kfajdsl/voxpopuli huggingface dataset:
as such since two thousand and seventeen we have gradually reduced the monthly pace of net asset purchases.
too. the euro area entered the crisis with an incomplete institutional and regulatory framework not only for the banking sector but also in other areas of economic policy.
in many ways we have a stronger monetary union today than we had in. two thousand and eight this is also reflected in the euro's popularity among euro area citizens which is currently as i was reminded a moment ago at its highest level since it was introduced.
untended would have posed a profound threat to price stability. the ecb responded with two sets of policies.
so what have we learned from our experience?
reforms at national level and the strong political commitment to the euro shown by european policymakers were equally instrumental in strengthening the foundations of our common project.
we needed not only to repair the transmission problems created by deleveraging banks.
indeed a wellequipped toolbox comprising both standard and nonstandard instruments has proven indispensable in conditions where monetary policy transmission is impaired or where space for interest rate cuts is limited. third we have seen the importance of a strong accountability framework
we are out of it primarily because of the resilience the energy and the entrepreneurial capacity of european citizens as well as their trust in their leaders' commitment to the
the main motor of the recovery has been the domestic economy driven by a strengthening in domestic demand and improving labour markets.
independence over the instruments we can use to achieve our mandate;
the european parliament in holding the ecb to account gives legitimacy to its independence.
first we have seen that a welldefined mandate is vital for our credibility with the public because it guarantees that the ecb will always act in the interest of the whole euro area and will not be swayed by interest groups.
resilience depends on the euro area being able to use a broad policy mix involving monetary fiscal prudential and structural instruments.
its twentieth anniversary gives us an opportunity to reflect on its successes but also to consider what still needs to be done for the euro to deliver its full benefits.
i will mostly focus on the past seven years which coincide with my term as ecb president. the two decades in which the euro has existed could hardly have been more different.
but the crisis of two thousand and eight fundamentally changed the economic and financial landscape in which we operated.
the second decade then produced the worst economic and financial crisis since the great depression. naturally these periods required very different monetary policy responses and different tools to implement them.
the european parliament has had and will have a fundamental role in guiding and designing our european future.
with the single market we have a powerful engine of sustainable growth to underpin our living standards.
today we are all reaping the benefits of their commitment of your commitment and we want future generations of europeans to benefit similarly from our commitment as well.
it is with great pleasure that i am here today to celebrate with you the first twenty years of the euro.
it is precisely in this sense that the single currency has given to all members of the euro area their monetary policy sovereignty compared with the preexisting monetary arrangements.
today our economies are integrated to a point that was not imaginable when the euro was designed.
based on such confidence firms invest and create new jobs. today most challenges are global and can only be addressed together. it is this togetherness' that magnifies the ability of individual countries
however in some countries not all of the euro's benefits have been realised in full.
great progress has been achieved since the crisis struck but more work still needs to be done;
that is best faced collectively.
partly it is because the economic and monetary union remains incomplete.
it is fitting then to celebrate this anniversary here with the directly elected representatives of all our citizens.
and there is no alternative to a future where we will all continue to work together to make our economic and monetary union an even stronger engine of prosperity for all its member states.
over the years here elected representatives and leaders and elected representatives in other parliaments have rightly recognised that ensuring economic prosperity and stability over the long term is a shared challenge
partly this is because reforms at national level are necessary and by the way they would be so under any monetary system to produce sustainable growth;
the euro is the most tangible representation of european integration that our citizens encounter on a daily basis.
it is together that we have a voice and we had a voice in the regulation of international financial markets a voice which has been fundamental in reshaping the world financial regulation after the great financial crisis.
to retain their sovereignty over the relevant matters sovereignty that would otherwise be lost in the global world.
stable prices have fostered people's confidence in the value of their savings which is one of the conditions for prosperity.
in the past together with the eu leaders the european parliament took the fundamental decisions to create the single market and in its wake the euro.
mr president i stand under rules of procedures twenty two and forty five and i want to raise awareness of a fifty six year old mp leyla gven who has been on hunger strike for sixty nine days.
i want the romanian prime minister to help the british prime minister in that process.
today it is a hot potato and not a bed of roses for prime minister theresa may who with amazing bottle has taken the bit between her teeth and is going the whole hog.
in the house of commons it is going down like a lead balloon tonight but the prime minister is not throwing the baby out with the bathwater nor changing her horses midstream.
i certainly welcome achievements made over the past two years as outlined in this report and i believe now before the european elections is the perfect time to look at where we can improve into the next mandate.
one of the most notable actions taken by parliament recently was to introduce a training programme specifically for meps on these issues.
i think this training is extremely important and i would urge all colleagues to attend.
madam president after many years of debate and work we are still not close to a solution to the migration crisis.
the reason is that the approach of the commission and this parliament has been unrealistic.
what most europeans actually want is not just managed immigration but less immigration because massive third world immigration is damaging to our societies.
reducing immigration must be the cornerstone of any european solution.
this is already understood in many member states. i hope the next european parliament has the will to deliver what europeans need and want.
individual implementation reports from a precise country to us so we could discuss them in depth but i'd like to thank mr bge for his very balanced report on central america.
but let me also express my strong concern on developments in guatemala and the expulsion of the un international commission against impunity which is a very serious deterioration of the political and business climate in the country.
on colombia i think it is now time to activate the human rights clause proper because there are so many killings of human rights activists.
how has the commission followed up this interesting complaint by the peruvian trade unions?
the three pillars of work needing to happen around the legal framework are the financial support for developing technologies and the socio economic implications of driverless.
the arguments around liability are now familiar and the ability to adapt technologies to local driving cultures are entirely feasible.
the clear desire on the part of technology firms like google uber and amazon to dispense with those inconvenient and unpredictable human beings has social implications that are both wide and deep.
however there is a fourth pillar and that is public acceptance of autonomous vehicles.
the traveling public is perfectly willing to accept the notion of autonomous vehicles with a human safety override on passenger aircraft as a matter of routine but the car is a symbol of personal freedom and status and it is powerful and it is cherished.
so politicians are sooner or later going to have to answer the question in the future will i still be able to drive my own car wherever i want to drive it?
you may have the floor at a later time.
it's a free transfer and it can be done on the priorities that are regionally accepted.
we definitely have to be determined to accomplish the paris agreement and the sdgs. that is why we strive for bigger climate spending targets when it comes to supporting strategic investments and exclude projects that could be environmentally harmful.
secondly we strongly oppose the funding of defence projects with investeu.
the militarisation of the eu budget be it through investments or through research support is not the proper way to solve the security challenges that we are facing.
colleagues before i open the floor for our group speakers i will not be taking blue cards in the first round.
the irish central bank now warns us that a new wave of mass repossessions is coming.
the fact that the eu institutions are legislating on how to deal with nonperforming loans npls could and should be an opportunity to put in place strong protection for borrowers.
but we can already see from the commission and the council's approach that their only interest is to actually restore the massive profits of europe's banks.
the commission's proposal on the secondary market for npls will have extreme and in my view appalling consequences on mortgage holders.
if the ecb won't protect ordinary people from debt vultures if the national central banks won't if the commission and council won't then people will rightly ask who will.
the commission's proposal needs to be scrapped.
i apologise to everyone else who wanted to contribute to the debate but time has run out.
i am happy that we managed to put together a higher focus on the social economy skills forecasting digital skills early childhood education and care.
these people are here whether you like it or not whatever your proposal is for the solution for this problem the country has to have the capacity and money in order to do the necessary work for the integration of these people into european society.
and i am very proud that we succeeded in doing that.
do we want to invest in business as usual spending money on outdated approaches and supporting the technology of the past or should we invest in the tools of the future the europe of tomorrow where growth doesn't have an equal burden in terms of climate and sustainability?
with investeu we have a chance to show in what direction we as policymakers wish to direct europe.
you have really done your utmost to advance this legislative proposal within the term of this parliament. i am very pleased that parliament largely shares the commission's ambitions and objectives for the european social fund plus esf an integrated fund with a substantial budget to implement the principle of the european pillar of social rights and linked to the european semester. it is also a fund with simpler and more flexible management and this will create more added value for its end users
our citizen for example in modernising and improving the labour markets ensuring good healthcare targeting the assistance to those who need it most and contributing to an overall stronger social dimension of the european union.
let me underline here that in our view pre allocating esf national envelopes even further than in our proposal would significantly reduce the flexibility of the fund.
this would prevent member states reacting to evolving social needs something we know happens in reality.
it would also limit the possibility of responding to particular issues which member states are facing and which are identified in the european semester process. turning to the specific amendment proposals related to the employment and social innovation esi strand of the esf our proposal seeks to bring this strand closer to the
esf. i note that many of these proposals seem to reflect a desire to keep the health programme as a separate instrument as it is
today. while respecting parliament's view the commission is convinced that greater synergies and coherence between programmes and closer coordination and consistency will maximise the impact of eu health measures and will benefit citizens health professionals and policymakers.
the new architecture of the esf will not only preserve a specific health strand which will continue to support public health policies to fulfil the objective of ensuring a high level of health protection but will also ensure that wherever they are relevant health aspects are addressed in all social spending.
indeed madam as you will have seen i did step in on a number of occasions so i am trying to give balance to what is a very emotional debate.
if mr lamberts is still here he's not here okay. but mr lamberts does this include those migrants getting into dinghies in france in order to cross the english channel?
what are they fleeing from?
what is the living hell in france that they are fleeing from?
these are migrants and the problem we have is that we are conflating the issue;
to decide on exactly how many people come into europe so that our local authorities can ensure that there are enough houses for these people enough jobs for these people enough schools and doctors and teachers.
right now it's a free for all and all that's happening is that the countries that have opened up their borders like germany have realised that they can't cope with this huge amount of people and are now trying to force these people onto other nations like hungary and poland nations that don't want them because they don't have the infrastructure for them. so until we actually manage and government is about governing
about being in charge our borders until we manage how many people come here in an orderly fashion how can we make sure that people who truly need asylum are not being ignored or that we're not creating migration fatigue among the people who live in our nations leading them to turn their backs on those people who truly need asylum?
can we get our house in order?
reform means to improve.
we are not improving anything.
madam president we cannot have a debate about trade agreements without discussing the very worrying situation in nicaragua where attacks against the independent press and critical voices in civil society are becoming more and more intense with threatened and real violence against journalists and ngos in particular.
press freedom is one of the cornerstones of democracies and the eu must use its political influence to ensure its partners respect their international human rights obligations.
the commission continues to present trade policy as one of the best ways to promote human rights at the international level.
putting in place binding rules that oblige companies to respect human rights is very urgent and we in this house voted for that in october.
in accordance with this policy objective the esf should support a number of specific objectives of which the first is to improve access to quality and sustainable employment that adheres to all existing union labour laws and respects the rights of all job seekers in particular the young and longterm unemployed and inactive people while promoting selfemployment and the social economy.
the eu policy has turned commercial shipping and coastguards in the mediterranean into a taxi service for criminal gangs dealing in human beings.
the eu is colluding in human misery and criminal money.
if the eu were to insist that all asylum applications must be processed in countries outside of the eu this would cut the deadly traffic immediately.
eu policy is therefore resulting in death and human trafficking.
it is encouraging the slave markets in north africa.
it has resulted in migrants being shipped into the eu for forced labour. the hope for europe now lies in national leaders to protect our ancient nations from themselves.
sebastian kurz in austria viktor orbn in hungary matteo salvini in italy these democratic leaders have taken back control from the migrant smugglers for the people.
borders belong to nations.
without borders there are no nations just a smugglers' gold rush.
by revising this regulation we have committed to giving the egf the necessary framework to act in today's world of work and i am happy that parliament shares this commission's initiatives.
together we should fulfil our commitment in line with citizens' expectations.
mr president the next time you're in a town or in a city look around and count how many people are driving for a living bus drivers cab drivers white van drivers uber drivers.
put them altogether and you've got probably the single biggest collective employer of men.
now as autonomous vehicles become a reality an awful lot of jobs are going to be lost in that sector and of course that has led to some concerns in this house which we have heard.
but it doesn't follow that all these people are going to be milling around unemployed.
technology is constantly changing the way we work and yet more people in most of our countries are in employment than at any time in our history.
that's the wonder of artificial intelligence and of modern technological change that living standards keep rising that we keep creating more new jobs as things get better and better.
look around at how lucky we are to be alive right now.
so let me tell you what our expectations are our wishes for the kind of europe we'd like to project using the sibiu summit.
we are with you in this central priority and you can turn this into something very concrete.
the first thing is a social pillar translated into european law and powerful european financial instruments. the second thing is a pre agreement on the multiannual budget on which cohesion is a central concern
the commission also wishes to praise the committee on regional development regi for having worked swiftly.
with the tight schedule ahead of us it is indeed paramount to be ready and steady when the next programming period starts.
the commission is confident that the council will do its utmost to maintain the momentum on this important file enabling the launch of negotiations soon.
this is all the more important as european territorial cooperation embodies the very essence of our european project getting together beyond boundaries to address common challenges. allow me to highlight some of the key novelties of our proposals.
the aim is to revisit the interreg architecture of programmes so as to reduce overlaps and fragmentation thereby increasing the impact on the territories targeted by the programmes.
here the proposal underlines the importance of functional areas such as sea basins.
at the same time the proposal provides means to preserve crossborder or bilateral cooperation notably in the maritime sector.
the aim of the proposal is also to reinforce the strategic dimension of the future programmes by linking them more strongly with existing strategic framework policy initiatives and finally to radically simplify the whole framework in order to dedicate fewer resources to administrative and control tasks and focus much more on results and real impact.
the commission appreciates that you recognise this important effort to simplify and calls upon you to work together to maintain these simplification measures.
first particular emphasis shall lie on measures that help the most disadvantaged groups and on member states and the regions that have been hardest hit and where the national and regional authorities lack adequate resources for taking the necessary measures. whenever the cessation of activity concerns a profitmaking enterprise the company concerned shall contribute to the reintegration of displaced workers preferably in the context of a social plan.
third should the commission implement technical assistance under indirect management it shall ensure the transparency of the procedure for designating the third party responsible for carrying out the task assigned to it and shall inform the european globalisation adjustment fund egf stakeholders including the european parliament of the subcontractors selected for that purpose.
since its design the euro has been a powerful economic tool and an ambitious political project.
first the single currency is an indispensable complement to the single market which has made possible its deepening and has boosted the integration of value chains and the strength of our economies.
third the euro is a cornerstone of a peaceful and closer union and a global actor after the end of the cold war and german unification.
in other words a strong euro is a fundamental condition for protecting and relaunching the european economic social and political model faced with the transformations of our time.
ten years ago when we were celebrating the euro in this house the financial crisis was about to shake its foundations.
that crisis has provided us with two lessons.
the first is that despite being incomplete the strength and resilience of the euro are rooted in the common political determination to preserve its integrity.
here the resolve of the european central bank and of its presidents has been decisive and the euro has protected the people during the crisis.
we should of course be able to distinguish between the euro and the economic policies conducted during the crisis including some economic policy mistakes which were made at that time. the second lesson is that if we want to achieve our ambitious goals resilience is not enough.
we need to complement our common currency with a robust democratic economic and social union. let us not wait until another crisis happens to develop the necessary tools to ensure stability and common prosperity for all our citizens.
the euro is a journey and it is time to move forward.
we could have delivered quick swift operations of rescuing and providing asylum.
yes this is necessary to meet the new challenges in europe and also to keep a strong commitment to cohesion.
we were really disappointed that in the last european council it was decided that the final agreement should take place only in autumn.
this is too late.
we have the conditions to get the basic agreement before this and we don't understand why the austrian presidency was not able to put forward a more ambitious schedule to finalise this negotiation.
the solutions are on the table.
we might be close to an agreement enabling us to complete the banking union and to create the budget for the eurozone something all monetary zones in the world have they have a budget.
yes we do need a new digital tax and we need to deliver this in a much quicker way.
so this is the way to go for us social democrats and we really think that we need to move to a new phase where this new kind of leadership emerges in europe.
we have to address their social problems not by leaving a community of solidarity not by leaving the european union but by making the european union more socially just and addressing problems of social inequality.
the european parliament with this proposal has proved that it is ready to pick this fight and to tackle inequality and now we need to see the council and the member states too showing their readiness to do that.
the commission's proposal is thus based on science and reflects a reasonable approach. it is supported by a clear majority of member states.
two thousand and nine secondly the biocides regulation is putting the same criteria on the table and there is no objection to that one.
my question to our colleagues is are we here for the rule of law or for the rule of industry?
this was part of the regulation on biocides and pesticides and it was one of the key debates.
the key question is whether the commission is exceeding its implementing powers and the answer is yes'.
that is exactly what we are discussing here.
that is the way we do it.