Debate: European coordinated response to the COVID- outbreak
Date: THURSDAY, 26 MARCH 2020
Speaker: Maroš Šefčovič
Language: EN

I would like to thank the European Parliament, all of you who are here, and also those who are looking at us through their teleworking stations and are participating in our work by this new way of remote voting. I think it’s extremely important to send the signal to European citizens that the institutions are working, that we have found a way to operate under these difficult conditions and that we can, and know how to, adopt the decisions which are so crucial for our citizens.  I really would like also to thank Mr Gonzáles Pons, Mr Moreno Sánchez, Ms De Lange and Mr Benifei – who realise that we are in a completely new set—up and that we in the European Commission are really doing our utmost, in close cooperation with you, to find the best responses to this unprecedented situation. To Mr Bay and Mr Dzhambazki, I would say that the whole world was not prepared – just look at how we are all struggling. But I think that we really mobilised very quickly and we found a way how best to share our responsibilities, because you know what the Treaty says about responsibility for the health sector. I mean this is not a blame—game. This is not about shifting responsibilities. We simply have to work together. I’m very pleased also that the predominant tone in the discussion today was how we can do this better. I’m very glad that we are hearing the same echoes coming from our Member States. I would like to reassure Mr Botenga that our model for acting under these difficult circumstances is ‘let’s do whatever it takes’ to tackle the crisis and to emerge from this traumatic situation stronger. We are working on the very concrete measures that Madame Ries, Madame Aubry, and Mr Mureșan were asking for, because we are fully realising that through concrete measures we can show that we are operational, we can deliver, and that cooperation at European level brings much better results than individual actions by Member States.  The President of the Commission has highlighted a few of the measures, but to give you more concrete figures from yesterday’s college discussions: First, what we needed to do is actually to map out how much of this medical equipment we need. How many masks? How many respirators do we need for our operations? To give you the preliminary conclusions of these analyses: we need 200 million masks, we need 30 million respirators, weekly, for at least 3 months.  The good news is that this joint procurement has worked and we will be able to have them for a reasonable price and we will be able to distribute them to the Member States very soon.  The same goes for the ventilators. We need at least 15 000 for the next three months. Unfortunately, we have something like half of that. But again, yesterday, we had very thorough discussions with the producers, exporters and importers of this equipment and we are pretty sure that very soon we will be able to help our Member States also with this crucial technology.  The first lesson we learned from this crisis was that our civic mechanism is not working if none of our Member States is in a position to help because of limited stockpiles. I think that we need to learn from that and therefore we are establishing the strategic reserve for this medical equipment, which will be open within days – we already have medical supplies worth EUR 10 million – and which would be under our jurisdiction, so it would not mean a request to the Member State that supplies the equipment, but it will be our decision to supply those Member States, those sectors, which would need it the most. I think that this idea, as Ms in ‘t Veld was suggesting, should be developed further as we need these strategic reserves for all sensitive equipment for the future, for when we need it. On top of this current situation, we are working on two strands. The first is of course all the measures which we need to tackle the health aspects of the crisis, but at the same time we are also working on the economic aspect, which I think will be with us for quite a few months to come.  First and foremost, we want to make sure that all this sensitive medical equipment will be manufactured predominantly here in Europe so we will not be so dependent on imports from third countries. We talked to the industry and we have been encouraged by the positive response. We believe that within three to four months we should be able to produce this sensitive equipment here in Europe so we can be much more autonomous in our decision taking. Then, of course, we need to take care of the macroeconomic situation. Here our focus is on making sure that it would provide enough liquidity for our financial systems. To respond to Mr Wallace, this is not for banks, but for businesses, for SMEs, so they can keep their operations open, and to protect jobs because we are fully aware that once a job is lost it is very difficult to recreate it. So we are working on making sure that as few people as possible will lose their jobs because of the coronavirus crisis.  Several of you mentioned the bazooka from the European Central Bank. I would just add that in addition to the EUR 750 million there are another EUR 2 billion euros and some other programmes offered by the ECB, so all together the response just from the ECB is in the area of EUR 1 trillion. We are working very closely with the EIB, and thanks to our financial contribution the EIB is developing a programme worth EUR 200 billion in loans especially aimed at SMEs because we know that they are the main employer in the European Union. We are also, of course, looking into ways to help big industries as well.  If I may, I will use this opportunity to call on the governments in central and eastern Europe to talk to the European Commission, to develop their crisis schemes, just as other countries in western and southern Europe already have done, which we – in an express manner, thanks to the great work of Vice—President Vestager – approved as legal State aid. We discussed yesterday how we can help them to develop these programmes, these schemes. We are ready to do that in the European Commission. I hope that also the governments from these countries will come to us so that we can together develop recovery plans, which are needed for every single Member State. Concerning vaccines and concerning coronavirus response systems, we have already allocated some quite substantial sums of money and we are working very closely – in a very special advisory group working with our President – to see where the leading epidemiologists and virologists are to develop the vaccine. We are also ready to make sure that we protect our critical industries in these times of a stock exchange rollercoaster, were they to be faced with hostile takeovers. We simply won’t let this happen, and I believe that the European Parliament will help us in that effort.  When I was here a few weeks ago, my last intervention in this Chamber was on the multiannual financial perspective. I agree totally with Mr Eppink that now is the time to decide. We need the budget. We need seven years’ financial perspective so we can plan the recovery of Europe and we can tackle better the emergencies of today.  I would just remind the general public in the European Union that we are in the last year of the seven—year budget and we are very much limited by financial constraints as to how much we can do. So I hope that the video conference of the leaders this afternoon, which should be very much focused, naturally, on tackling the coronavirus, will also be tackling the issue of how we are going to tackle this virus from the economic and financial point of view. For that we need the MFF, and I hope that this crisis will make it crystal clear to our leaders that we need good progress at that level. To conclude, Mr President, I would finish on the point made by Ms in ‘t Veld. I think that history teaches us that the best responses to post—crisis development have been prepared during crises. Of course, now we have to focus on the daily management, on how to tackle this crisis and how to make this nightmare go away as quickly and with as few victims as possible.  But at the same time we need to start reflecting on what will be next – how the world will change, how Europe will change, what our position will be on this new global map and how we will make sure that Europe emerges stronger via a strong recovery plan, by more technological autonomy, by greater strategic sovereignty. As you know, I’m responsible for foresight in the European Commission, and I would like to assure you that these are exactly the ideas we are working on. Once we have something more concrete it will be my pleasure to share it with this House as well.  Thank you very much, Mr President, and thank you all for coming here or for supporting us from your teleworking stations. Thanks to the interpreters and to all the staff from Protocol and to the technical operators who have made our session today possible.