Speeches

Madam President, after a year, where are we? In the face of the pandemic, an EU obstinate in defending the interests of pharmaceutical multinationals, including by opposing the lifting of patents. A mobilisation of Community funds has only just begun, in a conditioned manner and subordinated to the priorities defined by the EU and not starting from the realities and problems that each country faces, nor aiming to overcome the deficit of countries such as Portugal. The restoration of the draconian constraints of the Stability Pact, the return to dictatorship of the deficit it has promoted, the degradation of public services, particularly in health. What is required is the definitive abrogation of this pact. A social summit which confirmed the intention to continue convergence in backsliding in important areas. The pretense, under the pretext of the green transition, the deindustrialization of some, the consequent unemployment and the increase in dependence. A CAP that maintains an unfair distribution and promotes the concentration of production. These, like others, are policies that do not serve the people, namely the Portuguese people.

Mr President, these reports highlight the lack of references to public health services. Public services that were instrumental in the response to COVID-19, despite the systemic public disinvestment policies imposed by neoliberal policies and economic and political constraints of the European Union on Member States. Not surprisingly, given the objectives surrounding the so-called European Health Union, the European health market, which does not aim to empower and strengthen public health services, but rather seeks to open the field to projects of liberalisation, privatisation and concentration of this sector. At the same time, it insists on a public procurement model that seeks to condition the capacity of states to diversify the purchase of medicines, the option that blocked the faster advance of vaccination and that tied states to the interests of pharmaceutical multinationals, preventing the purchase of vaccines recognized by the World Health Organization. Responding to emerging health situations cannot be a pretext for transferring competences from states to the supranational sphere. What is needed is the strengthening of public health services and their universal and free character, is the empowerment of States in public research, in the production of medicines and other medical products, eliminating dependencies from abroad. The strengthening of cooperation in the field of health should be promoted on the basis of respect for the sovereignty of states and their autonomy, valuing their national authorities and taking public and public interests as a reference.

Madam President, the European Union's macroeconomic legislative framework is an almost absolute constraint on any sovereign development project. A framework that covers virtually all spheres of state life. Through blackmail and the threat of sanctions, the European institutions seek to condition and avoid more than the budgetary policy of the Member States, they seek to tie development options to the interests of big capital and the major powers of the European Union. In Portugal, it is macroeconomic policies in comparison with the Constitution that prevent the necessary public investment, the promotion of productive capacity, the control of strategic sectors. In short, they impede the economic and social development of the country, while promoting the growth of inequalities, social injustices and increased exploitation. The way forward demands the liberation of this corset, first of all by repealing, and not by reforming, all the mechanisms that constrain and condition States in the definition and implementation of their sovereign development strategies.

Mr President, since the 1970s the European Union has defined environmental policy guidelines through environmental action programmes. These programmes have integrated positive considerations into key areas of environmental policy, such as biodiversity, climate or soil, but also trade policy or access to justice, among others. The social question must also be considered. Concrete action is needed on all these issues, and Parliament's position, which we are debating today, contributes to this. The positive elements that may result are confronted with the policies of the European Union of a neoliberal and mercantilist nature, which this proposal does not reject. Examples are the perverse and ineffective market approaches that enshrine the right to pollute, such as emissions trading. Many other examples could be recalled. A serious approach to environmental problems requires a society that is geared towards meeting human needs rather than profit.