What Nils spoke about.

22 Apr

2024

SV Speech

Preventing plastic pellet losses to reduce microplastic pollution (debate)

Watch

Madam President, thank you very much. Commissioner, thank you very much. Over the years, we have made a number of decisions about plastics. It started perhaps in a somewhat political way with the proposal on single-use plastics, where it was perhaps more about collecting points than about solving problems. For this reason, we welcome with great gratitude the Commission's proposal. But we know we h…

13 Mar

2024

FI Speech

This is Europe - Debate with the Prime Minister of Finland, Petteri Orpo (debate)

Watch

Mr President, Mr President of the Commission, Mr Petteri, this house is a bit like the Tower of Babel. Fortunately, we have interpreters who make even confusing speech almost understandable. But today we have to challenge them a bit. The Finnish language knows such a word as being an orphan. And I get orphaned when I see how Finland and Europe are doing in the competition. We are constantly laggin…

29 Feb

2024

SV Speech

Commission recommendation on secure and resilient submarine cables (debate)

Watch

Mr President, thank you very much. Commissioner, thank you very much. If we look at the map of Europe, at the map of Northern Europe, we see an interesting thing that really arose after Russia started its war against Russia. (the speaker interrupted the speaker) What I was trying to show was a map of Northern Europe. If we look at the map and take into account that Russia is our neighbour, it mean…

6 Feb

2024

EN Speech

EU2040 climate target (debate)

Watch

Mr President, Commissioner, we have a legal obligation to set a climate target for 2040 and to start the process towards adopting the target. That is what we all agreed on during the negotiation about the Climate Law. We also have an obligation to live up to our commitments and to do our fair share as the EU to keep the change within safe limits. The priority must be to phase out fossil fuel as so…

18 Jan

2024

EN Speech

Recent ecological catastrophe involving plastic pellet losses and its impact on micro plastic pollution in the maritime and coastal habitats (debate)

Watch

Mr President, dearest Commissioner, I have with me three different reports here, and they are all telling the same sad story. Containers lost at sea are a huge problem. The catastrophe off the coast of Portugal and Spain actually involved six containers. What we see in the reports, it goes for the US vessel El Faro and for the EVER SMART, is that the containers are usually stacked in a criminal wa…

22 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Packaging and packaging waste (A9-0319/2023 - Frédérique Ries) (vote)

Watch

Thank you for a very difficult vote. I can understand that many Members have some doubts about the future, therefore I would like to refer it back for interinstitutional negotiations in accordance with Rule 59(4).…

21 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Packaging and packaging waste (debate)

Watch

Mr President, dear Commissioner, with the Commissioner we have been fighting on many issues before and usually we find solutions at the end of the day. That happened last week and it will happen this week and will happen next week. But I think we should be honest about one thing: this Commission has produced twice the amount of legislation the previous Commission did, and that actually led to a si…

21 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Packaging and packaging waste (debate)

Watch

Madam President, my dear friend Commissioner Sinkevičius, due to some personal challenges, Madame Ries can’t be here today, so I have the honour of presenting her part of it. The regulation of packaging and packaging waste has undoubtedly been one of the most hotly debated pieces in legislation in Brussels in recent months, both in terms of profound paradigm shifts it proposes and the intensity of…

8 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Order of business

Watch

I would like to maintain the proposal.

8 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Order of business

Watch

Madam President, Renew can support the Greens’ request for a debate and a resolution on the renewal of glyphosate if we change the title to ‘Council and Commission statements on the proposal for a renewal of glyphosate’ with a resolution to be voted in November II.…

17 Oct

2023

FI Speech

Effectiveness of the EU sanctions on Russia (debate)

Watch

Mr President, 601 days have passed since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. However, the war has been going on for a long time, since 2014. Irrespective of the sanctions, dual-use goods and other prohibited goods are still exported to Russia. This export needs to be stopped. As long as Russia continues its aggression in Ukraine and as long as Russia in one way or another threatens…

5 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Urban wastewater treatment (A9-0276/2023 - Nils Torvalds) (vote)

Watch

Mr President, thank you all, colleagues, for the support in this slightly difficult file. Based on Rule 59(4) of the Rules of Procedure of the European Parliament, I kindly request to refer this report back to the ENVI Committee for interinstitutional negotiations. And for that, I would like to have a vote.…

5 Oct

2023

SV Speech

Urban wastewater treatment (debate)

Watch

Mr President, thank you very much. And a thank you to the Commission for the active effort here to steer it all. The discussion is really about three different things: costs and the distribution of costs, micropollutants and PFAS, and this is really related. The more micropollutants we have, the more PFAS we have, the sicker the people will be and that means costs, just in another cost center. So …

5 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Urban wastewater treatment (debate)

Watch

Mr President, Commissioner, I would like to start by thanking my shadow rapporteurs for the good spirit during the negotiations. Despite very different circumstances, we were able to bridge most of the dividing issues. For the issues where we didn’t, I’ll try to explain my concerns. First of all, energy neutrality. I’m more than able to understand the challenges we have in European cities, where h…

11 Sep

2023

SV Speech

Renewable Energy Directive (debate)

Watch

Madam President, thank you very much. Commissioner. The European Parliament has made wise decisions in various contexts and sometimes less wise decisions. On 8 May 2003 we made a decision on renewable fuels. It didn't take so many days before we eventually realized that that decision might not be the wisest one in the world. This then led to new negotiations and new decisions, because the part of …

11 Jul

2023

EN Answer

Nature restoration (debate)

Watch

The good colleague from Belgium has the wrong information about Finnish forests, because there was a report that Finnish forests are emitting more. Then that was controlled several times and it was shown that this is not the case. So when you start to debate Finnish forests with me, you better stay by the facts.…

11 Jul

2023

EN Speech

Nature restoration (debate)

Watch

Mr President, before I start, I would just remind you that you let Commissioner Sinkevičius go over the time, with 7 minutes and 24 seconds, so please give us a chance in the same spirit. I don’t like emotional debates, and this debate has been very emotional. And therefore we don’t see the facts as they are. In all cases of shared competence, the Commission is forced, according to Articles 4 and …

17 Apr

2023

EN Speech

Deforestation Regulation (debate)

Watch

Mr President, Madam Kyriakides, first of all, I have to say that I was not the shadow of this legislation. The shadow actually jumped ship. It would probably have been better if he had jumped ship before and then we could have had the discussion about the file. But first, this is, of course, a very important legislation and an issue we will certainly come back to in future years. Second, this does…

13 Mar

2023

EN Speech

Binding annual greenhouse gas emission reductions by Member States (Effort Sharing Regulation) - Land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF) - Revision of the Market Stability Reserve for the EU Emissions Trading System (debate)

Watch

Madam President, I have to ask for forgiveness of those in charge of translation, because I’m going to start with some sentences in Swedish because of Jessica. Tack ska du ha, Jessica, för att du skötte det här ärendet. Det var inte alltid lätt. Förhandlingarna i rådet var inte heller lätta, men du lyckades ändå nå ett framgångsrikt resultat. It’s very important that climate action is looked at in…

17 Jan

2023

EN Speech

Presentation of the programme of activities of the Swedish Presidency (debate)

Watch

Madam President, put on your seatbelts and your headphones, because I am going to speak in Swedish. (addressing Prime Minister Kristessen) That doesn’t concern you, probably. Fru talman! Vad är det Sverige kan göra som ordförandeland och göra bättre? Det finns en lite besvärlig tendens i Europeiska unionen att alltid beskriva allting i lite ljusröda färger. Allting är jättebra och pengarna kommer …

13 Dec

2022

EN Speech

Renewable Energy, Energy Performance of Buildings and Energy Efficiency Directives: amendments (REPowerEU) (debate)

Watch

Madam President, Mr Timmermans, I start with a very personal comment I just told the Commissioner. I’ve usually been fairly critical of his deeds, but I have to say that I was very proud of what he did in Sharm El—Sheikh. I think it actually is worth the wait, I applaud. Then to the issue. Russia has forced us into a position where we need to find more energy and quickly. Having said that, to ensu…

22 Nov

2022

EN Speech

Resilience of critical entities (debate)

Watch

Mr President, Commissioner Johansson, resilience of critical entities could be slightly changed as a headline to ‘resilience of critical entities and slightly naive and sometimes stupid minds’. Why? After the collapse of the Soviet Union, many Member States thought that we are living in a problem-free world. I think the home country of Commissioner Johansson actually abandoned obligatory military …

18 Oct

2022

EN Speech

UN Climate Change Conference 2022 in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt (COP27) (debate)

Watch

Mr President, Commissioner Johansson, Minister, ever since Parliament handled the climate law, we have been trying to raise the ambition. Everybody hasn't been on board, but we have been persistent, and we will be in the future also. It doesn't require some sort of genius to understand that losses and damages will be the main topic during the conference. And sad to say, we have more losses and dam…

5 Oct

2022

EN Speech

Russia’s escalation of its war of aggression against Ukraine (debate)

Watch

Mr President, Commissioner, Minister, we actually know how the Russian war against Ukraine will end. It will end in a total moral, societal, economical collapse of Russia, and we already see the first sign of it. But this road to collapse is long and it’s lined with untold sufferings and human deaths. Along this Via Dolorosa marches the Ukrainian army and peoples of Ukraine. In comparison with the…

13 Sep

2022

EN Speech

Renewable Energy Directive (debate)

Watch

Mr President, dear Commissioner, and a great thank you to the Pied Piper of Hamelin, Markus Pieper. Tomorrow we are going to vote on a heap of compromises. And the good thing with those compromises is that nobody is actually very pleased with them – and that’s how it should be. And you have to ask why? Well, sometimes when you vote in the Parliament, MEPs tend to think that ‘my vote’, the way I’ve…