;
and the fourth indicator is an absence of substantial activity requirements.
we have a definition.
but fatca is a us law that is applied directly on eu territory. i ask this house if it were not a us law but a chinese or a russian law or a law of any other country would we also welcome the fact that it is being applied here?
the eu needs to have the courage to make its own policies and set its own standards.
we have been unable to do so for many years and we should not need the americans to adopt our laws.
we heard a lot about that this morning.
while i support the current corporation tax rate in the south of ireland i would like to see the executive and assembly have the power to vary the corporation tax rates in the north of ireland.
we need to increase the minimum effective rates for corporation tax which by the way are still higher than the actual corporation tax rates in some of these countries which are shouting loudest about it.
in addition together with europol the dutch police and others they founded the no more ransom project which helped thousands of victims of ransomware to get their encrypted data back without having to pay criminals.
the report stated that european institutions should not use software which is confirmed to be malicious such as software from kaspersky lab.
tomorrow we will vote on a proposal to divert half a billion euros that could be invested in useful and peaceful projects towards the development of new weaponry and particularly drones.
as greens we are committed to a european union that was founded on peace and continues to support peaceful and secure livelihoods through its aid budget.
i strongly urge my colleagues to vote against this report.
this agenda is being driven by our continent's powerful arms companies which have more than doubled their lobbying budget in the last five years and it seems to have worked.
if you truly wish for peace then prepare for peace by transferring the massive defence support budget to the eu's peacekeeping and human rights activities.
despite parliament's resolution that this should be fresh money sixty of it will come from existing civilian programmes so we will be investing in weaponry instead of improving communications and satellite technology.
but we should take note of the fact that the absurd inconsistency is there between spending public money to repair the damage caused by the very weapons that we are subsidising through budgets like the european defence industrial development programme.
madam president few political adages have been more destructive than if you wish to have peace prepare for war' which has been used as a moral justification by the belligerent since the romans imposed their version of peace at the point of a sword.
sadly i fear some colleagues on the left of this house will have believed the lobbyists' argument that funding arms protects jobs but to defend these jobs that thrive on death and destruction while ignoring the life giving jobs that this same money could support in just and sustainable sectors is a tragic failure of imagination.
we see great potential in a european year dedicated to the fight against child early and forced marriages and we will ask our services to evaluate this idea.
we also need to see more comprehensive approaches addressing all the various patterns behind child marriage.
to succeed and meet the two thousand and thirty agenda target we need a stronger partnership we need more and better laws more action plans budget and accountability mechanisms and more data collection.
lastly we need more long term commitment.
we are talking here about the devastating consequences of child marriage on the lifetime of girls and on society.
this is something that we cannot let happen. we cannot let ourselves be ignored.
that's a very negative view of ireland.
as i said we admit and we weren't in government only for the last couple of years that ireland hasn't played its part in reaching its two thousand and twenty targets but that is going to change.
this initiative resulted in a deeply disappointing but hardly surprising response from the commission.
ireland's own environment minister was not found wanting either at last week's european environment council meeting in a bizarre intervention he said he supports the right to water in principle but doesn't wanted it included in eu directives.
it called for water to be recognised as a human right.
in a box ticking exercise they have tried to slip a small reference to access to water into the recast of the drinking water directive but immediately the right wing forces are doing their best to delete even this small reference.
does he not understand that this is the central demand of the right two water citizens' initiative?
he said that we were laggards in the past but we are not going to be in the.
in the so called land of the free' almost two zero children have been forcibly removed from their parents in just six weeks.
now we condemn the human rights situation in the united states of america.
these are children and this is happening in a country that presents itself as a bastion of freedom.
mr president islamophobic travel bans withdrawing from the un human rights council and now industrial scale family separations and detentions. the us trump administration is graduating from post truth to post human rights.
in this chamber we are used to calling out human rights abuses in war torn countries and in dictatorships.
i believe that the eu needs to promote a rule based order and binding commitments of the unga.
only in such a way can we hope for improvements. just take the example of the deeply disappointing results of the european council last week. if we do not adopt binding measures it means that our desire to reform the system is not sincere.
let me just underline two points.
i accept that in some member states you can marry at sixteen with parental consent.
and despite there being many international and legal instruments already available to governments to fight these malpractices we have a long way to go to eliminate child early and forced marriage. our efforts must continue and be accelerated.
the ecr is committed to gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls through different means focusing on achieving protection for women and girls from physical and sexual violence as well as giving them opportunities in education employment and in society in general.
it is cultural norms and practices which allow this.
however i believe it is right we consider a higher age so that vulnerable young people particularly girls are sufficiently mature and are able to stand up for their rights and resist social pressure.
i therefore fully support the recommendations made by mep goerens in his report. much consideration was given to demands for a minimum age of marriage.
child early and forced marriage is a cultural not a religious practice and while strict legal enforcement and education may eventually bring about a changed mindset it will be a slow gradual progression before we are rid of these practices.
then suddenly there are no problems!
we are letting these countries down when they need us and we use their weak position when we need them.
the same countries that were blocking the association negotiations are now suddenly talking about albania helping them build these refugee camps that nobody wants to build.
i joined with women for europe a campaigning group who recognise that our rights will not be best protected by being outside the eu and that the cost of brexit will impact on women much more than men as we women always pay the price of increased household costs and we bear the burden of caring for our families in times of crisis.
i marched with young people who feel that their future has been stolen from them.
and believe me brexit will usher in a new era of austerity for the many not the few.
mr president on twenty three june nearly half a million people from all walks of life filled the streets of london to demand a people's vote on the final brexit deal.
and forty s the eu is a precious peace project not simply a market and we destroy it at our peril.
it might have sounded like this the united nations is a weak organisation but i don't know a better one.
in april of this year the security council held a debate about what turned out to be a chemical attack in syria.
the global strategy on the us foreign and security policy affirms that the eu will strive for a strong united nations as a bedrock of the multilateral rules based order.
it is by the way also the most powerful body within the united nations.
we must not forget that the eu and its member states were instrumental in shaping the global un two thousand and thirty agenda and the eu remains committed to being a front runner in mobilising all means of implementation and ensuring strong follow up. we continue to support the women peace and security agenda.
but unfortunately just as in so many other cases we have observed the veto of one superpower blocked the resolution condemning the attack and so each side voted against the other's proposals.
we actively support the un secretary general in his reform agenda to streamline the peace and security structure which needs to become more efficient focused and operational.
it was enshrined in the charter of the united nations which was adopted a few months after the end of world war ii.
as for human rights we are very concerned to observe an ever tighter space for civil society around the world and we would emphasise that human rights are indivisible interdependent and inter related.
we therefore call for strengthened protection of women and girls in conflict areas.
with regard to weapons of mass destruction and the issue of non proliferation we support all un actions as we do when we promote the full implementation of the arms trade treaty and encourage all un member states to sign and ratify it.
when the united states and russia are at odds nothing moves and people keep suffering or even dying.
our report therefore urges all those responsible to redouble their efforts to change both the veto right and the composition of the security council.
the question we all had on our mind was how will the united nations react to this atrocity?
i may pick up on a few outstanding issues in my final statement at the end of the debate and i hope that despite some differences you will support this important report.
we also support the secretary general's efforts in making a substantial change in order to align the un development system with the priorities of agenda two thousand and thirty and the sustainable development goals.
let me now turn to disturbing trends sexual violence including rape is still being used as a weapon and constitutes a war crime.
' in my opinion which is reflected in the report this weakness has a structural origin and it has a name it is called the security council.
let me illustrate this with an example.
if winston churchill were alive what would he have said about the un?
apart from direct psychological and physical consequences early and forced marriages have a dramatic negative effect on a child's right to education.
eleven member states including the uk still have not ratified this convention.
as a feminist and a children's rights campaigner i fully support the report's call for all member states to ratify the istanbul convention which is the most comprehensive legal instrument that we have to combat all forms of gender based violence.
and shame on theresa may for entertaining such an appalling regime during a recent state visit to the uk!
i would like to ask my fellow irish mep mr kelly if he shares the same vision of climate diplomacy as his party in the irish government because it is a type of climate policy that actually goes into international negotiations and argues for loopholes to dilute the laws. it's the type of climate diplomacy that climate action network referred to as playing a negative role in the eu two thousand and thirty legislation.
however one of the most useful things the eu could do to help the situation of indigenous people is to lead by example europe's autochthonous minorities also suffer from discrimination and denial of rights and some of them from social exclusion. as a reminder in the case of my minority twenty eight years after the fall of communism and eleven years after eu accession properties grabbed by the former regime still have not been restituted to their owners and some that
it is therefore welcome that the report calls on the eu and the member states to adopt all necessary measures for the full recognition and protection of the rights of indigenous peoples and for their prior and informed consultation on all issues affecting them.
the programme promotes the participation of small and medium sized enterprises from different member states in the defence supply chain and provides some bonuses for cross border smes and cross border mid caps.
as these redeployments have not yet been earmarked for specific purposes we are confident that this will not affect the good implementation of their respective programmes.
the research window is already well on track with the pilot projects and the preparatory action.
this was a huge effort for all of us and we all know it was not a very easy process.
i mean especially the commission's declaration on the list of priorities for the adoption of the work programme on the selection of experts for the evaluation of proposals and on the intention of the commission to manage directly the programme.
with the edidp we tested our capacity to discuss and to agree at european level between different institutions on defence matters but the real test of course is now.
it is balanced inclusive again and it will truly help the eu defence industry to cooperate more and more efficiently.
we will define the work programme of course with the limits of our competitors and as i said before the commission intends to implement the programme directly. finally as i stressed when presenting our proposal to you in october last year the programme is not only definitely not for the big companies and for the big member states.
they were working very hard in order to reach their agreement at a really record pace.
we just want to make sure through this programme that the security interests of the eu and the security interests of its member states are preserved. a firm obligation not to fund actions related to products prohibited by international law was added and a specific reference has been made to defence products designed to carry out level strikes without human control.
on governance the regulation provides a very well defined and framed list of categories of capabilities that the work programme should include.
the european defence fund as was said before is not a protectionist tool;
overall i certainly believe that the compromise is a very good and balanced text.
we need concrete and ambitious projects and this is work that is ongoing right now.
i am pleased that the final outcome upheld most of the proposals from the commission and of course even improved on some of them.
for everyone of course there were some points that didn't make it through the negotiations and that is why we have foreseen a number of declarations that will have to be appended in the record of tomorrow's session.
it is open to participation by beneficiaries from all member states.
thank you very much for your work.
i am very happy to see that the inclusive character of the original proposal was not only maintained but even strengthened in the final proposal.
additionally the programme provides strict conditions for the participation of companies based in the eu but not under eu effective control and for cooperation with companies from outside the eu.
it has to continue.
the programme targets communities from a group of twelve countries and focuses on education access to health care strengthening enforcement mechanisms girls' empowerment and changing social norms.
the revised european union guidelines for the promotion and protection of the rights of the child highlight the fact that raising awareness and promoting gender equality is a priority for european engagement with partner countries.
in october last year we had a girls summit in brussels which brought together many young girls from around the world.
ending child marriage has been identified as a priority for the european union action plan on human rights and democracy.
the union has cofinanced the setting up of a european network on guardianship for unaccompanied children.
the report also mentions children on the move as particularly vulnerable.
i would like to conclude by sharing some key messages from this summit that i find very valid in the context of today's debate.
we share this view.
it is also about enforcing european law and respecting the charter of fundamental rights and international human rights law. combating child marriage requires a comprehensive strategy and the european union has already stepped up its external work and the recommendations included in the report
we are also doing our homework inside the union.
secondly to end this practice it is of the utmost importance that girls and women have a voice at all levels of society. we therefore very much share the views expressed in the report that the active participation of girls in society is an active way of preventing child marriage.
ending early and forced marriage is as much about adopting protective legislation as about enhancing access to education.
this cooperation is already ongoing and will continue.
firstly child marriage is not only a violation of girls' rights but also a form of violence and discrimination against women and girls and as such is absolutely unacceptable.
the report refers many times to the lack of education not only as a root cause but also as a consequence of early marriage.
the human rights and democracy country strategies for the two thousand and sixteen two thousand and twenty period include children's rights as one of the main priorities some of them focused on combating child marriage.
the aim was to put the spotlight on what needs to be done to ensure their rights are respected protected and of course enforced.
the communication on education and emergencies and protracted crises adopted in may two thousand and eighteen reiterates the protective role of education recognising that children who are not in school are exposed to forced marriage and early pregnancy among many other risks.
this network will allow developing guardianship capacity as well as the prevention of and responses to early and forced marriage.
are of vital importance to us and will help us in achieving even more.
for instance the european union has contributed eur six million to the unfpaunicef global programme to accelerate action to end child marriage.
men and boys must take full responsibility to challenge discriminatory social norms and gender stereotypes and foster positive norms of gender equality nonviolence and respect. finally education is the main channel through which sustainable progress in ending child marriage will be achieved.
in september two thousand and seventeen the european union and the united nations launched a historic initiative branded the spotlight initiative' to end violence against women and girls with an investment of eur five hundred million.
until now this antidemocratic practice has never been seriously discussed at governmental level in latvia so my only hope is that it can finally be addressed at european level.
an unforeseen circumstance of driving ammonia production to countries outside the eu such as china and india which now account for sixty of production has perversely led to a shortage of carbon dioxide in the eu causing problems for bakeries abattoirs breweries manufacturers of soft drinks and food packaging companies.
yet there has been no discernible increase in global temperatures since the late ninety s despite an increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide.
to date the eu's implementation of the paris agreement in conjunction with its climate policies has seen largescale carbon leakage from the eu to third countries whose energy dependent industries such as those producing ammonia leave taking thousands of jobs with them.
let me reiterate the high importance that the european union attaches to the rights and well being of indigenous peoples their children their women and their men and to stopping the practice of land grabbing.
we really have to ensure first of all that we end any such practices that may be happening in europe and do everything we can to end them internationally because this is an absolute scandal in the modern era.
these conclusions also confirm the european union's support for the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples as well as the outcome of the two thousand and fourteen world conference on indigenous peoples.
mr president honourable members thank you once again for a very rich report and for your attention.
the eu is supporting land governance in about forty countries with a total budget of eur two hundred and forty million.
the assis report calls for the updating of the eu land policy guidelines from two thousand and four which the commission is already considering.
we will also further reflect on the call for the commission to launch an eu action plan on responsible business conduct.
thanks to european union support two hundred and eighty zero hectares were awarded through collective title benefiting some eight zero indigenous and afro colombian families living in the neighbourhood of protected areas of national parks.
the report addresses the issue of the training of delegation staff on the rights of indigenous peoples.
the report also attaches importance to ensuring dialogues and consultations with indigenous peoples at both national and regional level as the may two thousand and seventeen council conclusions note too.
therefore in two thousand and seventeen we stepped up our support for indigenous peoples and for human rights defenders working on land environment biodiversity and climate through the european union human rights defenders mechanism.