Speeches

Madam President! The Commission’s February 2024 annual report on EU competitiveness addresses many relevant factors and challenges. Therefore, energy is mentioned 43 times, critical raw materials 16 times, semiconductors 2 times and hydrogen also 2 times. Water is not mentioned at all. Despite the fact that in several parts of the EU we are feeling painfully how floods or droughts are knocking off the feet of citizens, farmers and businesses. Water is in every industry in the EU, but in the Commission's way of looking at competitiveness, not at all. The intellectual water level in the Commission cannot be so low that it does not consider that by 2050 almost 20% of Europe's inhabitants will be negatively affected by water shortages. A water shortage that, if we don't do something, will tear us apart in fights and wars over who should take the bill and who should have the water that is first and in front of everyone else if we don't do something. Fortunately, Letta's report on competitiveness proposes that we, as we have just got on the table, get a New European Water Framework. Yes, please. Many in this House have long and together with European civil society called for an ‘EU Blue Deal’. Exactly the same as Letta now does. Step up now! Commission. Throw yourself into the deep water with the rest of us. Otherwise, the EU's competitiveness will die from drought.

Madam President, thank you all so much for the debate. Thank you, Commissioner Schinas, for your closing remarks – very appreciated – and also thank you for saying that the Parliament took the proposal from the Commission. We preserved what was strong and good in it, but we also developed and made more value into the Commission’s proposal. Thank you for acknowledging that. That’s very much appreciated. I said a couple of times in my first intervention, I used the word ‘ecosystem’ in my speech, and I use that very, very precisely. I also invite more colleagues, more commentators, more stakeholders to acknowledge that healthcare in Europe really is a very complex ecosystem. We can expect and we must expect a lot from the pharma package. But it is not the only legislative package that can make healthcare in Europe develop in a more innovative and a more citizens- and patient- and family-friendly way. I really appreciate the colleagues who mentioned that in your interventions. My dear colleague Vistisen from Denmark, the Spitzenkandidat from ID, has left the room. But before he did, and in his intervention, he actually took the work we have made, and where his Group has also been a part of that, and tossed it into the bin – also saying that if it was stood to his opinion, this House should not touch the pharmaceutical legislation because we don’t know what we are dealing with. That stands in contrast to the comments we have already received from commentators and stakeholders that what we are now about to vote is something that is much more coherent, much more pragmatic and much more liveable for the future of this file going now towards trilogue. I thank you again, all colleagues who contributed. I am not running again, so this file will not be a part of my future. But I will watch what you do with this file going forward. It has been a pleasure. Maybe this will be the last speech that I will ever hold in this House. So thank you so much, all colleagues. Take good care of European legislation. Take good care of exactly this pharma package. And all the best.

Madam President, dear colleagues, today we will vote on the Parliament’s position on the revision of our general pharmaceutical legislation. A revision which is vital for patients, the industry ecosystem and our wider society. With today’s vote, we take a step towards addressing current and future challenges, as well as opportunities of our healthcare ecosystems. Europe is increasingly falling behind other regions in pharmaceutical research and development investments. Novel technology is challenging the existing legislative framework, and the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated the need for timely and equitable access to medicine, which should have already been obvious to all of us. Our report on the pharmaceutical directive proposes mandatory measures to increase access to medicines across Europe, while recognising that the availability of medicine is not depending on industry decisions alone. It proposes a more efficient regulatory framework while preserving quality, safety and efficacy standards and strengthening the protection of our environment. And it proposes a framework for incentives which, like a magnet, attracts products to Europe. This shall ensure that Europeans will always, also in the future, see medicine offered as soon as possible on our markets and developed to meet our needs, namely those needs which are not met today. In less than a year, Members from all different political groups and parts of Europe came together to form this position in the midst of election season and heightened political polarisation, no less. I would like to thank all colleagues involved in bringing this file here today, namely my co-rapporteur, MEPs Wölken, for the pharmaceutical package together with me, the shadow rapporteurs across all groups, my EPP Group colleagues who negotiated the regulation, MEP Sokol, and all our colleagues and our indispensable advisers who otherwise contributed with good suggestions and debate. Everything bricks making it possible to make good legislation in a professional and empathetic atmosphere. I need not remind any colleagues of the widespread doubts regarding the Parliament reaching today’s vote. The true measure of our success lies, of course, not in this legislative milestone, but in the real impact our work will eventually have on patients’ lives. Still, and very importantly, I look at the Council and hope that they will take note not only of our ambition for a swift adoption of the final legislation, but also our commitment in this House to collaborate, inspire and eventually reach a compromise that benefits the entire health care ecosystem in all corners of Europe.

Mr President, I am very satisfied and I am very, very grateful, and so we actually all can be, with the result of this revision of the waste shipments regulation, because it reflects a good balance between environmental protection and supporting our recycling industry for a circular economy. The new waste shipment regulation will help Member States to combat waste crime, support digitalisation, simplify bureaucracy and protect third countries from our waste, especially plastic waste. I hope for your support in this very last vote, so that the law can begin to deliver on the interests of our environment and the next generations. Also, I ask all to vote in favour because working on this law for two years – even more than that – also showed us that we can work together in this House, all of our groups, on what is complicated and highly technical, without fighting more than it takes to understand evidence, each other’s viewpoints and facts better. This sense of responsibility and cooperation made the EU strong when the Commission and the Council needed a little bit more arguments and more time to consider our suggestions to compromise towards a strong tool for a greener and cleaner future. The Council unanimously supported the trilogue outcome. And with a last and very big thank you to all my colleagues, shadows, other key players and especially all our advisors, I ask you from the depth of my heart, everybody to support with this very last vote, the waste shipments regulation. Thank you so much.

Mr. President! As the Commission may well hear, many of us are looking forward to the "water resilience" initiative, or as it is called in English: Water Resilience Initiative. But when we hear a little on the water pipes, what it is we get in March, then sounds a little like we are going to have a debate from June to September, where we talk further about all the challenges we have with the water. And maybe there will be more good suggestions on how we can solve it - sometime in the future. I'll just have to say there: We need to hear that you have understood that we are many here in the European Parliament, the European Economic and Social Committee, the whole of civil society and more and more out in the living Europe asking for an "EU Blue Deal". A systematic, well-thought-out, logical way of working with all the many different legislative instruments, investment instruments, and so on, that we need to really get rid of the water stress that we have around Europe. Not only with drought, but also with floods of astronomical dimensions. At the same time, we need a Blue Deal that takes the word "deal" and turns the way we work with water challenges into a business opportunity that makes our exports flourish, that makes our innovation send out all sorts of good solutions, that not only makes us water smart, but also makes an economy that becomes much, much stronger to cope with the challenges we face.

Madam President! In 2023, the European Year of Skills highlighted the problems, which are precisely about 74% of all EU SMEs lacking skilled labour. It affects everything from restaurant opening hours in the high season and the time patients have to be on hospital waiting lists to operations that can bring them back into the workforce – paradoxically! Two thirds of all EU companies search in vain for IT specialists, and too much of the workforce is stuck in the fact that not all countries in the EU have sufficient or good enough childcare facilities. 8 million Europeans, young Europeans have neither education nor work, but a year focused on the problems does not solve them. We need to act and we need to act now. This is why the Commission urgently needs to deliver an action plan – an urgent plan – to ensure that the workforce is made bigger and equipped with the skills it needs. Otherwise, we will starve the economic muscle, which must be able to pump growth, welfare, security and perspective into Europe without hindrance.

Madam President! Geothermal energy, it lies down in our underground and is just waiting to come up and contribute the huge amounts of renewable and really very stable energy that is actually involved. We just haven't taken geothermal energy seriously in a timely manner and secured the necessary frameworks and tools to use it. This means that now that we really lack it, we could have spent a lot of time first agreeing on whether we believe in geothermal energy at all as part of the future energy mix in the EU. Fortunately, we have not done so in the group of negotiators who are now tabling the report, which is to be voted on tomorrow Thursday. We really agree on that. Geothermal energy is an important part of the future of energy in the EU, and I would like to thank all colleagues, negotiators and especially our negotiator Professor Krasnodębski for a very good and focused cooperation. That is why the report also states that we would like to have a strategy that actually stimulates the deployment of geothermal energy. A strategy that is not only full of objectives, but also contains tools that are fit for purpose. One of the most important tools is data. Data, some of which actually already exist but are not shared or available to those who can and would like to trigger the extraction of geothermal energy that can come up as soon as possible. The report therefore also states that a geothermal energy extraction project must be put on an equal footing with all other types of energy, particularly in terms of financing and insurance. And then there is the unfortunate oldie but goodie regarding permissions to get started with a geothermal project. There must simply not go windmill in it, where prejudices, waiting times and bureaucracy stifle initiative and projects. My group, the EPP, and I wholeheartedly support the report, and we look forward to seeing the Commission adopt it and embark as soon as possible on concrete proposals for action. The climate struggle is not won without geothermal energy, and the earth literally burns beneath us. However, let's use that term to get started now.

Mr. President! Where you, with an understanding of how to use your time optimally and create results, have said that once you have written your to-do list, you should start with what you wrote at the end. Because that is usually also the most important thing, and I would actually like to suggest that we do so with the recommendations on the EU-China relationship. Let's start with what is about minimising risks in relations with China to ensure Europe's open strategic autonomy, as it so simply sounds, even if it covers everything from critical infrastructure and critical raw materials to China's increasing military provocations in the South China Sea. Otherwise, we will never get close to getting China to participate in solving the global challenges we face with climate, biodiversity, public health, food safety and so on. Otherwise, we will not get China to respect human rights and the rules-based world order, nor will we get China to stop supporting the United States' attempts to divide and destroy Europe. In just over a month, the Commission will come forward with its work programme for 2024. Based on the EU-China report, expectations are very high and this heralds significant efforts for increased economic security in the form of screening of foreign investments in the EU, export controls, diversification of raw materials and other supply chains.

Mr. President! If something has to go fast in the EU, it can also go fast, and it has to. The EU urgently needs to get out of its dependence on being able to source critical raw materials on the world market only from far too few suppliers, who thus have the footing of the EU’s green transition and industrial growth. We have to buy from more people and collect more ourselves from our own subsoil, huge amounts of waste and wastewater. Otherwise, we will not achieve the climate targets! Similarly, the current deindustrialisation of the EU economy will not be able to be turned into sustainable innovative growth needed to deliver not only on climate objectives, but also everything we need to do in the area of defence and would like to do in the area of health and life sciences. So I would like to thank my colleagues, the Council and the Commission for their effective cooperation until today, when work on the new Raw Materials Act can begin. Here it is important to follow and safely also facilitate, because there is plenty of local conflict material in the application of the law. When we talk about raw materials, we often talk about the raw materials themselves, but it is also in their processing that it is important to focus, whether they are extracted from the underground for the first time or recycled in the circular economy. This must be done in a cost-effective manner and without overlooking the need for research and innovation on alternatives to scarce and critical raw materials. China is here 10 years ahead of everyone else - 10 years! That says something about the need for pace and investment we face. But there's no way around it - start.

Mr President! Water is the gift that keeps on giving. Especially as a topic on the plenary agenda. This is the third time I've said anything about water. Even if the title is about energy. The logic is that water is mostly related to energy, and that in the way we use water, there is plenty of energy. Water is used for the production of energy, for cooling, in energy production and for the transport of energy. Therefore, it is of course not satisfactory that this year's State of the Energy Union Report status does not delve deep enough into the ocean of potentials that are activating the relationship between water and energy. Three sentences in a 31-page report. It's like treating water like a beer. I am not Kate Blanchett, but I can reiterate that the UN Water Conference this year strongly stressed that water must be taken seriously as the key enabler of health, food and energy NOW! We will not become green without getting more control of the blue, and the EU actually has the skills and therefore also the duty to get energy and water to play better together. We can do this by getting an EU Blue Deal, as we have an EU Green Deal, just as many colleagues, together with me and the European Economic and Social Committee, have recently asked EU governments to back it. There will be good energy in it.

Mr President! This summer, the Commission launched a major and much-needed initiative to strengthen the EU's innovation power. There is nothing wrong with the ambitions, and it just lacked. The innovative ecosystem in virtually all industries has too much trouble, so there is enough to address, which in many ways will remind of both cleanup and systematization. Something women are traditionally said to be really good at. But we can do more and more than that. That is why the Committee on Industry, External Trade, Research and Energy, which has put this debate on the agenda and is grateful for it, also asks what the Commission is going to do to make investors understand that they can therefore get much more out of their money if they find women entrepreneurs who work hard at their own pace and therefore do not contribute at the most optimal pace to growth and job creation. Often because they think that investors just don't like or care about women doing anything other than cleaning up and putting in system. It's just too stupid. If the EU is to unleash our full, innovative potential, then women entrepreneurs and investors must find each other. Now and effectively. In addition to the pilot project that I myself have proposed and initiated, very slowly, into reality, what else will the Commission do and much more? Because what's going on now? It simply does not work well enough.

Madam President! Mental health is the most important form of health. If your mind is heavy. If the vitality disappears and if the individual goes around in permanent error that it is his own fault and his own task to find mental health, then Europe has lost the DNA of neighbourly love, knowledge and willingness to understand mental health as something that happens most between people. Therefore, the debate and the questions formulated by the organisers are both welcome and relevant. Mental health in Europe is not doing well. Currently, for current and fundamental reasons. Reasons we need to do something about. For people, no matter where they are employed, but not just employees. Too often we forget the Europeans who employ other people. We forget the entrepreneurs and the self-employed. Owner-managers of small and medium-sized enterprises, which together form the economic backbone of the EU. We forget those who create jobs for others, while they struggle with the increasing amount of often opaque rules and generally uncertain and unpredictable times. Their mental health is also challenged. Their mental health also needs action so that we can stop the development where fewer and fewer people in the EU start their own business and create good jobs for others. The mental health of employers should therefore be a priority, and I hope that the Commission will also take that into account in this debate.

Mr. President! Then we debate water again here in the European Parliament. We did that two weeks ago, and we did it last month. But it is as if we are not really getting to the bottom of the challenges and opportunities we have with water in Europe. The challenge is that in some places there is too much of it and in others there is too little. The challenge is that water resources are not used well enough while it circulates in our society. The challenge is that in some places the water is not clean enough for people on land or healthy enough for fish in the sea. There is a lot to talk about when we talk about the water, the problem is just that we splash around between the topics and, as I said, do not really get to the bottom and back to the surface with a structured plan for what we do when the debate is over. Therefore, it is welcome that the Commission writes for its latest work programme that it will take a water initiative for resilience in the first quarter of 2024. The question for today's debate is therefore: What should be included in the Commission's Water Initiative? Let me make a few suggestions: Let this be the starting point for us to soon have an EU "blue deal", as we have an EU "green deal". Come up with the sketch for a truly holistic, ambitious, structured and evidence-based deal that can activate all relevant policy themes regarding water. After all, water is not only about its quality, but also about energy, critical raw materials, food production, biodiversity, infrastructure, aquatic ecosystems, research and much more. Give us a proposal for an EU blue deal that brings it all together – in breadth and depth – to make the EU truly water smart, while strengthening our economy and global competitiveness.

Mr President! This parliamentary term is coming soon, and that is good, especially for the water agenda. Okay, the Drinking Water Directive has been fully revised, as has the regulation on the reuse of waste water for irrigation. And with a little luck, we will finish revising the Groundwater Directive, the Directive on industrial discharges and now also the Waste Water Directive. But otherwise, water is frankly being treated somewhat incoherently at the moment, with the pursuit of CO2 reductions – despite a pandemic, war in Europe, energy crisis and general economic slowdown – dominating. Yes, we have been presented with strategies, and yes, several of us have worked hard to get the water in, where it otherwise plays an overlooked role, such as the Energy Efficiency Directive. But in addition, the water has received a somewhat place-motherly treatment without strategic synchronous swimming between the close to 30 different laws and directives that actually have an impact on Europe's water. And while the seabed is dying, at least right now around my own country, and farmers are being hung out as particularly guilty. Meanwhile, there is an abnormal drought, or roads and houses are destroyed by floods, and while we miss out on innovation and business opportunities. We can do better, which is why we must have an "EU Blue Deal" in the next parliamentary term, just as we have an "EU Green Deal". Fortunately, more and more people are saying it louder and louder. Hopefully high enough for the Council to understand that we actually mean it and will support its inclusion in the work programme of the new Commission.

Mr President! Thank you for the debate. Of course, we must have a crisis-ready European Union, and we must discuss this thoroughly. And so do we this morning. But we must act, first and foremost. Crises, they have many causes, and they have many actors. Water is one of those that is pretty much involved in it all. Either as a gossip handle that can tell us that something is coming and that something is not working, or it is the boxing glove that takes up too much space and creates disasters for both nature and for people. In this parliamentary term, we have had a lot of focus on the "EU Green Deal". Of course. But it has also meant that the water agenda has been pushed aside. The need for systematic and coherent action in the field of water is alarming. That is why I hope that this morning, when we are talking about a crisis-ready European Union, will give you colleagues an opportunity to find the e-mail I have sent you with a letter I have written together with the European Economic and Social Committee. A letter that we send together to EU Heads of State and Government calling on them to give us an 'EU Blue Deal' in the next parliamentary term. Because we will not have a green and sustainable future if we do not take water more seriously, and we will have crises to our throats if we do not also have the role of water in avoiding crises much more high on the agenda.

Madam President! Congratulations on a very, very good report on the importance of our groundwater being well and our surface water also being well. I would like to suggest that instead of using the rest of the debate to pay tribute to the good report, we should also use the opportunity to promise each other that the collection of signatures that is going on around the European Parliament right now, which, together with the European Economic and Social Committee, is advocating that we get - in the next parliamentary term - an 'EU blue deal'. Now we have had in this period, and we must continue to have, an "EU green deal" that takes care of the climate. At vi også får en vandbio, som sørger for, at alt, hvad der vedrører vores vand, får et samlet lovgivningsmæssigt løft og et løft på en måde, så vi får gjort EU vandsmart for vores egen skyld, for næste generations skyld og i høj grad også for resten af verden, som kan lære rigtig meget af måden, vi gør vandet til den sunde, til den energismarte, til den bæredygtige ressource, som den bør være for en verden i balance.

Mr President! 99% of all businesses in the EU are small and medium-sized. These are what we call SMEs and they form our economic backbone. A backbone to carry us through the transformation of our society towards true sustainability. The backbone carries our economic muscles. The backbone and muscles are Europe's body of health systems, universities, schools, nursing homes, infrastructure and much more. And not least the workplaces in both the private and public sectors, which in an eternal interaction enrich each other, and make our lives as citizens both safe and rich. And that gives us confidence that we can also afford to solve future challenges. This is why SMEs are essential for the well-being of the EU and why the well-being of SMEs is essential for the EU. And it's not doing well, that backbone! My own small country, Denmark, is today Europe's most innovative country, but not many EU countries are, when we look at the global picture. At the global level, the EU is on a clear path behind the dance, while international markets are running away from us. In fact, the European Union has a larger population than the United States, which has 10 million more SMEs than we have. Why? Among other things, because they have fewer rules, better laws and more carrots for those who can and want to run a business. This is not rocket science. Let us now create better conditions for European SMEs now!

Madam President! In recent weeks, the left has weeped our ears and social media full of claims that biodiversity stands with one leg in the grave if the Nature Restoration Act is not voted through. We who are bourgeois and want sustainable solutions have heard a lot of nonsense. Nonsense that, together with populism, spin and personal attacks, can actually destroy our democratic biodiversity. So we need to get better at talking and working across here in Parliament. A good example of how we can actually do this is updating the Energy Efficiency Directive. Energy efficiency is, after all, the most cost-effective and quick way to reduce CO2 emissions, which directly benefits biodiversity. On behalf of the EPP, I negotiated a directive with high ambitions and a very large toolbox to implement them in every EU country. I am therefore also quite proud that I, as the only Dane in the EPP, succeeded in getting my group to agree that in future energy efficiency improvements will be binding on all EU Member States, so that we know how much each country contributes towards the goal of climate neutrality by 2050. For us citizens, sustainability is crucial, and it does not destroy biodiversity. On the contrary, it ensures that we get the most effective solutions adopted.

Madam President! It is worse elsewhere than in my own country, Denmark. But when my otherwise rainy little country in the north has not seen a single drop of water for more than two weeks, which has not actually happened in 17 years, it says something about the catastrophic state of the European Union in the form of a decided drought. A drought we have actually been able to measure since 2018, that is, before we got the "EU Green Deal" on the table and later embarked on the Fit for 55 package of directives and regulations, which says a lot about all the green, of course, but far too little about the blue. Today, therefore, we dare to say that we have not understood that there is no green future without a healthier, stronger and larger blue economy. That is why it is crucial that from now on, in the midst of summer heat, in the fear of forest fires and the prospect of a miserable harvest and lower self-generation of energy, we join forces in this House, in the Council, in the Commission and with all those who know better than us and who are able to create an 'EU Blue Deal' as quickly as possible. Let us immediately use the EIT, the European Institute of Innovation, to create a water KIC, a cross-border and multidisciplinary community of knowledge and innovation. Let us now begin to sweat a little more in the political workshops, because we are not without tools that can solve the drought in the European Union. We just need them now.

Mr President! We have promised to reduce the EU's CO2 emissions by at least 55% by 2030. The promise it must be kept. That is why this debate is as serious as it is long. But there is also something funny about the title of the package with the many directives. "Fit for 55", which is not about menopause, but about the transition from a fossil to a green EU. We know that. But we've done it every once in a while, which is okay. Too good mood, it never hurts, and we'll need it. Because the ability to laugh makes the size and complexity of the societal changes we are facing right now endure and have to deal with. Hopefully. It's probably a coincidence, but right now – it's also a bit of fun – we have a Swedish presidency somewhere. And then we in this House, as Swedish chefs from the Muppet show, have occasionally thrown around with green demands and high ambitions, while we have updated these many directives and invented new laws. The question then is whether what we have put together in the political kitchen now also tastes good in reality. "EU Green deal" is very "green" and thank you very much for it. Is it a "deal"? Can it do what it has to do without destroying our businesses and the economy we need to be able to do what we want for the climate? But if it does not deliver the necessary CO2 reductions that we have promised. If that happens, there won't be much to laugh about in the future, and I certainly can't see the fun in that.

Mr President! Iran can stand at the point of no return now. We are right there in history where the situation in Iran, with everything it does to human dignity, the position of women and the future of young girls, can change. Especially because of the redress that the people themselves are mobilising and the connection to the outside world and the Iranian diaspora that our digital era offers. That is why it is being heard in Iran, and virtually all of the European Parliament called in a resolution in January for Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, the IRGC, to be included on the EU's terrorist list. Several European foreign ministers have also said that they would like to see this happen. Such a thing gives hope, and right now the Iranian people are nourished by the hopes we give them. Giving hope to people in desperation must not be a free game or hot air. We simply cannot be aware of this, just as we cannot be aware of pouring professional legal arguments down the board, as the EU's foreign policy representative, Borell, claims by saying that we cannot put the IRGC on the EU's terrorist list without a concrete court ruling. Let's put the facts on the table. Let us give Iran action and not just hope.

Madam President! It has been said so many times. The energy we do not use, it is the best for the climate and for our wallet and for our security. Because with the inclusion of energy policy in security and big politics after Russia's hostile invasion of Ukraine, we have to take it very seriously. Therefore, it also makes perfect sense for the EU Building Directive to get into gear. This is what we need if energy efficiency is to deliver the CO2 reductions needed to achieve the agreed climate targets in 2030 and climate neutrality in 2050. So, of course, the buildings must contribute to the green transition. But there is an annoying ambiguity about which housing types should actually deliver and how. And some people are irritated by the level of detail in the proposal for a directive, which in some places may also look as if we here in Brussels do not really believe that the national states can figure out the task themselves. So it's a mess. Especially if the critics are right that these are some of the reasons why we would not reach the climate targets. It will actually be a tragedy. It was hard to find a consensus in this house. The negotiations have been very tough, and the vote will show whether the experience of messiness will be even greater than the content of the broad, ambitious and yet realistic compromise negotiated. This could give a very bad start to negotiations with the Council, which is now about to start. We will soon only be able to count in one hand the years up to 2030, when we will have to remove at least 55% of all CO2 in the atmosphere in Europe. Let us now get to work, and we will do so by voting in favour of the political agreement negotiated by the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy and the additional proposals on the table, which can only do this better. Now let's focus on it and get started.

Madam President! Dear Presidency, dear Commission, dear colleagues. It became clear in yesterday's debate on cars of the future that the supply challenges for raw materials for batteries are sloppyly underestimated in the EU. The debate is somewhat similar to the logic of those who mistakenly believe that more taxes, more loans, more rules and more state aid are the way forward to the climate goals without harming our competitiveness. The showcase of unimaginably irresponsible dealings with the future of Europe is getting bigger and bigger. By 2040, we will need 25 times more graphite than we did in 2020, and up to 42 times more lithium. The EU currently uses around 25% of all geological raw materials globally, but produces only 3% itself. We are becoming a raw material junkie with credits from dubious suppliers far away. It's just not going to work. We need to understand that metals are becoming more important than oil and gas have ever been. But raw materials do not rain down for free from the sky. They have to get up from the ground - also from our own in the EU - into the single market, into productions, after which they have to drive around and around the circular economy. Now!

Mr President, colleagues, according to Rule 59 of the Rules of Procedure, I therefore now request referral back to the committee to enter interinstitutional negotiations. Thank you so much.

Mr. President! Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, dear Commission. Thank you in particular for a very, very fruitful debate. We have been all around, and it seems that we will hopefully see tomorrow that we will have a very, very large majority behind the compromises. So we are very strongly faced with the Council in our debate, which I hope will also start very soon. I share the Commissioner's ambition that we start the trilogue negotiations soon. This was said by several colleagues, and it is worth emphasising again as a final comment, namely that we are not moving towards a circular economy. Nor will we get a better and sustainable way of behaving with our nature and our consumption if we do not get started with circular economy in our waste management. And that requires us to create an internal market for precisely waste. And we get that with the compromise proposals with which we have made the Commission's already quite good proposals even better. Then there are also those who think if we can hold on to some special materials through this law, so that we can hold on, and we can get, green steel - that is the example - in the future. One should just be aware that the small A-B-C for the correlation between supply and demand never ever points to the fact that by closing a market, you get both higher quality and lower price. No, we must lean into international trade and make sure that, of course, steel products are treated where they are both best and cheapest treated. At the end of the day, that is what will be most in the European interest. I have to comment on this; then Commissioner Sinkevičius says that you are in on pretty much everything we are proposing, of course it must be within the scope of the disc also in legal terms, but in any case you will probably need more money. Please do not use it as an argument at this stage that the ambitions we have for not doing what Grace O’Sullivan of the left so wisely said, namely that we are neglecting due diligence and acting while we can while it is cheapest, simply because the Commission wants more money. The cost of doing nothing is far, far higher than a discussion right now on whether the Commission needs more money through the MFF. Here we have a common task. Let's lift it and then make sure the next generation can look at us and say we did the right thing, the timely thing and the sensible thing.