What Marc spoke about.

The latest COVID variant omikron boosted the stock prices of Pfizer and Moderna considerably. Pfizer saw its share close 6.1 percent higher, about $17.5 billion in additional market value. Competitor Moderna even saw its shares increase by 21 percent. A virus variant such as . This is particularly cynical. After all, it is precisely Big Pharma's patents that make new variants more likely. Patents

You want a European sanctions mechanism, a "global" sanctions mechanism. Like the United States, you want to punish the whole world. I mean, not the whole world, just the countries that don't obey you. Countries that do not follow the policy of European imperialism. Those who do not open up to European multinationals. Because let's not pretend that human rights matter to you. You have never sancti

We are asked to fast track an Act in Support of Ammunition Production. Commissioner Breton wants to give huge amounts of taxpayers’ money to extremely profitable multinational companies, but refuses any democratic debate. Let us be clear: this proposal goes far beyond supporting Ukraine – it aims at creating a European network of arms producers, a proper EU military—industrial complex. The proposa

Madam President, listen, I do not dispute the importance of training, on the one hand, but, on the other, there is still the case of GSK here in Belgium. GSK is about workers who know how to make drugs, it's about workers who know how to make vaccines. And despite that, there are 1,217 jobs that are threatened today. And why? What's the base? It is that there are, on the one hand, a lot of profits

Mr President, you are talking about getting involved in the war in Yemen. A new war in the Middle East. Do you find, dear colleague, that oil is not expensive enough? You say we have to condemn the crimes, I agree. But here you are siding with Saudi Arabia. I feel like you've found new dictator friends. Human rights? Nothing to do, no. You are going to support Saudi Arabia? Yet it was Saudi Arabia

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, the dolce vita? I asked myself: When we discuss the budget, do people know how much members here earn? I did the calculation, it is 13 to 14,000 euros per month, plus or minus 9,000 euros net, plus the 359 euros per day of presence, not to talk about other costs, of course. It makes life easy. The problem with this is that it totally disconnects

Madam President, High Representative, for five years we have heard here that all we needed is more weapons deliveries and more sanctions. Your colleague European Commissioner Kubilius recently spilled the beans, saying Europe has no independent peace strategy – none; zero. In five years of war, we have not developed one strategy on how to end this war. In the meantime, the war is spiralling out of

Thank you. I think that's a good point. I think it would be very wrong to say everything is the same. On the other hand, it would also be very wrong to deny the different types of violence that exist in society. There is the violence of those that have burned cars of workers, which is horrible, not just because of the car that's burned, but because of all of the work that's behind it – people tryi

First of all, let me thank you for showing what I just said, for proving my point. You call on half of this Parliament to withdraw from elections. That is installing dictatorship. Be ashamed of that, first of all. Secondly, I don't know what Europe you're living in, but most governments in Europe are governed by right-wing parties. So the responsibility for everything that's going on and the destr

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, let us be clear: the destruction of small businesses and public goods is unacceptable. This is the worker who has worked hard all his life, who loses his car in flames. These are small traders who work hard and we are obviously on their side. But here, this shameful alliance between the right and the far right wants to attribute this without any proof to poli

Madam President, thank you, I am going to take advantage of it. Honestly, the President has an extraordinary power because we, as Members of Parliament, we are allowed to propose policy measures, and within urgent resolutions, the President can say, no, I do not accept this. But she should only be able to do this if it is out of scope, if it is irrelevant. Now, over the last plenary sessions, we h

Mr President, colleagues, there is no question or discussion: Taraneh, Leila must not be executed. No one should. But let us here tonight also mention Sima, 35 years old, a kidney patient. She had to visit seven pharmacies in Tehran to find life-saving medication. Why? Because Western sanctions are making medicines scarce and expensive. They are a death sentence for many Iranians today. Your sanct

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, sometimes it is difficult not to get exasperated here because I think, when we discuss the world, we must see the context in which we live. On the one hand, we have our relations with Russia cut off; Mrs von der Leyen has just announced it: By December, there will be no more Russian gas entering Europe despite the energy crisis. On the other hand, we are dail

Madam President, when I hear the right and the far right talking here, it is a little bit Alice in Wonderland. Finally, in your case, with leather boots and a certain nostalgia for Spanish fascism. But either way, you act as if there is no embargo, no blockade against Cuba. That Cubans could do whatever they wanted. That's not the reality. I'll get you back to the ground a little bit. It is your f

Madam President. Madame von der Leyen, your self-sufficiency, your arrogance has bothered me. You're talking about the best of times, but for whom? For you, perhaps, with $34,000 a month, and for billionaires. But for European workers today? Our trains are late, our roads destroyed, our hospitals desperate, our firefighters under-equipped. One in two Europeans has financial difficulties. Leisure a

Mr President, Commissioner, Mrs Kallas, today, foreign policy for citizens must be at the service of citizens in Europe. I have given up all hope at the humanitarian level, because when you cannot condemn the massacre of children in a school in Iran just because it is the United States, or the bombing of a marriage, it is extremely serious – but at least at the service of European citizens. Today,

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, you are talking about security, but I still want to ask you the question: when you celebrate the flexibilization of rules – fewer rules, fewer procedures – to the safety of who do you think? Because today we have a law that limits in Europe the use of eternal pollutants, such as PFAS. Clearly, the law is not enough, if we see the number of cance

Madam President, I believe that we cannot separate the two proposals from the so-called ‘28th regime’ – or ‘Europe Inc.’. So we need to look at the concrete tax problems we are facing today. The first is, of course, tax avoidance and evasion, which today, according to conservative estimates, can amount to up to EUR 200 billion at European level. The second problem is that, of course, this often ha

Mr President, Commissioner Šuica, I will try with great restraint to express to you the depth of my anger at your words, which are dripping with hypocrisy. You talked about the El-Facher massacre – thousands of Sudanese massacred by the Rapid Forces, supported by the United Arab Emirates. You did not dare to say it, but you know it. What did you do? One month after this massacre, you have been in

Madam President, Commissioner, the news about Ebola is, of course, horrific. It is a disease that kills, which is also scary – transmissible, very deadly – but, at the same time, we must also dare to tackle the root causes of the problem. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, what would it take to effectively fight Ebola? This is not just about finding a vaccine; it is also a well-functioning publi

Madam President, listen, it has been said, but 1 222 people have died in Belgium because of the heat. If it had been a military attack, how would you have reacted here? If there had been 1,200 deaths in Belgium as a result of a military attack? That would have been a state of emergency. You would have mobilized all the troops, all the forces, all the funds to react to that. And here today, what do

Madam President, the EIB approved over one billion of projects in Israel with companies blacklisted by the United Nations. And why were these blacklisted? Because they were complicit in the illegal colonisation of Palestine. This is a violation of international law. And the EIB was forced to open an internal investigation into this. Imagine: the biggest public investment bank in the world – a Euro

Madam President, listen, ladies and gentlemen, yes, human rights must be respected. But, listening to some of my colleagues, especially French on the right, I feel that you have a bit of the seed of being expelled and having been expelled from the Sahel, right? And everything is starting to get a little clearer in my head because I wondered, in Belgium, in France, we continue to produce and buy mi