Speeches

I am speaking in this debate because in the last legislature there were many debates in this chamber of the European Parliament about Ukraine and, unfortunately, very harmful opinions about how Poland and Poles behaved. There were very defamatory words against Polish farmers. I would like to remind you that Polish farmers defended Polish land, Polish food, Polish food security and their own farms. I would like to remind you that in this parliamentary term, in this new parliamentary term, there should be no false, untested judgments and opinions. This Parliament may then be better off if there are concrete, proven, true statements here. Unfortunately, in the previous assessments of some MEPs who are also in this Chamber today, this was not the case. I therefore ask that we simply respect each other and that this debate on important issues will be better.

Mr President, thank you very much. Mr. Commissioner, I'm sorry. We are debating at a time when there is great concern in the European Union. Voters are asking why companies are fleeing the European Union, why farmers are protesting, why jobs are shrinking, why people do not have the money to pay their electricity and heat bills, why there is less security in the European Union, and it is expected that this problem will widen even further. But a compromise has to be found. I think it was found in part. Thank you very much for your cooperation, Mr Negrescu, and we as ECR will abstain here. It is true that some of our amendments, the ECR amendments, have been appreciated – for which I thank you once again – but there are also some provisions that we cannot agree to. I am thinking here above all of these big decisions related to the Green Deal, to reproductive and sexual rights, but these are not the most important things. The most important things are those that are related to the economy, and I think we have done a little too little in this matter.

Mr President, thank you very much. Mr. Commissioner, I'm sorry. There will be money for Ukraine, that is good news, but the analysis of the multiannual financial framework has taught us that we need to be better able to plan, and better spend money, and know what we can, simply, afford. We as Poles, as ECR against Putin, but no one listened to us. Inflation could also have been predicted, because economic crises simply happen. The current leaders of the European Union have recklessly indebted the European Union, and we have a huge problem with that. Today, the Union simply needs to find new money, so the new money is 33 billion of fresh debt that will have to be incurred for Ukraine. This transfer of 10 billion euros, which suddenly found itself, 10 billion, it is not known whether sometimes there is no more such money. So the question is, how do we spend this money? And we need 21 billion euros as an additional contribution from the European Union countries. We extinguish the fire, we are happy to extinguish, and we should simply prevent the fires. And this is at the moment the great problem of the current elites of the European Union, which has led the European Union into a crisis. And as I hear, they still want to rule. Putin is happy, he is watching everything that is happening in the European Union, and we are simply putting out these fires. So we say this: more eurorealism, more euro-economy and less different types of ideologies such as green religion or gender ideology.

I listened carefully to your comments. I am also a teacher by profession. Education reform is underway in Poland. As we talk about the educational space, we are talking both about teachers, about the quality of teachers' work, about those requirements that teachers must meet, but we are also talking about the quality of requirements. And I would like to ask if you would like such a solution, which is currently preferred in Poland recently, to move away from homework, homework for students? Is this the right way to improve the quality of education and get rid of illiteracy?

I have the honour to ask you a question as a farmer. It is a rare situation in the European Parliament to be able to ask a question to a person directly oriented in the field of agriculture. I just wanted to ask you and ask you to answer, how are European farmers informed about all the policy objectives of the European Union? Isn't there such a thing that farmers, whom we all respect and should respect, are not informed about the various aspects of climate policy, the costs of the solutions introduced under this policy? Could you say something about that? Thank you very much.

Mr President, thank you very much. In this debate, I see very harmful opinions towards Poland. I completely disagree with what Mr Kubilius said, blaming Poland for the fact that Polish carriers are blocking the border. That's not the case. Poland was, is and will continue to be in solidarity with Ukraine. And no one else helped Ukraine and the people of Ukraine like Poles, Poland and Poles. However, the European Commission has done little. The European Commission is wrong not to see, for example, what is happening on the other side of the border. It is not the case that those who protest on the Polish side – I am talking about carriers and farmers – do so as a phantasm. It is simply an act of desperation. This is an act of defending their property. This is an act of defense of their property. And that must be understood. We must truly stand in solidarity within the European Union, but without harming the ordinary people who are doing business and suffering from this war. So please do not lie about the attitude of Poles, because we want to solve this problem. Let's just get the Commission to work, because she's the main player here.

Mr President, thank you very much. Mr. Commissioner, I'm sorry. Madam President, I'm sorry. Thank you very much for your vote. We will be constructive as ECR because, among other things, our amendments on transport, on young farmers, on military mobility have been included. We did what was actually possible, so we will try to support this budget. But we also stress this problem related to the revision of the multiannual financial framework, because without this revision we will have certain problems related, for example, to the increase in debt repayment, which is increasingly bothering the European Union. And we also hope that after this revision there will be money for Ukraine, very important funds, because Ukraine is waiting for these funds. It seems to us that in all this narrative, however, we have been overwhelmed by the new debt opportunities of the European Union. We are very afraid of this, that is - we think - a very bad way, and we are also thinking about not falling into the trap of this debt, especially since many European Union countries, such as Greece, already have over 170% of debt to GDP, Italy has 144% of debt, and Poland has 48%. So we're going to be constructive and we're going to keep looking.

This is the 11th time Orban's name has been mentioned. You say all the time that Hungary, Poland, Poland, Hungary, Hungary, Poland are to blame for everything. Poland, as a country, has proposed a tenth package of sanctions to limit trade in diamonds with Russia. Putin earns about $300 million a year by trading diamonds with Russia. Who is blocking the diamond trade with Russia? Orban, huh? No, I don't. Poland? No, I don't. Belgium. Why don't you attack Belgium?

Mr President, thank you very much. Mr. Commissioner, I'm sorry. The ECR supports many amendments, all the more so as our amendments have been partially accepted. These include amendments on young farmers, an increase in the budget, as well as an increase in the amounts for financing military mobility and defence research. But it was wrong that there were increased funds for frontline countries that accept mothers and children from Ukraine. This is the case, among others, in Poland. In the Polish health system, in the Polish school system there are Ukrainian children and there is not enough help for them. Nor are we enthusiastic about these extraordinary own resources, fresh money to be delivered to the Union budget. We do not think it is a good idea to increase the budget for the European Public Prosecutor's Office and the Institute for Gender Equality. Equality of women and men. We still believe that the Cohesion Fund is a very basic instrument through which the European Union can develop in parallel and evenly. This fund should be maintained and increased as much as possible so that all countries in the European Union, if we are talking about European solidarity, can simply develop evenly. In all countries there are people with different types of deficits, needs, and after Covid and as a result of the post-Putinflation war we have a huge problem with it. So here we will support the good things, criticize the bad things. Let's see what the Council does with our proposal. Fingers crossed.

Madam President, I'm sorry. Of course, we support all these activities related to the STEP platform, because since it is in the United States, if we want to compete with China, we must allocate funds to the market that will help compete with these innovation tycoons. So we're all for it. However, we are very interested in this issue related to aid for countries with lower GDP. We are very worried that strong countries want to take money and say that it is best to help the best. We believe that it would be possible to allocate this amount of 5 billion to countries with lower GDP. That's what we're asking for, that's what we're asking for, and we think we're right about that. So we also ask and strongly support the increase in funding for the STEP programme and we believe that simply a special fund for poorer countries is very important from the point of view of harmonious market interaction.

Mr President, thank you very much. Mr. Commissioner, I'm sorry. I live near the border with Ukraine and I know very well what drama is taking place there. Sometimes I hear planes flying over Ukraine and landing in Rzeszów to help Ukraine. And, of course, we support all those actions that are aimed at helping Ukraine. We see Ukraine in the European Union in the future. It's obvious to me. However, we oppose the proliferation of requirements for Ukraine at the moment, as well as the issue of the so-called greenness of various types of investments. Ukrainians today need bread, water, work, not ecological problems. The time will come for that. Ukrainians must also be helped to fight corruption. This is a big problem and this country has to deal with it if it wants to be in the European Union in the future. We are talking about big money for Ukraine, about 50 billion euros – that is approx. We're talking about loans, we're talking about grants. I am sure that these will be total subsidies, because Ukraine's GDP is currently –106%. They won't even have anything to pay back the money they borrowed. In view of the above, as a group of European Conservatives and Reformists, we strongly support a thorough analysis of aid to Ukraine and reliable information on how much money and when we have already transferred to Ukraine, because these corruption situations are quite difficult there. Ukraine is fighting, also on behalf of the European Union. We hope that Ukraine will simply win this war and that the European Union will help it in this war. By the way, I would like to mention, of course, not to formulate very unpleasant and untrue information about Ukraine, and about what is happening on the outskirts of Ukraine in general. Elections were held in Poland yesterday. Manfred Weber said forty minutes ago that Donald Tusk won this election. This is not true, ladies and gentlemen, this is such black information. The Citizen Platform, Donald Tusk's party, won 28% of the vote, Law and Justice, the Law and Justice party for today, has now won 38%. If Mr. Weber has any new mathematics, let him implement it in Germany, not in the European Parliament.

Thank you, Damian, for accepting the question. I have this remark: You pay great attention to the right and blame the right for all that is wrong. On the other hand, probably your socialist colleague, a minister of the Danish government a few days ago, said that the European Union needs to be surrounded by a high fence. Why don't you comment on what he said, but keep talking about the right, who is supposed to be guilty of everything? There are politicians from different political groups who have different opinions. And you always start by scaring people in Europe with the right. That's not true. It's not fair. Comment on the statement of the Minister from Denmark.

I listened diligently to your statement and wanted to ask, and I look forward to a short answer: Yes or no, because the first visa investigation was implemented by the Central Anti-Corruption Bureau in July 2022. In March this year, seven people were charged in the case, three people are still in custody today regarding visas. How can you say that there is some inaction in Poland when it comes to this infringement procedure in the case of 270 visas? And my question is this: Have you heard of all this? Did you just come here to talk from the rostrum and attack Poland?

Sir, you're accusing the right of having its own media. Don't you think it would be appropriate here in the European Parliament to rank all the capitals and media owners in the European Union? Why am I asking? Because in Poland more than 50% of the press is in the hands of German capital, and about 70% of television in Poland is foreign capital. So my question is this: Do you not think that we should carefully check what capital and where the media has, in which countries?

There is a revision of the finances, because we are standing in front of the wall. EU leaders cooperated with Putin's Russia, Poland warned about this. And he invaded Ukraine and devastated the European Union, ridiculing its leaders. Everything in the EU was supposed to be ambitious, but it was not real. Stories about the energy transition of the economy were in ruins. Climate policy is ruining the family's budget today, so we have poverty, cold and dark homes. There is an economic flap of the Union, companies are fleeing to the US and England from the European Union. A hastily introduced platform of strategic technologies will not prevent this flap, it is only proof of the flap. Ambitiously, the Union has only become indebted, and to such an extent it wants this debt to be common and almost eternal. The Commission estimates that the budget is devaluing at €74 billion by 2027. The EU wants to divide refugees into better ones, into those who are smuggled to the south of the Union with a subsidy from the EU, from German NGOs. And the Commission does not want to help countries that help Ukrainians, mothers and children from Ukraine who are in these frontline countries. Finally, the Commission says that all countries have to pay interest on debt for recovery plans, but politically the Commission is blocking money for Poland.

You come from the Liberal Party, a very influential party in the European Union. I'd like to hear your opinion. My question is this: In June this year, an article appeared in Brussels, in a think tank, in which one of the professors says that the climate policy pursued by the European Union is, first of all, very expensive and leads to switching off the lights, to a lack of heat, to a lack of power. Do you not sometimes see the connection between this momentum in climate policy and the fact that individual people's wallets are being emptied, that climate policy is ruining the budgets of the poorest inhabitants of the European Union?

Mr President, thank you very much. A very interesting deal. I believe that the modernity of the European Union, of Europe, can be preserved precisely thanks to good relations with the United States. We all need this very much. We need to learn from the misguided policies that the European Commission, the European leaders, have carried out in recent years in linking the Union with Russia – a monstrous mistake that is now avenging itself. So if we combine the economic normality of the European Union with the United States, if we manage to reach this agreement, it will primarily benefit companies, businesses, and that is what it is all about. So I commend the agreement and I believe that we should move in this direction, because tying up with the United States will not harm either business, or the United States, or the European Union, on the contrary.

Thank you very much for agreeing to accept the question. I assess you as a good expert on the European market, as well as on Polish affairs, and I would like to ask briefly: Do you understand the situation of Polish farmers and that the food security we are talking about in Poland can be disrupted by smugglers, by those people who illegally import food into Poland, by speculators, by all those who simply do not understand either the European Union, or the starving people, or the war in Ukraine? Do you agree with the proposal to help? For the European Union to donate this money to transport grain through Poland to Africa? The European Union can afford that 300 million euros.

I listened very carefully to your comments and you said that there are many social issues to be solved in the European Union at the moment. Did you think that this war that is going on in Ukraine is not about society, it is not about children, it is not about mothers, families, refugees? Do you not understand this, just that this war is also a social issue? And this is also a war that is taking place at the border of the European Union. Why are you so convinced that what is happening in Ukraine is not a social issue?

I have a short question for you because you have proposed a solution, namely the creation of this European rescue mission. This is an interesting proposition, only the question for today is this: how to finance such a mission in a situation where the budget of the European Union in the Multiannual Financial Framework for 7 years already lacks money? Commissioner Hahn proposes that Member States contribute €65 billion to this MFF. Where do you think you can get the money for your idea?

We are aware that at the moment companies are fleeing from the European Union to China, to the United States, to the United Kingdom. There they build their campuses, because the tax burden is very high. The solution we are discussing today may benefit the unemployed in the area of agriculture and forestry. These data are already there, and those exclusions that will be, will cause an increase in this matter. Are you not afraid that the introduction of these restrictive solutions will simply bring an unexpected problem, that is, an increase in unemployment, which the European Union will also have to face? So I would like to know your position on this.

–I have a question for you. Because on June 23 this year Greta Thunberg deleted her entry from five years ago, that on June 23 this year there will be annihilation of humanity. She deleted that entry. Do you not think about everything that is said about this climate package, also in light of the fact that we already have information from the Committee on Budgets that next year, 2024, the election year, it is planned to cut 50% of expenditure on payments? In January this year, 100% of the European Union countries asked for full payment subsidies. The Commission is cutting them down. Where'd the money come from? This is my question: Where will you get the money for the purposes we are talking about here today?

In principle, I agree with your statement completely, but I did not have a suggestion of an idea from your side. You are a member of the largest political group in the European Parliament. This group has a powerful influence on what happens to EU money, to the budget of the European Union. The revision of the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF), the budget of the European Union, is currently underway. I would like to know your opinion, your position. Will you work through the group to increase funding for water issues?

I have a question for you because last week in the Committee on Budgets of the European Parliament there were guests from the Bundestag, German parliamentarians and they talked about the huge cost of living in Germany and that it is only now that the average German citizen, as he looks at the electricity bill, gas bill, energy bill, finds out how difficult Germany and the German industry have been. And they also said that they will not add a penny to the European Union in their lives. The question is this: Would you be willing as a member of a very important faction in the European Parliament to slow down the Fit for 55 package process?

You mentioned Poland as the country that washes its hands of refugees. I would like to ask you if you are aware that during the war in Ukraine 12 and a half million refugees from Ukraine - mothers and children - came to Poland? Do you know about this? And you brazenly accuse Poland of rejecting the issue of refugees. That's not the case. Poland and all Poles, and not only Poles, beautifully help mothers and children from Ukraine. And you are accusing us of not wanting to participate in migration policy. Previously, there were refugees from Chechnya in Poland - 100,000 Chechens. Your ignorance presented here in the European Parliament simply harms the European Parliament. Please take note that Poland participates in the migration issue, because over 12 and a half million mothers and children from Ukraine cross Poland.