What Tomislav spoke about.

4 Jul

2022

HR Speech

Adoption by Croatia of the euro on 1 January 2023 (debate)

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Dear Commissioner, dear rapporteur, colleague and colleague, after nine years of membership in the European Union, Croatia is close to achieving another strategic goal. Entering the eurozone will eliminate transaction costs and currency risk, which will mostly benefit Croatian exporters and tourism. The announcement of the introduction of the euro has already led to an increase in the national cre…

22 Jun

2022

HR Speech

2021 Report on Montenegro (debate)

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On its European path, Montenegro has made notable progress, and the fact that it has recently a pro-European government committed to upholding the rule of law and the rights of national minorities is particularly encouraging. In this sense, it is a good sign that the Croatian national minority, among others, now has its representative in the executive branch, a minister in the Government of Monten…

9 Jun

2022

HR Speech

The call for a Convention for the revision of the Treaties (debate)

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Mr. Vice-President, Vice-President, colleagues, founding treaties have always attracted public attention and have been the subject of controversy. In this regard, the Conference on the Future of Europe has taken a further step forward, allowing some citizens to express their views on the future of the Union. In the context of a pandemic that has affected all Member States, it is therefore not surp…

9 Jun

2022

HR Speech

The call for a Convention for the revision of the Treaties (debate)

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Colleague Kolakušić, you are talking about essential changes to the contract. I don't know if you know that more than 90% of acts in the Council are already adopted by qualified majority rather than unanimity. So this is my question because it is on the basis of what are the areas that you think are essential to remain the competence of the States in the sense that it is decided unanimously. Or yo…

6 Jun

2022

HR Speech

One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

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Dear Chairman, a storm of unprecedented proportions accompanied by hail and strong wind on May 25 hit the northern part of Croatia, with the most severely damaged farms in Varaždin, Međimurje and Krapina-Zagorje counties. While we expect a final assessment of the damage caused, we can already conclude with certainty that half of the floristic production in Croatia was damaged as a result of this s…

6 Jun

2022

HR Speech

EU islands and cohesion policy (debate)

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The main challenges faced by island residents are a lack of basic infrastructure, poor transport connections to the mainland, high prices, labour shortages and a lack of sustainable economic activities that are not exclusively seasonal. Of all the above, island areas are exposed to depopulation and underdevelopment, which is a huge problem. We must fight this with the help of cohesion policy, the …

18 May

2022

HR Speech

One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

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While the entire European Union is united in condemning Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Serbia, which wants to become part of the European Union, refuses to unequivocally condemn Russian actions and impose economic sanctions on them. However, Serbia's war is not foreign. It was from there that the aggression against the Republic of Croatia was launched in the 1990s, resulting in thousands of killed …

4 May

2022

HR Speech

Competition policy – annual report 2021 (debate)

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Dear Vice-President, Commissioner, colleague and colleague, correcting market distortions is a key role of competition policy. However, we are witnessing that the same competition policy has failed to prevent the emergence of digital giants abusing their dominant position in the single market. Such platforms regularly make business dependent on SMEs and deprive consumers of choice. The sanctions i…

4 May

2022

HR Speech

The case of Osman Kavala in Turkey

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Dear Vice President, Commissioner, colleagues, Turkish philanthropist and entrepreneur Osman Kavala was sentenced last week in Istanbul to life imprisonment without the possibility of reducing his sentence on charges of attempting to overthrow the government, while seven defendants were sentenced to 18 years in prison. Kavala, a prominent representative of Turkish civil society, spent four and a h…

3 May

2022

HR Speech

The follow up of the Conference on the Future of Europe (debate)

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Dear Chair, the Conference on the Future of Europe has confirmed that citizens want greater powers for the European Union in the field of health, the creation of a European data space that will enable the exchange of health data and facilitate cross-border healthcare, the realisation of the strategic autonomy of the European Union in the production of medicines and a better decision-making system …

3 May

2022

EN Speech

The follow up of the Conference on the Future of Europe (debate)

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So you said that people want us to resolve issues and problems. I agree with that. You said that people want to have bigger incomes, minimum pensions and things like that. I agree also with that. But why do think that unanimity will achieve that? Why do think that getting rid of unanimity will lead the Member States to actually share more powers with the smaller Member States and that they will be…

7 Apr

2022

HR Speech

Mental Health (debate)

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Dear Chair, Commissioners, colleagues, mental disorders are one of the biggest public health challenges. Their distribution, the burden they cause on health systems, indicates the necessity of action at multiple levels. In 2018, around 13.5% of all hospital beds in the EU were psychiatric beds, and this process certainly increased during the pandemic. Scientists point out that mental health proble…

7 Apr

2022

HR Speech

Right to repair (debate)

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Dear President, Commissioners, colleagues, research has shown that 77 percent of consumers would rather fix than replace a defective product. However, there are many barriers that prevent consumers from repairing products. Among other things, these are: the duration of the repair, the lack of replacement parts, the price of the repair or the purchase of a new device, and the unavailability of repa…

6 Apr

2022

HR Speech

Violations of right to seek asylum and non-refoulement in the EU Member States (debate)

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Dear Chairman, the right to rest is often abused. Irregular migration is a major problem of the European asylum system and in this regard I would point out that the Republic of Croatia, with more than 6 500 police officers, effectively protects the longest external land border of the European Union. Last year, over 17,000 people were treated in Croatia who were found to have crossed the state bord…

6 Apr

2022

HR Question

Violations of right to seek asylum and non-refoulement in the EU Member States (debate)

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Colleagues, why are you mixing pears and apples? Refugees arriving from Ukraine come from the war zone directly to the European Union with all documents and cross at marked border crossing points. People coming to Croatia or Greece come without documents that we don't know who they are, we don't know where they originally come from, they cross the border at night outside the border crossings and t…

4 Apr

2022

HR Speech

Use of vehicles hired without drivers for the carriage of goods by road (debate)

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The current Union-wide rules on the use of vehicles hired without drivers have been in place for 30 years without any substantial changes and need to be revised to meet current and future needs in the road transport sector. The current Directive provides for a minimum level of openness of the market for the use of such vehicles, as it actually covers outdated legal provisions reflecting the former…

23 Mar

2022

HR Speech

One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

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In the night hours of March 10 this year, just seven minutes after entering the airspace of Croatia, a Soviet-made drone crashed in the wider center of Zagreb, fifty meters from the student dormitory where thousands of students are staying. Before entering Croatia, the aircraft travelled for 43 minutes through the airspace of Romania and came from the territory of Ukraine. Fortunately, this unfort…

10 Mar

2022

HR Speech

Destruction of cultural heritage in Nagorno-Karabakh

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Dear Chairman, Commissioners, colleagues, Cathedral of St. James in Šibenik, Church of St. Krševan in Zadar, the historical core of the city of Dubrovnik, Banski dvori in Zagreb - a total of 1861 immovable cultural monument was destroyed due to Serbian aggression against the Republic of Croatia, whose aim was to undo the Croatian national identity, built for centuries. That is why we in Croatia kn…

10 Mar

2022

HR Speech

Transparency and administrative standards - the treatment of public access requests based on Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 (debate)

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The transparency of the democratic system is essential, as it enables citizens to participate in decision-making. Transparency is the backbone of all European policies, and among its most important elements is the right of citizens to request and obtain access to documents held by the European institutions. In principle, all documents of the institutions should be made available to the public. On …

8 Mar

2022

HR Speech

The situation in Bosnia Herzegovina (continuation of debate)

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Dear Chairman, Vice-President, Commissioner, colleague and colleague, the stability of Bosnia and Herzegovina is essential for the maintenance of peace and security in the area of Southeast Europe. In order to ensure stability in that country, it is a priority to overcome the political crisis in which Croats, as a constituent people, are imposed illegitimate representatives at the level of the Pre…

7 Mar

2022

HR Speech

One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

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Since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis, six out of ten consumers have faced financial difficulties. In such circumstances, a number of consumers contacted me with comments that banks had sent unsolicited credit cards to their home address or that they had unilaterally increased their limits for permissible and tacit overdrafts on current accounts. Such bank practices must cease immediately, as…

7 Mar

2022

HR Speech

Cohesion policy: reducing healthcare disparities and enhancing cross-border health cooperation (short presentation)

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Dear Chair, Commissioners, colleagues, standards of healthcare provision in the EU are not harmonised, as there are significant differences between European regions but also between Member States. You are much more likely to die of cancer if you live in less developed regions of the European Union than in the most developed parts of Western and Northern Europe, which is unacceptable. We must do ou…

17 Feb

2022

HR Speech

Strengthening the system for protecting PDO and PGI denominations in the EU after the Prosecco/Prosek case (G-001003/2021 - B9-0004/2022)

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Dear President, Commissioners, colleagues and colleagues, the debate on the differences and similarities between Croatian and Italian Prosecco has been held in the EU institutions since the period of Croatia's accession to the European Union, and the Italian side has systematically obstructed the protection of the origin of Prosecco and its positioning on the European wine map and market. Italian …

15 Feb

2022

HR Speech

Tackling non-tariff and non-tax barriers in the single market (debate)

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The single market is a cornerstone of the European Union and as such generates 25% of European GDP, but its full potential remains to be realised. Scientific studies show that the hidden potential of the single market amounts to as much as €713 billion. This is why we need to accelerate efforts to remove unnecessary administrative barriers that hamper cross-border exchanges and make it difficult t…

15 Feb

2022

HR Speech

Implementation of the Toy Safety Directive (debate)

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While European rules on toy safety are among the strictest in the world, the fact remains that unsafe toys continue to circulate in the European single market. This is evidenced by the fact that, according to the latest information on dangerous non-food products, toys were the most frequently reported product, with as much as 27% of all notifications. This is why we need to improve the rules on th…