What Daniel spoke about.

15

Feb

2022

EN Speech

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Corruption and human rights (continuation of debate)

Mr President, too many Europeans think that corruption is something that happens far away, that leaders stealing from their citizens is something that doesn’t happen in the European Union. Too few Europeans, unfortunately, know that we make it possible. European banks launder the money. European accountants develop the shell companies structures to hide the money. European real estate companies he…

15

Dec

2021

EN Speech

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State of play of the RRF (Recovery and Resilience Facility) (debate)

Madam President, the Recovery Fund has so much potential. We’re jointly fighting climate change and investing in our digital future, investing all across the European Union. Well, almost, because Viktor Orbán’s government, for example, has prevented the European Union from paying out any money in Hungary. He’s keeping over EUR 6 billion from Hungarian citizens and businesses. And what’s even more …

24

Nov

2021

EN Speech

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Presentation of the Court of Auditors' annual report 2020 (debate)

Madam President, I like it very much when the numbers add up, and I’m grateful that the European Court of Auditors checks that EU money is going where it’s supposed to go and if this money is well spent. The number that stands out from the annual report is obviously the error rate. 2.7% of the money is not going where it’s supposed to go. It is mismanaged, stolen or somehow lost along the way. Th…

24

Nov

2021

EN Speech

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Fundamental rights and the rule of law in Slovenia, in particular the delayed nomination of EPPO prosecutors (debate)

Mr President, Minister Logar, you stood here earlier and said that EPPO membership and respect for the rule of law is of utmost importance for your government. Yet the Slovenian Government used a personal vendetta of the Prime Minister against the EPPO candidates to block their nomination for six months, preventing the fight against corruption, money laundering and VAT fraud in Slovenia. I find it…

22

Nov

2021

EN Speech

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The revision of the Financial Regulation in view of the entry into force of the 2021-2027 multiannual financial framework (debate)

Madam President, Orbán’s son-in-law has committed fraud against the EU budget at least 35 times, worth over EUR 40 million. After all this, he can still apply for EU funds. He can continue to commit fraud on even more projects because the blacklisting that currently applies is a joke as long as it doesn’t apply to 90% of the EU budget. Orbán’s father also gets millions from the EU budget through c…

19

Oct

2021

EN Speech

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The Rule of law crisis in Poland and the primacy of EU law (debate)

Mr President, I would like to say to the Prime Minister that I think the defining line of his speech today was please do not disturb me. I think you, Prime Minister, have made it very clear how much your government, how much your party, has radicalised. You see it from the allies that you have here in the house, basically, the enemies of the European Union, but you see it also by the refusal to en…

6

Oct

2021

EN Speech

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The state of play on the submitted RRF recovery plans awaiting approval (debate)

Madam President, we’re discussing a simple question today: is it a good idea right now to pay out many billions of euros to Poland and Hungary, countries that have no independent judiciary, that are defiant of decisions of the European Court of Justice, and where, in the case of Hungary, Orbán and his family and friends are stealing EU money on an industrial scale? So I would ask: how are we even …

6

Oct

2021

EN Speech

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Pandora Papers: implications on the efforts to combat money laundering, tax evasion and avoidance (debate)

Madam President, from 2014 to 2017 Andrej Babiš was the finance minister of the Czech Republic and as such was sitting on the Council, negotiating anti-money laundering, tax evasion, the fight against tax havens. But while he was sitting on the Council, Andrej Babiš had a secret because he himself, while saying that he was fighting tax evasion, used a letterbox company to buy a EUR 15 million chât…

16

Sep

2021

EN Speech

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United States sanctions and the Rule of law (debate)

Madam President, colleagues, Commissioner Johansson, the situation in Bulgaria is much worse than what is reported in all the monitoring of the European Commission. And thanks to the change in government, we can better grasp today the scope of corruption, of nepotism, of money laundering that is taking place in the country. And it also shows the failure of the Commission to really do anything abou…

16

Sep

2021

EN Speech

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Announcement of voting results

Madam President, two years ago this House defended the integrity of the EU institutions when we were examining the Commissioner candidates. Three of those candidates were rejected because of conflicts of interest. Those conflicts, of course could have reduced the ability to do politics in the best interest of European citizens, so two years ago we made European politics cleaner, more trustworthy a…

15

Sep

2021

DE Speech

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Media freedom and further deterioration of the Rule of law in Poland (debate)

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, The German chancellor was in Warsaw a few days ago and stressed that the solution to the dispute with the Polish government must first and foremost take place in dialogue. The European Commission has been in dialogue for years now, and so far I cannot see any change in reducing the rule of law, restricting media freedom and attacking minorities. In that sense…

6

Jul

2021

EN Speech

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The creation of guidelines for the application of the general regime of conditionality for the protection of the Union budget (continuation of debate)

Mr President, what do Lukashenko, Assad and Kim Jong—un have in common? Well, all three are autocrats, they hate free media and they hate our democracy, but they have also for many years been members of a club, the annual list of the worst enemies of press freedom published by Reporters Without Borders. Since yesterday, there is a new member of this club, Viktor Orbán. Let that sink in: a Prime Mi…