Speeches

Madam President, When I was whistled for the first time in my life on the open road, I was eleven and the men were around 30. What's going on in a man whistling after an 11-year-old girl on the open street? I think it's hacking! When I was told as a student: You're a girl, you can't do math – that was my old white math teacher. Violence, humiliation, that does not happen in the open street – and that is the top, that is the top of brutality – in the open street, with murder, with femicide. It starts in school time. I don't belong to anyone. I'm not your daughter, I'm not his sister, I'm me. We women stand for ourselves. And we see this clearly here in this hall, how many women are here in the hall, how few to no men are here in the hall and how many men are silent or suddenly recognize our rights. Where were you when the trial for Madame Pelicot ran? Where were you? That's what I'd like to know. I find this debate just hypocritical.

Mr President! Mrs von der Leyen, I listened very carefully to your speech on the presentation of the programme. You always mention the concept of competitiveness and defence. If Europe, the European Union, wants to be defence- and competitive, we need to be visible – and a great many citizens are listening here. What does this Europe bring me? Why am I here, and what good is the European Union to me? The European Union is visible when I can pay my rent. The European Union is visible if local authorities are supported in tackling homelessness by 2030. The European Union is visible when we no longer have child poverty. I am still waiting for us to finally take a serious political approach to combating child poverty. We just need money to fight poverty. We can't get around it. When it comes to an Anti-PovertyStrategy goes, we have to provide money. We need laws, we need rules. If we want to be competitive, we must finally help the people affected by Long Covid. So there is a lot to do. It must be visible.

Mr President, Commissioner! Today we have the Middle East on our agenda. And here I would like to look at Gaza and Israel, where it is justified to have a debate about it and to throw a spotlight on it. But I also want to throw a spotlight on Syria. This is the neighboring state of Israel, and Israel is currently militarily present in Syria, I say. Since the summer of this year, the region around Suwaida, the region of the Druze, is under siege. People are doing badly. There is talk of massacres, of murders, which are clearly documented. What happened in western Syria – the Alevis, but also the Christians – is documented. Twenty-five years ago, Bashar al-Assad came to power, and we rolled out the red carpet to him because it was thought: A young man, a president who can speak English, that must be renewing for Syria. Where did we end up? Now, ten months ago, we rolled out the carpet again to a young new so-called president, and we're looking at what the new Syria can look like. I don't want us to have to be guilty again in 25 years, that we're here...

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, We are going to Qatar for the World Summit on Social Development – the second one – and I am very pleased to be able to travel there with my delegation. This is already an honour, and I hope that we will also show Europe a united face. Yes, we have achieved a lot in the last legislature. I hope that we will achieve even more in this legislature when it comes to combating poverty, discrimination, exclusion in the labour market, but also the exclusion of people affected by poverty. These are migrants, these are children, these are people who may never really have had a good, fair start. In the Member States, we often have the situation that where you come from, you will land or end up most of the time, to say it very badly. Classicism is still the big issue here. I think we can go to Qatar with our backs strengthened, but we should also not forget to talk to others to listen. What can we learn, what can we take with us? Because, of course, we did not eat wisdom with spoons, as we say in Germany, but I believe that we also do well to peddle with our successes, but we also do just as well to listen, to learn: What is better, where are we not good, and where can we get better? Of course, this has everything to do with money. I hope that we will see social justice again in the budget. I look forward to our journey.

Mr President! Anti-Semitism is anti-Semitism. There is nothing to relativize about this. I don't fight anti-Semitism with racism. Anti-Semitism has never been gone. He didn't suddenly fall from the sky two years ago. It did not fall from the sky in 2015. No, he's been in Europe for hundreds of years. He's never been gone. He's never been away in education, in media. When we ask Jews, they tell us the same thing. I don't fight misogyny with misogyny. We should also be very clear: Those affected by discrimination, exclusion and hatred and hate speech – and these are very, very many – who have been victims of fascism and those who suddenly stand in solidarity on one side or the other – this is hypocritical. So we also need to be clear: What can fight anti-Semitism? It is not the reduction of democracy projects, as is happening in Germany in the context of budget consultations. It is not about giving good speeches – I fight anti-Semitism at different levels. That must be clear to all of us. For this we need money, structures and no more hatred and hate speech and false solidarity from the right.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, First of all, I would like to thank the rapporteur for the good cooperation and cooperation – I believe that this should also be mentioned – and that we are now entering the negotiations in a well-closed manner. I once worked in my previous life as a call centre employee for a larger company in Hanover – the one with the three letters; I do not advertise – and then of course you have people on the phone who call spontaneously and of course are happy that there is a real person, a phone number that you can call, and there is also a real person and not some computer voice. Then there is someone dissolved in tears with three children, standing somewhere and saying: Boah, I can't get any further. Can I get my money back now? What's the situation for me? You save all year on your vacation. We just got out of the summer break; We may still be able to afford it with our budget. But who supports me? Who answers my questions? What does Brussels do for me? We protect your holidays, dear citizens, perhaps this can be said so clearly; whether it is a holiday abroad or a stopover in our Member States. But we protect consumer rights and hopefully enter into good negotiations.

Madam President, dear Commission! Climate change is not a phase, rabbit. That's not something you've come up with, that just fits, and then infantile behavior kicks in, and I close my eyes, and climate change doesn't even exist. At the beginning of the week, yesterday, we talked about the areas that are drying up, where there are forest fires, where people are losing their homes; And then it says, yes, climate change, but actually it doesn't exist. We will not be able to stop climate change, but we can mitigate the consequences for the poor. What is the housing situation for homeless people? We have a decision to end homelessness in the EU by 2030. We need to support the local authorities, because they say: “I like to do it, but from what money? And who gets it?” I believe that the acceptance of the EU and the work we are doing here is: What does the EU, this Brussels, do for me? Can I live off the rent? Can I get housing as a poor person? How can a commune of Brussels benefit? And that strengthens democracy, and that is our task – shortening, non-transparency is not a solution.

Mr President! I said to myself some time ago: Human rights are not the hot shit in this House or even in the European Union. If I look at the speeches here and listen to them, this is all very well meant, but then the next moment Ableism kicks coldly again. That's wording of helping, doing good, the poor, somehow we have to... I, too, always hear criticism of these institutions and workshops: Where do people go then? Commissioner, you said it right, it does not make sense to move them from one butt to the next. We are just before the summer holidays, then where to go with grandma or where to go with the dog? I'm hearing a bit of a discussion tonality right now. What are we going to do with the child? What do we do with the child after school? Where'd you go? They think of the end. These children are prepared for old age and death, but not for life. The question must always be asked: Do I want to live and work in these conditions? If the answer is no, why disabled people? Then why young people? When I was 16, everyone in my class got career advice. Everyone could say what they wanted to become. For me, career counselling went straight to the institution counselling and I didn't even need a school-leaving certificate, because, that wasn't necessary. They got the money and that's why I call: We are now dealing with the long-term budget. Where do these funds go, where do EU funds end up? If we are still funding these institutions with EU funds, I do not want to hear anything more in this House about: We are ready and we have guidelines. At the end of the day, what do we do with coal and finance inclusion or exclusion?

Madam President, Hurrah, we have a paper, but we no longer have an anti-discrimination directive. Hey, it's an advantage. I am referring here to my colleague Marc Angel. People with disabilities are 100 million people in the European Union. And when it comes to the rule of law - and we visited the UN last week with the LIBE, EMPL and PETI committees - we are counting on ourselves, on the EU, on human rights, on the rule of law. The rule of law is human rights, and I miss it here. And when we talk about human rights, we talk about women's rights, we talk about LGBTIQ, and we talk about Romani, even if it's difficult to express. And the fact that it is still being debated and we are happy that we have a paper, but no laws yet, and these laws are being undermined, strangled, cancelled, have no real value – that is the scandal in the European Union. That is why in the next EU - I call on you, Commissioner - we finally need an alternative to the Anti-Discrimination Directive.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen! We are discussing a strategy and, in the same breath, we are watching relatively tacitly as the Anti-Discrimination Directive is wiped off the table. It was a long, hard fight. It is about fighting discrimination against people with disabilities, against people who belong to the Romani culture, against the population, against the queer community. We have been talking about competitiveness for the last few weeks and months. Competitiveness – that seems to be the very big issue. So, dear opponents, be reassured, nothing happens. The issue of discrimination, human rights is no longer so en vogue. 500 million people with disabilities live in the EU. We've just heard the Romani numbers. This is not a niche group. We are citizens of the European Union. Discrimination is not sought out, it is not asked for. That happens to me. And to fight against it is the task of the European Union. Because we are citizens of the European Union.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen! I listened very carefully yesterday to Mrs von der Leyen's speech, and Mrs Bischoff, you said yes, competitiveness – Competitiveness – I have been hearing this for several months, but then for whom? As long as we have a healthy, participatory society, if people don't feel taken with them, can't be there, are afraid of the future and not because something comes from the outside, but because I lose my job due to different reasons, then I'm not part of this competitiveness, then I don't matter. Social justice is the kit that holds a society together. I said that in the last legislature. We do not have a problem with knowledge, we have a problem with implementation. Once again, we are discussing the social question. The issue of homelessness is in this legislature or is still not being seriously addressed in this legislature. We have 500 million people with disabilities. We just got the Global Disability Summit in Berlin. We are talking about disability poverty and lack of accessibility. This is a target group. These are citizens who don't matter at all. So I expect this Commission to come up with legislative proposals. I am not even talking about the anti-discrimination directive, which is currently being cancelled. I expect concrete guidelines from the Commission that we will not once again have fun debating the importance of social Europe.

Madam President, Commissioner, dear Council! Just because one has chased a dictator from the court does not mean that a complete dictatorship has disappeared; Countries that have experienced dictatorships know this. Assad is gone, but the dictatorship has remained. The fear is still there, the mistrust below the people is still there. Al-Sharaa is the new president – I would say he is the point of contact on Syria issues, but still far from being seen as an elected president. And he hasn't been able to really convincingly portray how he envisions a united Syria. I was in Syria, Suweida and Damascus 14 days ago, and the great fear, of course, is that a state will disintegrate. But then this state must interest me, then I must also interest the people in this state; then I have to go to Suweida, then I have to show myself in the Kurdish areas and not only say: I want a united Syria, but please come by me. We need to solve the problem of poverty, youth unemployment, violence against women – I know we don’t know where else to erase. Please donate the money directly on site and not to a dictator, a terrorist in a suit – the picture has been tried many times.

Mr President! This morning, Commissioner Lahbib, we had the debate on Disability strategy, and here I would like to use the room again to draw attention to the situation of disabled girls and women. And we are not only talking about the girls and women in wheelchairs, but also those with learning difficulties. Every second woman with a disability is affected by violence, and that can happen within the family, that can happen in institutions, that can happen anywhere. And women are often not believed, especially those with learning difficulties – because they cannot put it into words, they have no communication, they are not believed, because they are simply convinced that a woman with a disability is only disabled and not a woman. It's a woman without a uterus, if you will. We have two major conferences next year – the Women's Conference in New York and the Conference of Persons with Disabilities in June. Two important areas, because important conferences, where we will also be present as a Parliament. The Commission has to report in Geneva on the state of play regarding the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities – and here, I believe, disabled women should play a major role.

Madam President, Dear Commissioner, welcome to our House and to this important issue, I am very pleased. First of all, I have some bad news for all of us: There is no European Member State that has implemented the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities as it should. We all failed! We are all in the same boat. The good news: We can do better. We can do better with the development of the strategy. There is still – as the colleagues have said – that people with disabilities – or disabled people, I am in favour of the social model – still live in poverty, especially women, who still live and work in institutions, supposedly for their protection. If you ask yourself, you have a disabled friend and you have a disabled colleague, and the answer is no – where are the people? Mostly in places where they are supposed to be so safe. One in two women with disabilities is affected by violence. It's not visible. That's what's happening in these closed spaces, and we have to break that down. We must break it up by stopping funding such institutions. I'm not talking about social media. For example, I'm talking about agriculture. It is often the organic, organic or agricultural farmer who receives EU funding but then uses the services of disabled people who then work for one euro an hour – thus circumventing European social standards! There is no company in Germany that does not produce in facilities or for workshops. It is the best developed dumping wage model we have in the European Union. I don't have to go to India or Bangladesh. If our standards are to have human rights-compliant regulations, this must also apply to disabled people. And it must be clear: Where is our money going? I would ask you to pay attention to this for the next strategy. We're talking about the MFF., which is very important. I see that we have an opportunity to act and then have to question it just as well, have to control it – what do you actually do with our money? – and that this is not necessarily the good and the beautiful and the love. I'll come to the end. It's Christmas and we want to do something good. No, well-intentioned is not well done!

Mr President! I throw a number into the room: 54. And I throw another number into the room: 48. 54 Years of the Assad Dictatorship: Father Assad and Bashar al-Assad, his son. Less than 48 hours after the fall of the Syrian population itself, without bloodshed, I would like to mention, it has not been possible to cry out immediately for deportations. I have followed this debate, I feel the same way as my S&D colleague Thijs: It disgusts me how inhumanely people talk about people. Supposedly, as if they had no free will of their own, as if it were already God-given, that they must of course automatically plunge into chaos, as if there had been no civil rights movements in the past, no opposition movement in Washington, in Paris, in Berlin. The people are here! There is a democracy plan, and I call on you, Mrs Kallas: Get in touch with the new movements, the old, experienced activists and talk to the people! They are tired of making decisions about their heads. They are tired of knowing what is good or what is bad for them, for the men, for the women, for the women. minorities. This is my appeal to you, Mrs Kallas.

Mr President! I believe I am the only woman in the progressive camp who is not lesbian, queer or anything else – and I do not feel threatened. That's crazy! And I find these words really painful so far. What do you take away from children of men when they say: ‘I am a lesbian, I am gay’? I notice in the schoolyard – as a boy – that the neighbor who is next to me, that I find him somehow sexy. And maybe I want to have an ice cream with him when I'm 14, 15. It doesn't hurt anyone, we don't take anything away from anyone. And we have been fighting for a very long time to get back to the ground of professionalism, Commissioner Helena Dalli, dear team here in Parliament, and we have been fighting for a very long time for the implementation of the Anti-Discrimination Directive. And this is a very, very important point. This Anti-Discrimination Directive covers once people from the LGBTIQ+ group, but also people with disabilities. And we hope that we will finally be able to get Germany to unblock this, that we will not be able to boo guy or the boo woman In the European Commission, in the Council, we are saying that we want to continue here when it comes to human rights, when it comes to our rights. This is now our work for the next few months when it comes to new elections at the end of February. That's what we're going to fight for.

Madam President, We often have the floor here today. competitiveness – competitiveness – and that everyone is somehow ready for change. I come from Lower Saxony, I come from Großburgwedel, and Großburgwedel is not very far from Gorleben. We know what it means to have nuclear energy on your doorstep. What do we do with this shit? To those of you who are still advocating today that we must somehow reanimate nuclear energy, the old rubbish dumpsters, I ask: What do we do with this shit? We have to sell this dirt to the citizens on our doorstep in Gorleben. Wir haben Gorleben erklärt: Gorleben is not safe! Gorleben stands for Rebecca Harms. Rebecca Harms was a great fighter in the European Parliament against nuclear energy. Of course, we also have to explain to them: How do we want to reshape the energy transition in the 21st century? The energy transition for companies does not mean that we stick to the old, dirty mechanics, because then those who demand it must give me an answer: Where's the dirt? Best regards from Gorleben!

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen! After this very emotional debate, I would like to throw a number into the room: 100 million people with disabilities live in the European Union, and they are the last to be remembered and the first to be forgotten. People with disabilities, elderly people, people who are homeless, who are not immediately seen or who do not appear in rescue plans. And this is important for the next Commission that when it comes to funding, when it comes to civil protection, we take these very groups into account. And this is not a small niche group that we are talking about, we are talking about citizens in the European Union who have a visible or invisible disability. No, they can't hear when an alarm goes off. No, they may not be able to see if it's raining – and it's not about removing puddles, we're talking about a climate disaster. Disabled people are the last we think of and the first we forget. Therefore, my call to the next Commission, but also to this House in the next five years: Valencia is today, and the next disaster is coming – and I am happy when people like us are taken into account in the household.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen! The fight against poverty is probably now on the Commission's agenda in this upcoming legislature, and this is very well heard. But we also have the long-term budget ahead of us, so we can decide what money will go into housing – social housing. As the European Union, we have said: Homelessness must end by 2030. It is very nice that we are dealing here with the issue of social affairs and housing at EU level, but then we also need an answer for the municipalities that say we would like to do this, but please give us the money for it. It is not just the classic house building when we talk about housing and so-called fears of descent – we are an ageing continent. How often do we read in newspapers: Older lady, older gentleman, has lived for 50, 60, 70 years, since childhood in his apartment, in his house, and suddenly – April, April –: You have to move out. In the old age with the financial situation, you can usually no longer afford this. If we do not want society to fly around our ears, we must invest in social standards, but also in social housing.

Mr President! We have achieved a lot here as a team, and I see that we are sitting here closed in the front row. I am very happy, dear colleagues, we were really a megacool team. We have reached the minimum wage, the Climate Social Fund. We are now trying, in the next parliamentary term, to implement the poverty-resistant basic security as a legislative initiative and to protect people from poverty. Then one hears after La Hulpe one or the other voice that says: Well, now it's good too! We have better things to do now, we have to take care of the right problems! Social, that's quite nice, but the defense to the outside, from the outside, that's what we need now! That's right! We need defence when it comes to external attacks on Europe. But we also need internal security, and that is social justice, that is protection. The fight against external attacks is right. But if there are no answers for the elderly woman, the elderly lady, the young people who are afraid of what is coming to them, if there is no protection, then we should not be surprised if Europe disintegrates. And there is no army to help.