Speeches

Mr President, rapporteur, the European Parliament has been calling for years for the creation of a statute at European level for associations and NGOs in order to ensure mutual recognition between Member States and to facilitate the cross-border work of such associations. To this day there are still major complications in recognising the activities of international associations and this is particularly serious in cross-border regions, as is the case in my country, Euskal Herria. As stated in the opinion of the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, it is precisely in cross-border regions and Euroregions that associations and organisations play a very important role in facilitating work around the interests of which civil society is a participant. And, in addition, there are more and more associations and NGOs that defend the public interest and face different economic, social or environmental challenges, among others, and that operate across borders in the midst of natural communities. But, despite this, they continue to face legal and fiscal obstacles. I would also like to draw attention to the announced reform of the Schengen area, because it can be an obstacle to cross-border community life and specifically to the real functioning of associations working on both sides of the border.

Mr President, Mr Vice-President of the Commission, I would like to begin my speech in line with what one of the honourable Members has said and, once again, to denounce the excessive political hand of the chairman of the Committee on Petitions, who repeatedly acts outside the impartiality that he is supposed to have, as we have been denouncing different Members of Parliament. The agreed text reflects the work done by the Committee on Petitions in 2020, but at the same time public ignorance about the scope of the right to petition is well known; The Committee on Petitions must therefore adopt a more proactive approach and a stronger communication strategy. I would like to express my concern, as a member of the Conference on the Future of Europe, at the diluted version of citizen participation being offered: a golden opportunity is being missed to launch a real bottom-up process to provide greater citizen adherence to the European project. Finally, I would like to say that we welcome the inclusion in the text of the need for the European Citizens' Initiative to be a much more dynamic and attractive mechanism for groups and citizens in general. The stateless nations of Europe also have the need to establish a European framework for the free and guaranteed exercise of the right to decide, the need for a mechanism of clarity at European level, as we presented a number of Members last October.

Mr President, since data on violence against women began to be collected in 2003, 112 women, 11 minors, have been murdered in Euskal Herria. Behind this unacceptable number are names and stocks, stolen life projects. We especially want to remember Erika Tavares, Conchi González, Aintzane Pujana, María Pilar Berrio and the 75-year-old neighbor of Biarritz who have been murdered throughout 2021 in Euskal Herria. To address this we need clear tools and commitments, and one of them is the Istanbul Convention, a tool that opened the perspective of what sexist violence is and demanded clear commitments and responses from States, with measures of truth, justice, reparation and guarantees of non-repetition. As other previous colleagues have already said, to date only 21 Member States have ratified the Convention and the Union has not yet done so as such. We urgently call on the European Union to ratify the Istanbul Convention and to put it on the Council's agenda. We know that homes are not safe for many women, just as States and institutions are not safe if they do not take care of agreements like these. I want to end by thanking the feminist movement for the tireless work of awareness and action. If we are here today, it is evidently because they continue to lead the way.

Mr President, I’d like to thank the rapporteur and the whole team that have been working on this file. We have achieved an ambitious report. The current European Union framework places too much emphasis on high-skilled workers and not enough on middle- and lower-skilled workers and pathways of labour mobility for migrants of all skill levels are crucial. However, we believe it’s time to stop seeing labour migration only as a solution to current socioeconomic problems based only on the immediate needs of employers. We must understand this in a broader system which takes into account a number of criteria. Also, in the case of asylum seekers and undocumented workers, they must have access to employment and the same labour rights, ensuring swift action to regularise their status and prevent exploitation at their place of work. Creating safe and legal pathways is the only way to reduce reliance on unsafe and irregular routes. It’s essential to protect and prioritise vulnerable groups such as children, women and LGBTIQ persons, as it is these groups who suffer the most. We need real, actual and ambitious policies to make the Union strong and a place where human rights matter.

Mr President, first of all, I would like to congratulate the rapporteur, Mrs Šojdrová, and all the shadow rapporteurs, because we have achieved a good text that fits with the debate that, at least in the Basque Country, is taking place on the necessary educational innovation and pedagogical transformation, with ambitious proposals such as universal accessibility to education and the importance of face-to-face education beyond virtual tools; It must be said that the massive use of digital education during the pandemic has highlighted significant inequalities in the most disadvantaged social sectors. We also welcome the fact that at least 10% of the recovery funds and the 2021-2027 multiannual financial framework are earmarked for education programmes as an important aspect of recovery measures and as part of measures to combat climate change and the rise of the far right and authoritarianism. And also the need for higher education diplomas, including vocational qualifications, to be recognised throughout the Union. There is also some shadow: the text is not ambitious. In investing in education we have fallen far short of the 6% of GDP proposed above and we miss the fact that minority and co-official languages have not been taken into account in the text. They are vehicular languages in education - in much of my country, for example, 70% of students choose Basque as a vehicular language - and we think they should not be ignored by the European Education Area.

Madam President, we are experiencing a dramatic increase in electricity prices; In the Basque Country we have seen public outages and mobilizations because this is an issue that affects the most modest economies in a brutal way, and the measures that the Commission has presented to us are not aimed at lowering the price of energy, but at alleviating its effects on the domestic bill, and there they remain. With crazy prices, the European Commission still does not question the marginalist price model that causes this price escalation, a model that causes us to pay the megawatt hour at current prices, regardless of whether energy generation comes from renewable sources, much cheaper. Abandoning VAT is by no means a solution; Lowering the taxation of electricity is a disaster that doubles down on the social coverage of European families. A couple of weeks ago, 19 Members of Parliament sent a letter to Vice-President Timmermans and Commissioner Simson reminding them that Member States do have legal tools to intervene in the price of energy in emergency situations such as the current one, and therefore, in view of the next European Council, public administrations must again be required to get involved, increase their participation in electricity and ensure supply to all citizens at bearable prices. The inefficiencies of a market model of the last century, which no longer responds to the reality of the 21st century, are more than noticeable and can no longer be endured. The changes planned for 2030 must be prepared to move towards the energy transition, and this situation does not put us on the right track; We must now talk seriously about a change in the production model.

Mr President, Poland is a State of the Union that no longer maintains minimum guarantees to preserve the separation of powers: courts are politically influenced, gender and LGBTI rights are systematically violated and the state of emergency has even been used to prevent the flow of migrants by flouting European asylum law. The judgment of 7 October this year denies the rule of law of the Union and is a very dangerous precedent for the coherence of European Union legislation. The use of judicial systems for political purposes is completely deplorable: This is the case in Poland and other states, such as Spain, where the renewal of the General Council of the Judiciary is currently paralysed by its partisan mediatisation. The Commission and the Council could have acted better and more effectively: the Council should already prioritise the rule of law crisis in Poland and declare that there is a serious risk of violation of Article 7, and the Commission should launch an infringement procedure in relation to the legislation on the Polish Constitutional Court, and so we ask you, Mrs von der Leyen, to activate the Rule of Law Conditionality Regulation.

Madam President, first of all, I would like to thank Malin Björk, who is a colleague of the Left Group, and Diana Riba, a fellow candidate in Now Republics, for the great work done with this report. Gender-based violence is one of the largest human rights violations in history, which lies in the patriarchal structure of societies and gender stereotypes and must be totally eradicated in order to speak of equality. In recent years, cases of violence have increased, and we must not forget that COVID-19 has significantly increased the number of attacks. Thanks to the feminist movement, equality and gender-based violence are in the spotlight, paying special attention, in addition, to disabled migrant women from minority groups and other vulnerable groups, from a multisectoral approach. I would also like to underline that gender-based violence manifests itself in many ways and that lack of access to sexual and reproductive health is also violence against women. We must continue to denounce each and every one of these aggressions. It is vital that gender-based violence is included in the list of European crimes to tackle it together in the European Union, because gender-based violence is also a pandemic.

–Mr President, Commissioner, first of all, I would like to thank the rapporteur, Javier Moreno, and his team for the work they have done on the revision of the Blue Card Directive, as well as all the groups that have worked together to reach this result after so many years. The objective was to achieve a more attractive blue card and, although trilogues have not been easy, we have managed to consider positive elements, such as faster procedures when we talk about intra-union mobility and family reunification or more favourable periods of unemployment in terms of long-term residence, conditions that are in fact more favourable for the applicant. These are the points that we consider to be the added value of the revision of the instrument. However, we would have liked to have considered issues such as extending the list of skills, opening more categories or that the points mentioned above, such as long-term residence or the period of unemployment, were even more favorable for the applicant, to really have achieved an even more attractive tool. In short, our view is that the result achieved is satisfactory, but we must not forget that it only includes highly qualified groups, and we think that further work is needed to ensure that the Union also provides entry routes for low- and medium-skilled workers, as already proposed in the report on illegal immigration. In conclusion, I would like to say that we must bear in mind that the situation in Afghanistan is going to cause a new migratory flow to the Union, which, in our opinion, should address, among other urgent measures, the creation of legal and safe pathways for the most vulnerable groups. Today we are successfully taking a small step that should be part of a European migration policy that respects human rights. It must be said, once again, that this is not the case with the Pact on Migration and Asylum proposed to us by the European Commission.

Mr President, Commissioner, aeronautics is a strategic sector of the Union with more than 600 000 direct jobs. Aircraft manufacturers have been affected by the cancellation of deliveries and, in the Basque Country alone, 600 workers have lost their jobs. 20% of the sector has disappeared due to redundancies in Aernnova, ITP, Alestis, Aciturri and Lauak, and this puts the European Commission in need of action. A resolute defence of employment in the sector and its future is necessary, because the redundancies related to the pandemic are not acceptable. We are talking about an absolutely circumstantial situation. And we must protect the sector from relocations, as a result of the large sales operations that are taking place in the context of the loss of value of some companies. The Union cannot facilitate the creation of an opportunistic concentration in response to the outbreak of the pandemic. And, finally, the great challenge of the aeronautics sector also passes, in this case, by the ecological transition. As is being done, more or less correctly, in the automotive sector, the aeronautics sector needs a public plan to match the objectives of the Green Deal and thus protect the employment of thousands of workers as a matter of priority.

Madam President, for those of us who defend the role of the emerging states in the construction of Europe, Slovenia has been an unavoidable reference of a democratic, non-violent and successful process since that December 1991 in which it achieved its independence. Those of us who aspire, like the Basques, to have our own state in Europe believe that independence is the best way to achieve social justice for all our citizens. Today I must say with frustration that, thirty years later, Slovenia has embarked on a dangerous path that leads it to autocracy through xenophobic and anti-European discourses and practices, attacks on the rule of law and the separation of powers, the elimination of fundamental rights under the excuse of the pandemic, control of the media, a police state and the persecution of legal political parties, as we also knew in the Basque Country. His anti-migration policy against the right of asylum and hot returns would embarrass all Slovenians who found a new life in the United States or Argentina fleeing political repression and hunger. We are only going to ask you to protect human rights and civil and political rights in Slovenia, and to restore to your country the international prestige of a people who managed to be free thirty years ago, Mr Janša.