Speeches

Mr President, the collapse of the CAP budget, the disastrous Mercosur Treaty, the capitulation to US wine and spirits taxes, the inflation of standards and constraints on our farmers and now, as we have just seen, a soft reaction to Chinese taxes on our pork exports. I am originally from Brittany, where I live, the main French pig farming region, and our breeders are excessively worried. They are worried because the Chinese market is indispensable for them. So what is the Commission doing? Nothing. It is once again abandoning our farmers and ranchers. Why is she abandoning them? Because agriculture has become an adjustment variable on other issues. We prefer to defend German interests. We prefer to defend German industrial and automotive interests, including with China, than to defend our agriculture. Our breeders and farmers understood that the European Commission was abandoning them. We do, too.

Madam President, the agricultural crisis is deep, and it is getting worse. The current CAP, which broke with the spirit of 1962, is the main cause. We must therefore turn our backs on our choices, which are often guided by ideology. Farmers will never live off their jobs as long as you organise unfair competition, as illustrated by the disastrous deal with Mercosur. They will never live off their trade as long as you stifle them with the diminishing rules of the Green Deal. Commissioner, our farmers are asking you for an increased budget, an inflation-adjusted budget and a sanctified budget for the future CAP. Not only does this not seem to be on the agenda of your future choices, but your willingness to bring Ukraine back to the European Union also promises a collapse of aid for our farmers. Europe needs a powerful agriculture, capable of ensuring its food sovereignty with quality products. Our farmers ask us: you ask – to protect them and make sure that they can produce – everything that you do not seem to want to assure them.

Mr President, the European Commission's software is has been, cheesy, overwhelmed. Clinging to the dogma of free trade and open borders, the European Union does not see that the world has changed. Great powers, such as China and the United States, have ended liberal globalization and are protecting their economies. Meanwhile, the Commission is negotiating free trade treaties with Ukraine and Mercosur, which will kill our agriculture. All this is of course in addition to the free trade agreements with Morocco, New Zealand, South Africa, etc. Selling German cars seems to be the only objective of the European Union, which has sacrificed French wines and spirits. Ms. von der Leyen is disqualified to lead the fight with the United States and protect our economy. We must write a new page in European history, without Ms von der Leyen.

Madam President, the offshore wind farm of Saint Brieuc, in Brittany, France, has been entrusted to the multinational Iberdrola, which charges EDF the megawatt hour at €155 while production by a French nuclear power plant is €65 per megawatt hour. To this must be added the connection, the network, which costs a fortune: 20 € per megawatt hour. France also announced a $37 billion multi-year plan to connect offshore platforms at sea. These offshore platforms disfigure our landscapes and are a real challenge for our fishermen. So we are indeed paying dearly for the dogmatism and destructive green ideology of the European Union. Because we lose our food sovereignty, we put users at risk. As we saw earlier, we are making big profits for multinationals and exorbitant costs for the citizens of the European Union. We are fighting this policy. She's a crazy politician.

Madam President, the European Commission gives grades, good grades, bad grades. Its members are judges, jurors and why not executioners? But does the European Union not violate the rule of law when it stifles the scandals of Pfizergate, Qatargate that affect its highest authorities? Does the European Union not violate the rule of law when it intervenes illegally in the electoral processes of Romania and Poland? Doesn't the European Union violate the rule of law when it funds NGOs to corrupt MEPs' votes? Does the European Union not violate the rule of law when it excludes the third group of this House from the positions of responsibility to which they are entitled? The European Union cites Hungary 32 times in its report, but nothing, not once, about the violations of the rule of law of the Spanish socialists of the Socialist Sanchez. So yes, we must respect the rule of law everywhere. But the European Commission should start sweeping in front of its door with a very big broom.

Madam President, it is the fault of others, it is Putin's fault, it is the fault of COVID, it is Trump's fault, it is China's fault if food prices rise. In reality, the European Union refuses to look at its own responsibilities. If many food prices soar, it is also due, for example, to this inefficient and dramatic European energy market, which means that electricity is indexed to gas and that all producers, in the end, are affected and must increase their prices. If the price of bread baguette increases, it is because our bakers, of course, are experiencing an explosion in their electricity bill. We owe this to the European Union and its dramatic energy policy, and then, of course, to the Green Deal, which imposes a punitive ecology that significantly increases production costs and which our producers in industry or agriculture, in all areas, pass on to consumers. We in France propose one thing: lowering VAT, or even abolishing VAT, on basic necessities, because food is an absolute necessity.

Mr President, Algeria is not a democracy. Some seem to be discovering it today. This tyrannical regime has despised and persecuted freedom of expression for 63 years. This regime, which has completely failed, which is a veritable economic and social bankruptcy and which hides behind a memorial rent to the detriment of France, is now in the spotlight because it has locked up in its prisons a great Franco-Algerian writer. So, yes, freedom of expression; But whether Boualem Sansal is 80 or 25 is the same problem: he was locked up because he said things that this government did not like. In the end, there are terrorist organizations that take hostages, as is well known, but there are also states that take hostages. Because Boualem Sansal is not only a prisoner of conscience, he is also a hostage, which allows this government to negotiate I don’t know what additional visa or refusal to accept OQTFs. I too am outraged by the attitude of our left-wing parliamentarians here in these bays, who refused to vote for Boualem Sansal’s release. Why this? Because he denounced Islamism, and today part of the French and European left no longer hides its complicity with Islamism. So, I say it: Yes to the freedom of Boualem Sansal! But France has no lessons for Algeria: it is also persecuting its political opponents, as evidenced by the judicial coup against Marine Le Pen two days ago.

Madam President, people across Europe are rising up to challenge the authoritarian drift of the European Union and the authoritarian drift of Ms von der Leyen. In the face of this, as in all dictatorships, there is a stiffening, a surge of authoritarianism and liberticidal excesses. We saw this at the European Council of 20 March, where some, including in this parliamentary assembly, challenged what is, however, in the Treaties, namely the right of a State to vote, the right of a State to oppose certain decisions. We have seen this, of course, with Romania, where, to the acclaim of the Europeanists, a candidate was banned from running and elections were cancelled. We saw it yesterday in France, where there was a real democratic scandal, a judicial coup d’état aimed at preventing the favourite of the presidential election – albeit very critical of your European Union – from standing at the polls. I should like to say something to you, ladies and gentlemen, which should be outraged by these decisions. Be careful, because history has proven it to us: those who attack democracy will regret it, because there will be serious consequences.

Mr President, everyone in the Chamber is interested in agriculture. We even saw, just now, the president of the Renew Group talking about agriculture, even though she has never set foot, as a full member, in the AGRI Committee. Commissioner, you met a lot of farmers and actors at the Agriculture Show. They all told you the same thing: They told you that they did not want Mercosur, that they did not want Ukraine's accession, which would be a disaster, and that they did not want the Green Deal. Moreover, this name of "green pact" has disappeared from your vocabulary and your roadmap. Yet it is still there, since you show for agriculture climate neutrality in 2050 with its consequences: the fall in yields, the decline, the fall in production, the punitive ecology totally incompatible with the maintenance of farmers' incomes. You are deliberately ambiguous, Commissioner. I tell you very clearly: Farmers across the European Union, almost unanimously, are asking you one thing: Stop this Green Deal to save European agriculture.

Mr President, the European Parenthood Certificate, included in the official programme of the European Commission for 2025, confirms its willingness to impose this regulation, like a dictatorship, despite the opposition expressed by several Member States (Italy, Sweden, Slovakia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Romania) in the Council in June 2024. Why are the Commission and the European Parliament persevering on this controversial issue, when family law is a national competence? That proposal would require States to recognise parentage from surrogate mothers, whereas their national law prohibits it. Member States would therefore be obliged to indirectly validate practices contrary to their national legislation and their political and ethical choices. This forcing would consist in obtaining de facto recognition of surrogacy and facilitating its practice, which is nevertheless prohibited in several European states, such as France. The legalization of the commodification of the female body is, in the end, the true intention of this outrageous settlement. All those who claim to defend the rights of women and children should mobilize against this.

Mr President, Commissioner, I would like to talk to you about a Breton chicken farmer named Patrick. He works long hours all day and in the evening he spends many hours on his computer dealing with the tsunami of your standards: the 160 pages of rules that the European Union has imposed on the poultry sector. He saw his production costs rise, his income collapse. He learns one day that Pedro, a Brazilian chicken farmer, will be able to sell his chickens at home, at bargain prices. He learns that Pedro has no standards, does not respect animal welfare, even uses phytosanitary products for his maize, while Patrick can not, and that Pedro uses growth antibiotics. It was not listened to by the Commission. So Patrick asked me to ask you a question, Commissioner: "What interests are you using to impose such injustice on me?" He even added: You will tell the European Commissioner that I no longer believe in his Europe.

Dear colleague, you have presented us with all the good points that the EPP Group sees in this agreement with Mercosur, but I would like to ask you a simple question: How will you, when you go home, explain to our farmers that this agreement with Mercosur is good? How are you going to tell them that they are not competing unfairly? How are you going to explain to them that you're putting them in competition with people who don't follow their rules? How are you gonna talk to them?

Madam President, the European Union faces three challenges: the first, the migratory flood that threatens the identity, freedoms and security, and finances of Europeans. And you are responding to them with this pact on migration and asylum, which, of course, will accelerate this flooding. The second challenge facing Europe is, of course, competitiveness and the lack of competitiveness. You are responding with the Green Deal, punitive ecology and the tsunami of bureaucracy. Even on artificial intelligence, you're talking about frugal artificial intelligence. We think we're dreaming, you're really in the moon! The third challenge facing Europe is, of course, denatality. Again, no answer. You are simply proposing to replace Europeans with immigrants. Your programme, presented quickly just now, with appalling generalities, does not respond at all to these three challenges, nor to the imperative of power that Europeans expect. They are waiting for the great alternation with the Patriots group. We're working on it.

Mr. Speaker, climate change exists, it has always existed. On the other hand, what is unacceptable is this climate catastrophism of the ‘Green Khmers’, because it makes it possible to justify tsunamis of constraints, standards and regulations that penalise the European Union’s economy, the most virtuous in the world. The EU has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 33.9% since 1990. China has increased them by 300% since 1990. In a situation of global competition and with the revival of American power, we keep shooting ourselves in the foot. But I would also like to draw the attention of some, particularly on the left, to the fact that the application of all these standards, constraints and regulations primarily penalises popular groups, who are prevented from heating up, moving and working freely. Ecologism, I call it ‘greening’, is definitely a sport of the rich.

Mr President, one evening my children come home from school and say to me: “My friends weren’t at school today.” They weren’t there because they heard that their dad had put an end to his life in the farm building. This dairy farmer actually committed suicide, as happens every other day in France. He did not end his life because of the physical difficulties of his job, or because of remoteness or isolation, or because of climatic hazards or long working hours. He ended his life because he was financially ruined, because he could no longer live on his work and feed his children, because he was harassed by the banks, because the bureaucratic hell you impose on farmers forced him, in the evening, after his long days of work, to go to his computer without being able to take care of his children. This is the tragedy of many of our farmers, our herders, who can no longer make a living from their work. So the European Union needs to change its paradigm. We need to change that. Our farmers do a difficult job, they know it, but they love it. They just ask that you let them live off their work.

Mr President, the Green Deal was born in the brains ravaged by the ideology of a few pseudo-ecologists, those whom I personally call the ‘Green Khmers’, because they want to destroy everything, starting with the economic power of the European Union. What is regrettable is that the European Commission persists in this ideological delirium. I note that, from the very beginning, this Green Deal was implemented without an impact assessment. Yet we know this impact: in agriculture, it is lower yields, lower incomes, higher imports, while in industry, the European automotive sector will be destroyed and hundreds of thousands of jobs will be lost. China thanks you, the United States thanks you, Mercosur thanks you. Your Green Deal is a planned, organised and planned suicide of the European economy. When you have seen the collapse of an economy which, however, is the most virtuous, well, we will not lack anything, because we will import products manufactured on the other side of the world under absolutely polluting conditions. Shooting yourself in the foot seems to be the credo of your European Union.

Mr President, under the leadership of Viktor Orban and following the Letta and Draghi report, the European Heads of State have only noted what we have been denouncing for a long time: the loss of competitiveness of the European Union and the widening gap with China, the United States and the world's major powers. Whose fault is it? Whose fault is it? No one's telling us. It is the fault of this European Union, supported by the Socialists and the EPP. And we are told that this competitiveness must be restored. But how can we restore competitiveness when, at the same time, we open European markets, with free trade agreements, to products from all over the world? I am of course thinking – as it is now – of the disastrous free trade agreement with Mercosur. How can we restore competitiveness when, at the same time, we cover our companies and producers with standards and constraints? How can we restore competitiveness when, at the same time, in the Commission and in this Parliament, for some, we are contaminated by the toxic discourse of the green extremists, who advocate degrowth, that is, the reduction of our production and the reduction of our competitiveness. We must of course completely change our cursor if we want to restore the strength and competitiveness of the European Union. We must change our cursor, we must set up a Europe of power. Yes, I say it clearly: A Europe of power! Don't be afraid of that word.

Madam President, in a deteriorating security and strategic environment, the European Union is unable to anticipate crises. But on the other hand, we notice that it takes advantage of them, in each crisis, to grant itself competences that the Treaties do not give it. As we have already said, among the key threats that are forgotten in this report are migration flooding and Islamism infiltrating everywhere. This migratory flooding and Islamism poses a serious threat to our freedoms, security and identity. I will take only one point in this report that would almost make you laugh. The European Union is asking EU citizens to build up stocks to be self-sufficient at home for 72 hours. We are therefore asked to put canned food in our closet to live for 72 hours, while at the same time, with the Green Deal and the free trade treaties, the European Union has destroyed our food sovereignty and made us dependent. In this area, as in many others, to deal with crises we must not trust the European Union, we must trust our nations and their citizens.

Mr President, of course we in the Patriots for Europe Group can only welcome the intention to protect European consumers. However, the Letta report shows us that we are witnessing an increase in fraud, an increase in unfair competition and these famous imports of dangerous products. So certainly, we talked a lot about toys. I would also like to talk about medicines, for example, which are extremely dangerous to health when purchased from sites that nobody controls. In reality, in the Commission and in this European Union, you are reaping the benefits of your policy. It is the result of the supreme dogma of free trade that brings us to where we are. Indeed, how to control this jungle that has become today e-commerce, where digital giants reign supreme. I think the solutions are not, as usual, the ones you propose. The solutions are national. National customs must be strengthened to control these imports of dangerous products. Since I have a few seconds left, I would like to point out that the European Commission is negotiating the free trade agreement with Mercosur in complete secrecy and secrecy. But here, too, we are likely to import dangerous products, meat of very poor quality, fed by products banned in the European Union. Finally, you are faced with your contradictions. It's time to change policy.

Mr President, on a historical scale, Europe is experiencing massive immigration, an unprecedented migratory flood. The peoples of Europe no longer want it, the peoples of Europe no longer can. They have demonstrated this in the last elections, European of course, but also national. This massive immigration has, everywhere in Europe, a very high cost. It threatens our identity and our way of life. Recent events have shown us that this immigration is also a source of record insecurity. The atrocities committed by migrants in Solingen or in France, with the despicable murder of little Philippine, show us that we must stop this policy. The European Union is also showing us that for it, immigration is not a problem, but a project. We saw it again this summer on the beaches of the Canary Islands: Europe is a sieve. Thousands of immigrants are freely returning home and tomorrow will pose enormous problems. So, faced with this, we obviously see that some states are turning their backs on European policy and taking back their national policy. We have seen it in Germany, we also see it in the Netherlands, we see it in Italy and this is a good thing. However, it is time for the European Council to take up this urgent issue of uncontrolled or even imposed immigration. The peoples of Europe demand it, the peoples of Europe demand it.

Mr. Speaker, extreme weather events have always existed, but in the past our farmers, who had solid wages and stocks, faced them. Today, this is no longer the case. The solution, of course, is not agricultural degrowth. On the contrary, we must ensure our food sovereignty and, contrary to what environmentalists want, increase scientific and technical progress. In the field of drought the solution is not, as the environmental extremists want, to let fresh water flow into the sea and throw Molotov cocktails against gendarmes in Sainte-Soline in France to prevent the storage of water. To fight against the consequences of the climatic hazards that we are seeing, well, is simply to turn our backs radically on catastrophic ecologist ideologies and speeches of the same tone, those catastrophic ecologist speeches that contaminate our European institutions far too much.

Mr President, the prospect of signing a free trade agreement with Mercosur was one of the main reasons for the major farmers' demonstrations in France and in many countries a few weeks ago. President Macron lied to the French by telling them that these negotiations were stopped. We learn that, since the beginning of September, the Commission has been negotiating at a slow pace and is preparing to sign this agreement in November. This agreement is a real disaster for French livestock farming and for European livestock farming. It certainly makes it possible to sell German cars, but it is a shipwreck for our agriculture. The Commission, by carrying out these negotiations on a case-by-case basis, is carrying out a real provocation in the French and European campaigns. You are aware that anger is brewing and I am afraid that if we continue in this direction, in a few days we will see in the countryside and in European cities large demonstrations that are much harder than last time.

Mr President, this 110-page report already raises legitimate concerns in the French and European countryside. The anger of the farmers and their legitimate demands of the beginning of 2024 have not been heard at all. We are being asked for even more agricultural degrowth, i.e. to reduce production. We are asked for even more environmental standards, and then, of course, we stigmatize breeding and we ask for less breeding. Meat is of course stigmatized. Criticism of our farmers' "Farm and Fork" strategy has not been heard. Environmentalists, though a minority, have won. Our farmers risk being sacrificed if these guidelines were to become those of the Commission and the future CAP. So perhaps with these guidelines, European agriculture will be the most virtuous. However, it will no longer feed Europeans.