Speeches

Madam President, The euro is the most expensive currency of all time. Mass migration brings us millions of foodies, but no skilled workers. And climate rescue leads to deindustrialization and mass poverty. The AfD has been saying this for ten years. The OECD is now making us right and, according to surveys, more and more Germans. Common sense is returning to Germany, it seems. And that is exactly why the pro-government Institute for Human Rights there is now calling for a ban on my party. If one speaks obvious truths in Germany, citizens are prosecuted under flimsy pretexts, and parties are banned. The decision on this lies with the Federal Constitutional Court, whose judges are appointed by the old parties on the basis of political opinions. This is the supposedly exemplary New German model of democracy and the rule of law that you want to enforce here in Hungary, Poland – and with weapons also in Ukraine. This New German model will also fail.

Madam President, Commissioner! If elections do not proceed as Brussels wishes, accusations immediately follow that Russia has manipulated or financed the winner. The two biggest cases of foreign interference in our politics here concern the EU itself. Firstly: In the Qatargate scandal, €1.5 million was found among MEPs at home or in suitcases, plus €22 million in accounts in Panama – payments used by Qatar and other governments to buy votes in this house. Secondly: Before the Italian elections in September 2022, Ursula von der Leyen threatened Italian voters: In the event of the formation of a Eurosceptic government, the Commission would take appropriate measures, including the removal of large sums of money from Brussels. Both, dear colleagues, are blatant examples of foreign interference in the democratic process. Russian assets are frozen on suspicion. But why don't they seize the assets of the von der Leyen family and put them on the sanctions list? Because here abuse of office and advantage are obvious.

Mr President! Former Bulgarian Prime Minister Kiril Petkov promised Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to help Bulgaria bypass the rules for joining the euro. Nothing new, because Mario Draghi, then still with Goldman Sachs, paved the way for Greece with swap transactions in the euro against high fees. Ten years later, we had the never-ending euro crisis. Later, Draghi became the biggest lawbreaker since the war. Von der Leyen is just as arbitrarily overriding the law. As Secretary of Defense, she awarded consulting fees to US consulting firms, and as Commission President, she negotiated billions of orders for COVID vaccines with Pfizer via SMS. She refuses to provide information about the content of the news and compensation to her family. But nothing happens. The EU is pushing rule of law concerns to tackle unwelcome Member States. The EU breaks the law if and how it likes it.

Madam President, The eurozone, along with Britain, has the highest inflation rate in the developed world. Rapidly rising energy and food prices mean: The standard of living is falling, citizens have to freeze, and savings are being destroyed. In 2022 alone, German savers were expropriated by around 200 billion euros. But the ECB raises interest rates by a ridiculous 0.25 to 3.7%, with inflation above 7%. So timidly, galloping inflation cannot be tamed. The situation is clear: The ECB is the vicarious agent of ailing banks and irresponsible governments, whose debts it simply inflates away by low interest rates at the expense of citizens. The fact that inflation is not destiny but willed is demonstrated by Switzerland with 2.6% inflation, Taiwan with 2.3% and even Russia with 3.5% – countries with sound budgetary management that do not want to save the global climate.

Madam President, If the Germans are crazy, half the world wonders. And the answer is: Yes, because Germany suffers from helper syndrome and belongs on the couch. For 15 years, Germany has been trying to save everything and everyone. You seem to have saved the euro, but at the expense of monetary stability and at the expense of the savers and pensioners who finance your record inflation and debt. The Wall Street Journal called your global climate rescue the stupidest energy policy in the world, because with a share of 1.3% of global CO2 emissions, Germany cannot save the climate, but you ruin the German middle class and our citizens through priceless electricity, heating costs and forced renovation. Those who cannot afford this, the US real estate fund gratefully buys the long-saved house far below value. They also want to save migrants. Every single one of the additional five, six, seven million people from the Orient and Africa that we have had more in the country for ten years costs us around 700,000 euros on average, or 17,500 annually, for life. Africa generates a new Germany of 85 million people every 18 months: Do you want to save them too? And finally, your Russia policy: Together with Merkel, you led Germany into a low-cost energy dependence on Russia. Then the big brother just blew up the Nord Stream pipeline. They persistently deny any reconnaissance and impose almost monthly new sanctions against Russia, which do us more harm than Russia. And you are supplying weapons with which the West can prolong the war, but Ukraine cannot win it. The German government and the EU suffer from helper syndrome, but they do not help anyone, but do self-harm. The psychoanalyst Alfred Adler saw the causes of the helper syndrome in the consciousness of his own inferiority. The helper tries to overplay his own problems by turning to those who are even worse off. He is not at all interested in whether his help is fruitful, because by doing so he could no longer relativize his own inferiority. The patient Germany belongs in therapy to overcome his weak self-esteem and to free himself from the helper syndrome, because the bill of your pathological altruism unfortunately does not pay your government, but our citizens.

Mr President! When the EU gave itself a common currency, it had two options: either a soft currency with high inflation and a central bank printing money simply to keep export industry competitive and keep highly indebted member states from bankruptcy, or a hard currency modelled on the low-inflation D-mark and a central bank firmly behind savers and pensioners, forcing the government to adopt prudent fiscal policies. With the adoption of the Maastricht rules and an inflation target below 2%, the choice seemed clear at the time. But 30 years after Maastricht and after three ECB presidents from Mediterranean countries, we have double-digit inflation rates, clammy banks and record debt. Almost every state disregards the Maastricht rules. Everyone in Europe wanted a German currency, but no one wanted German budgetary management. After Draghi successfully licensed the euro, the Commission and the ECB are now calling for the strict fiscal rules to be abandoned. Minister Lindner is completely isolated in the Council. The role of the new Germany in the new EU should be clear: Shut up and pay up – Shut up and pay! It is becoming increasingly clear that Germany needs to rethink its relationship with the EU. But I'm afraid Mr. Lindner will capitulate. Today, by the way, is May 9.

Mr President! The European Parliament and the Council of Ministers are negotiating the new EU Migration Pact, which aims to facilitate asylum procedures, create new access routes, expand family influx and abolish the illegal concept of migration. Von der Leyen is even considering a European Union of Migration and Destiny, in which Europe absorbs Africa's population surplus. According to two studies by the University of Amsterdam and the Danish government in 2020, every migrant from Africa and the Orient cost a modern welfare state just under 600,000 euros. Today, this makes almost 700,000 euros for life or 17,500 euros annually. More than 5 million migrants from Africa and the Orient live in Germany today than in 2014. The annual cost is at least 88 billion euros. Africa bears witness to a new Germany with 85 million people every 18 months. If the German government took them up, that would be 1.5 trillion euros. Their migration pact is insane!

Mr President! Last month, Christine Lagarde was the victim of a joke call. Unintentionally, Lagarde revealed: The digital euro is about total state control over citizens' money. Lagarde literally: ‘We have in Europe a threshold above EUR 1 000, you cannot pay cash. If you do, you take your risk, you get caught, you’re fined, or you go to jail. Our citizens will be controlled, only for very small amounts – around EUR 300 or EUR 400 – will there be no control’. Payments over 1000 euros are to be controlled and at some point everything over three or four hundred euros. Cash payments guarantee freedom, because no bank or state can know what you bought where, how and when. Cash protects against negative interest, expropriation and loss due to bank insolvencies. Lagarde got bogged down on the call, and now we know: The digital euro should deprive us of this freedom of cash payment.

Mr President, the EU is introducing a new regulatory framework for crypto—assets, which offers some consumer protection, may deter businesses operating from within the EU, but above all raises serious privacy concerns. The new rules impose extensive compliance requirements on crypto—asset providers which need to obtain an EU operating licence. Crypto—asset providers also need to provide real—time information about pricing processes and trading volumes. This requires considerable technical expertise, which raises entry barriers for SMEs. Crypto transfers above EUR 1 000 between exchanges and unhosted wallets owned by private individuals are now automatically reported to national authorities, regardless of any money laundering or terrorism—related suspicions. The EU is criminalising decentralised finance and its users. The fight against money laundering and terrorist financing should be fought against the Islamist terrorists and the NGOs financing them, not against ordinary citizens that are venturing into crypto for a safe store of value in times of runaway inflation and unaffordable real estate. Under the guise of anti-terrorism and anti-money laundering, the EU is establishing a total financial surveillance state. This should be a grave concern for anyone who takes privacy and individual rights seriously.

Mr President! Germany pays 37 billion euros gross annually and over 26 billion euros net to the EU. This means that Germany pays almost half of the total EU budget net and every German 444 euros of EU gross contribution per year. In addition, Germany's contribution to the EU Recovery Fund of over €200 billion from 2021 to 2026, i.e. €33.3 billion per year or a further €397 per person per year. In total, each German pays a Fron of currently over 840 euros annually to the EU. In addition, there are, first, the Bundesbank's indefinite, unsecured and irrecoverable 1.2 trillion Target2 loans to the ECB system, for which every German is liable at around €14,300 so far, and, second, the €1.5 trillion asset losses of our savers as a result of the ECB's monetary and inflation policy. What do the Germans get for allowing themselves to be consumed like moths by the flame through the fallacies of the EU? The highest energy prices in the world, mass migration, which costs us an additional 100 billion euros a year, insects and worms in food, a Green Deal, which should de-industrialize us like the Morgenthau Plan once did, and a foreign policy that can soon plunge us into a European war.

Mr President! In 1970, Sweden's per capita income was almost 50 percent higher than that of Denmark. Today Sweden is poorer than Denmark. The cause: Almost a third of today's Swedes are not Europeans, but only 10 percent of Danes. A crucial difference, because every migrant from Africa and the Orient costs a Western European welfare state on average almost 700,000 euros for life, according to Dutch and Danish studies. In 1983, Denmark had the most liberal immigration law in the EU. But then the country came to its senses: Illegal migrants have been deported, citizenship rights have been tightened, asylum benefits have been reduced and family reunification has been made more difficult. Today, Denmark has the best welfare state and one of the highest wage levels in the EU. Sweden and Denmark are just one example of the inverse relationship between migration and economic performance. In order to survive, we need Danish conditions all over Europe!

Mr President! Since we have been human beings, we have been trying to make ourselves independent of nature. Independence from nature is the foundation of our civilization. But the Greens want us to develop back in civilization and have electricity only when the wind blows and the sun shines. Greens oppose the production and consumption of energy, the basis of our civilization. Greens are turning against mobility, without which our economy cannot exist. And greens are turning against education and economic growth, which have made us richer, healthier and safer. In a January interview, German Green Economy Minister Robert Habeck was asked whether his green utopias did not destroy prosperity and lead to mass unemployment. He defended himself with the following words: Sure, you can fail, but he, Habeck, has – quote – ‘no buck to be a minister in a government that no longer makes big plans. That is why we prefer to be fully at risk, and maybe we will succeed, and then we can all be a little proud of ourselves together” – quote Ende. This is the policy of hasardeurs, i.e. people who take incalculable risks and rely on a well-meaning fate instead of their own skills or scientific experience. No one, no one outside Europe, will take these risks.

Mr President! Germany pays more than 40% of the EU budget net. But there are many poor people living in Germany, especially poor pensioners. Germany has one of the highest legal and actual retirement ages in the EU. But for Germans to work longer and more than many others, they pay the highest wage-related taxes in the world. In old age, they receive less pensions than pensioners elsewhere in terms of the percentage of their previous work income. Germany also has the lowest home ownership rate in the EU as a whole. Therefore, our pensioners also have a higher risk of poverty, because they also pay rent from little pension. Germany has had the worst governments in the world since Merkel. They may please the EU, but they are destroying Germany and Europe.

Madam President, In Brussels, Chancellor Scholz has devised a lazy compromise for e-fuels in the EU ban on internal combustion engines. This is no longer helping the German auto industry. It is losing its export hit combustion engine and is now competing with electric cars from China and the USA. Both are massively subsidized, while the Commission blocks EU subsidies. It also doesn't help most drivers who can't afford an e-fuels car. The German and European economies have so far benefited, firstly, from cheap Russian energy and, secondly, from export successes, especially overseas. The EU under German-green deception makes energy priceless and endangers our export economy and thus our livelihood. Finally, end your green bullshit and stagflationary policies for our economy and give free rein to free citizens.

Mr President! First of all, quick recovery, because I just saw you go to the desk on crutches. I refer to Rule 32(2) of the Rules of Procedure on the Bureau's obligation to provide information. Is there a Bureau decision to abolish German as a working language in Parliament’s internal and external communication? My concern relates specifically to the work of the Directorate-General for Communication, which seems to have discontinued German in the communication of plenary activities. This would significantly affect the largest communication market within the EU. German, as you know, is an official language in six Member States. 130 million people speak German as their mother tongue or first foreign language. It is also an official language in Luxembourg. Therefore, my request to you: Make sure that German is maintained as a working language in this House, especially in external communication.

Madam President, In some countries, mainly in Southern and Eastern Europe, EU subsidies, including coronavirus funds, account for up to 20% of gross domestic product. The €800 billion coronavirus recovery fund has invited organised fraud in the supply and settlement of defective protective masks, self-tests, vaccine doses and medical equipment, green investments, illegal waste disposal and migrant traffickers. The European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), the EU Court of Auditors and Europol have long warned against such fraud risks. Nevertheless, the allocation of funds remains in the hands of the beneficiary national governments and excluded from the EU control mechanisms. We as MEPs are deprived of a lot of information – even who the final beneficiaries of the funds are. With lack of transparency and lack of control, the EU buys political willfulness. Not so different from Qatar.

Madam President, Madam Commissioner, the failure of Silicon Valley Bank is the largest bank failure since the financial crisis. The contagion risk remains non-trivial. Two points. First, SVB was a leading tech start-ups financier. If its failure were to crush the tech bubble, we should also have to worry about dozens of billions of NGU money which was funnelled into digitalization. NGU money was created out of thin air and may well vanish into it. Second, SVB’s chief administrative officer, Joseph Gentile, was the CFO of Lehman Brothers until its collapse in 2008. He also worked for Arthur Andersen, an accounting firm that went bankrupt in 2002. Now, will this House ever address the problem, the impunity of these banksters? Or, in view of Mr Gentile’s dismal record of achievement, is he now being considered as the next ex-pat President of the European Commission?

Mr President, Brexit proved that Article 50 is more than a dead letter and that, whatever the difficulties, it is possible to leave the EU. The Windsor Agreement too is good news to Eurosceptics. It shows that playing hardball with the EU may yield dividends. The Windsor Framework limits the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, it creates the unique situation where Northern Ireland is partially in and partially outside the single market, certain EU rules on VAT and excise duties will still apply, but subject to exceptions governed by UK fiscal rules, while EU state aid rules are scaled back and won’t apply to UK subsidies to Northern Irish farmers. If Belfast can have tailor—made exceptions to EU rules, why not EU Member States? More importantly, the Northern Irish Assembly will be able to veto new EU rules on customs, goods and agriculture from applying in Northern Ireland. If Belfast acquires the right to veto new EU regulation, why not full EU Member States? The Windsor Agreement proves that à la carte association with the EU is possible. Countries may suit themselves but also reap the benefits of free trade and wider cooperation. All such sensible arrangements require is for the EU and the French and German Governments to abandon their inflexible obsession with the uniform application of EU law and their misguided vision of an EU empire, and instead to accept that the EU should return to what it should have always been: a confederation of independent states which acknowledge their common, as well as divergent, interests. In 2015, when I was still an academic in Britain, I chose to support Brexit. I thought Britain broadly had a good deal within the EU, but I was also convinced that the EU, led by Merkel, would press ahead with ever closer union and further down the road to economic perdition. Exactly that has happened. The EU has become the stagflation zone of the developed world. Sadly, in Britain, the situation seems just as dismal. EU enthusiasts blame Brexit. I disagree. In fact, after Brexit, the UK Government continued to follow EU policies. It deliberately exaggerated the health risks of the corona crisis. It fell prey to climate hysteria. It failed to curb both mass migration and the woke culture, which stifles rational thinking. The UK Government has made mistakes, but outside the EU these can be corrected. The Windsor Agreement and recent attempts to reform UK asylum law are a good start.

Madam President, The European Commission's latest economic forecast should shake us all up. Four Member States are now officially in recession. The four are the largest per capita net contributors to the EU budget: Germany, Austria, Sweden and Denmark. Unlike the US, the EU has not recovered from the coronavirus crisis, partly because it is more affected by rising energy and food prices than anyone else because of its nonsensical climate policy. Particularly affected is Germany, where growth is collapsing and wages and pensions are not compensating for galloping inflation. However, the ECB ignores its mandate and accepts inflation. Germany now pays more than 40% of the total EU budget net. What do the Germans get for it? The highest inflation in over 70 years, economic stagnation and the escalation of the Ukraine conflict, which did not create, but spurred, stagflation. Fifty years ago, Lebanon was the pearl of the Middle East. Then the country took in millions of unqualified refugees. Inflation has risen, and GDP per capita is now lower than it was in 1970. Germany is well on its way to becoming Lebanon in Central Europe. Von der Leyen likes to talk about the moon landing of the EU. Maybe you'll find your new tax colony.

Madam President, Commissioner, Madam President! The ECB blames the Ukraine war and global causes such as rising energy, fertilizer and transport costs for record food price inflation. In 2022, food price inflation was 15.5% in the euro area and 19.2% in Germany. By comparison, it was 12.4% in the US, 6.4% in Japan and only 4% in Switzerland and Israel respectively. Strangely, if higher energy, fertilizer and transport costs drive prices worldwide, why have food prices risen almost four times as fast in the euro area and almost five times as fast in Germany as in the high alpine country of Switzerland, which has hardly any agricultural area, or in the semi-desert state of Israel? So fairy tales are told here, because the main reasons for the record inflation are the ECB’s monetary policy – because those who expand the money supply by 70% within a few years cannot avoid inflation in the long run – and secondly the useless EU climate policy – useless, because the EU’s influence on the global climate is asymptotically zero with a share of less than 8% or 9% of global emissions – and thirdly the Russia sanctions, which do us more harm than Russia. Year after year, the eurozone is falling economically – globally and even vis-à-vis the non-Euro-EU. And the EU itself is falling behind worldwide; We're going to be second-rate. And that's why we should invest our money in future sectors and not waste it on green dream dances.

Madam President, Madam Commissioner, the Greek Prime Minister enacted a law which grants him direct supervision over the Greek Secret Service, which has since spied on its own ministers, a former prime minister who is now an opposition leader, a Member of the European Parliament, journalists and the head of the Greek military. The Greek Government refuses to give any reasons for the surveillance. Under a new law, public officials will even be liable to criminal prosecution if they carry out audits about who’s under surveillance and why. Greece’s Watergate scandal makes a mockery of the rule of law. The European Commission, however, is turning a blind eye. It prefers instead to bully EU-critical governments for practices allegedly politicising the judiciary but which in reality are commonplace in Germany. The Commission should open Article 7 proceedings against Greece, as a matter of urgency.

Mr President! REPowerEU is providing 20 billion EU funds to help EU countries become more independent from Russian energy imports. However, the European Court of Auditors criticises the misuse of funds to green the economy. Emergency aid for citizens and energy-intensive companies was envisaged. Instead, countries with high fossil fuel consumption will be favoured. The biggest victim of misuse is Germany, which is particularly dependent on Russian gas. In addition, funds intended for German farmers, the East German economy or schools in North Rhine-Westphalia can now flow into the pockets of wind barons and solar giants. This is not a step towards energy self-sufficiency. We are becoming more dependent on Helios and Aiolos – on the sun and wind gods. This is not in the interests of the citizens. I therefore vote against this proposal.

Mr President, Commissioner! Are we witnessing the beginning of the end of green terror? The new EU rules for long-term investment funds could be interpreted in this way. The position of the European Parliament was clear and was adopted by a large majority against the votes of my group, the ID Group. Parliament wanted to channel long-term investment into the green economy as much as possible. This lays the foundation for green asset bubbles and threatens the stability of financial markets in the EU. We have always rejected this and continue to fight against misallocation of resources to green fantasy projects that threaten our competitiveness in Europe. Although we were isolated from our position in the European Parliament, the Member States, including the then French Presidency of the Council, and the European Commission surprisingly joined the position of the Alternative for Germany and the ID Group: Long-term investment funds are not a suitable vehicle to covertly and to the detriment of investors von der Leyens Green Deal to finance. The political agreement that the Council and the Commission have now reached has de-greened the position of the European Parliament. This is a small but hopefully groundbreaking victory for political reason and for all those political forces who reject green totalitarianism and do not want to condemn our citizens to a life in a kind of green GDR. The agreement is also a bitter defeat for the Greens and their friends on the political left and in the midst of this Parliament. It seems that the political balance is shifting. In times of record inflation, unrestrained public and rising private debt at zero growth, support for green adventures is waning. And it's adventure! What did German Green Party leader Habeck say a year ago? He has no – literally – gossip about a government that does not want to take great risks. And maybe it's going well. Then – according to Habeck – we could all be a little proud of ourselves. This is the policy of Hasardeuren and 21 hysterical German Greens in this Parliament – unfortunately no one is present here. Let us hope that the others - I said Germans - will soon awaken from this mass psychosis. Then we will see more green defeats.

Madam President, There is a specter in Europe, the specter of political reason. 13 EU governments are resisting mass immigration and calling for a fortified EU external border – so far dismissed as an ideé fixe so-called right-wing extremist. 13 Member States – this is half the EU that now agrees to a core demand of our ID Group. Firstly, this means: The debate is shifting – not only European citizens, but half of EU governments reject disastrous immigration. Secondly: Every vote for parties such as the AfD, the Rassemblement National, Vlaams Belang, FPÖ and Lega counts, because we already influence politics in and outside governments. It is high time for the Council to finally bury Leyen's migration pact, protect our external borders and create a clear legal framework that pushes pushbacks and remigration.

Madam President, The Qatar affair proves that the EU must step up its fight against money laundering. An important step in this direction would be the ambitious expansion of the EU list of high-risk third countries that do little to combat money laundering or terrorist financing. The list currently includes 25 countries, including common suspects such as Afghanistan, North Korea, Iran, Panama and Morocco. According to the NGO Tax justice network countries such as the United Arab Emirates and even the USA are among the ten most money laundering-friendly countries in the world. The Emirates are even on the Financial Action Task Force.blacklist jurisdictions that are subject to increased surveillance. We support your fight against money laundering, but please not only against Pyongyang, but also against your friends in Dubai and Delaware.