Speeches

Mr President, as a diplomatic weapon, in addition to being a cyber weapon with devastating effects, the Pegasus software continues to crack down by spying on the devices of some of our colleagues here. Beyond the obvious impediment to respect for privacy, this must lead us to question the passivity with which the European Union approaches the subject of cybersecurity and, more broadly, that of digital technology. Yes, the European Union is very strong when it comes to over-regulating the digital field or restricting freedom of expression on the internet. The implementation a few months ago of the Regulation respecting digital services (Digital Service Act) is here to prove it to us. But as it muzzles its citizens, the European Union seems helpless in the face of the belligerent action of the Israeli company NSO, which is behind the spyware. This double standard reflects all the hypocrisy of the Brussels authorities. In terms of personal data protection, by rightly initiating a commission on the misdeeds of the Pegasus software, we let almost all our data flow across the Atlantic at the same time. Choosing to use US companies such as Microsoft, Amazon or Oracle, in many areas, creates the risk that the US will grab our data and use it as it sees fit because of the extraterritoriality of their right. With the FISA law or the provisions of the Cloud Act, the data managed by these companies can indeed end up in the hands of the United States at the simple request of the national security agencies of the country. While this interference is more subtle, it is no less intrusive than the spyware found in our colleagues’ mobile phones. In the face of cyber threats, it becomes urgent for Europe to ensure its digital security independently in order to safeguard its vital and strategic interests.

Mr President, on Christmas night, while millions of Christians around the world celebrated the birth of a child more than two thousand years ago, another 200 Christians died of this simple adoration. Around the crèche, the ultimate joy of the arrival of life, 200 Nigerians from Plateau State were massacred in the most terrible way. The cause of these killings is not explained, as some have argued, by simple tensions between farmers and Fulani nomads linked to land sharing, against a background of desertification, no. The main motivations lie in the anti-Christian hatred of jihadists. 2023 was another black year for Christian communities. According to various studies, 360 million Christians are now heavily persecuted and discriminated against worldwide. Despite this, we have to fight, including in this Chamber, to get the opportunity to talk about it. And never, never was there a tribute or a solidarity march in Europe to denounce these massacres, which in Africa are permanent. Of course, the necessary respect for Nigeria's sovereignty prevents us from interfering in its internal affairs. However, the Commission has designated Nigeria as a pilot country of the European Union for humanitarian, development and peace-building projects, to address the needs of vulnerable populations. We therefore expect the Commission to direct its action towards greater protection for Christians at risk.

Mr Lagodinsky, I am not a spokesperson for the AfD, I do not know at all whether they were executives or representatives. In the present case, I dare to hope that, if that were the case, they would indeed be ousted and removed from their manu militari party.

Madam President, the European Parliament likes variable geometry indignation. It calls for a necessary fight against anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim hatred, but forgets the first victims in the world because of their faith, namely Christians. We are still waiting for a coordinator responsible for this, as you have called the one against antisemitism and Islamophobia. The European Parliament also likes to give pledges. Even as Israel still mourns its deaths and the atrocities of 7 October led to an explosion of anti-Semitic acts, you put anti-Muslim hatred and the recent outbreak of anti-Semitic violence on the same level. In the name of buying social peace, you are not depriving yourself of a level playing field that is somewhat unworthy. All anti-religious violence and humiliation must be banned. All of them. Only, do not remain blind on the internal movements of certain religions whose precept is the destruction of those who do not think like them. You say you want to lower antisemitism. So stop letting them come to our soil or subsidizing with our money the hatemakers, when they are not the terrorists themselves. The wolf came by your fault into the European sheepfold. Let's chase him. And only in this way will we find a pacification of interreligious life. (The speaker agreed to answer a blue card question)

Mr President, like fakirs, our European Commissioners are marching on the fire of our broken up industries and crushed agriculture. Far from worrying about it, they even advocate a net 90% reduction in our greenhouse gases by 2040. Ten countries, including France, have followed Denmark's lead on this goal. Are you only aware that you are announcing a return to the Middle Ages? How can this be achieved? To give up any mode of motorized transport or to become hunter-gatherers? Will you tell us that international trade and free trade will end? Can you tell us clearly what your roadmap is to achieve this goal, please? And will you also continue to play into the hands of national governments which, like the Macron-Attal government in France, make promises to farmers with one hand, but which, in fact, put everything in your hands and docilely administer this destruction that you are organising? We suspected it, but now we are sure: our farmers will be sacrificed on the altar of your diminishing ideology. Just have the honesty to admit it out of respect for democratic transparency.

Madam President, we are once again caught in this unhealthy vice that is killing our agriculture. On the other hand, we have the apostles of decay, who magnify the Stone Age without taking into account the fact that their ideas kill agronomic science like our farmers in the name of an infallible Mother Nature, totally fantasized. On the other hand, we have the gurus of the wild economy, for whom science is a lever for profits and an excellent means of exerting pressure on the food independence of nations. Yes, this report is ill-tuned and obscure. This is what ANSES has said in France. No precautionary principle, no risk assessment, no transparency for consumers, no protection of conventional or organic crops. What will we have on our plates? We'll never know. Who really wants this text? Farmers? No, it is the seed merchants who, by technical means, will take over our agricultural independence a little more. It becomes vital to get out of this sterile binarity. Let us help science to preserve our agriculture, but let us stand firm on our clear principles of sovereignty and respect for the consumer.

No, that is not my point at all. In the present case, there is no cancellation of contracts drawn up in certain countries. Except that, we are not going to lie, this text just serves to provoke an attack, an offensive, against countries that have freely and sovereignly chosen not to recognize certain unions and especially not to help and "sponsor" the system of surrogacy, which is the case with this text.

Mr President, as there is no area that the European Union does not want to escape from its totalitarian impulses, we are now dealing with the European Certificate of Parenthood. Moreover, these awful terms give the impression that being a parent depends more on administrative compliance than on nature itself. Using the same arguments of apparent benevolence and practicality, each State will have to recognise the parenthood of a national of another Member State – that is to say, it is understood – ‘regardless of the form in which that parenthood takes’. The devil hides in the details, it is said, and the detail here is of size: on the basis of hypothetical cases of children in a situation of legal uncertainty, the Commission invents situations of distress in order to interfere in the family policy of the Member States and impose its ideology. This certificate will require the recognition of the parenthood of same-sex couples who have used medically assisted reproduction, while some European countries have freely chosen not to recognize this parentage. Even more serious is the practical recognition of filiation after surrogacy, i.e., as a reminder, renting a woman’s belly to produce a life acquired by contract and scheduling the abandonment of a child from conception. A terrible regression, which is none other than the commodification of human bodies. Human rights, EU law, state sovereignty: nothing frightens the compressor roller of this divine law commission. With this legislation, member countries may be led to recognise more rights for families formed outside their borders than for their own families, or even to recognise multi-parenting. Let's not fool ourselves: a clear offensive is being carried out by the European Union against Poland and Hungary, which have sovereignly made parenthood a fundamental issue. Moreover, it is always surprising that the European Union is doing so, with such energy, to threaten and trap its own members. This raises the question whether, in substance, on this issue as on others, unity is less important than ideological victory, an ideology that too often develops, all the same, here, against the rights of women and children – is the most vulnerable. (The speaker agreed to answer a blue card question)

Madam President, after imposing the digital certificate of vaccination against COVID-19, the European Union is back by the big door to interfere in the sovereign competences of states – health, in this case. The European Health Data Space marks Brussels’ growing desire to establish itself as a superstate vis-à-vis European nations. Do we really want the European Union to look after the health of Europeans as it does the rest, i.e. as a totalitarian hyperstructure? In addition to being part of the digital identity portfolio, this liberticide project will capture the health data of Europeans for the benefit of Microsoft. Digital sovereignty therefore takes a hit, and with it your ability not to constantly submit to GAFAM and their depredations. You are flouting the interests of European citizens, and worse: you do not prevent private actors such as banks or insurance companies from using our data. Whatever the consent of Europeans, they must give their all to be better controlled. We reject this liberticide drift, which is an attack on states and individuals. No, the European Union is not an empire. No, the freedom of Europeans is not negotiable. No, Europe is not for sale in the United States.

Mr President, on 4 August 2023, in Cherbourg, Oumar N., who had already been convicted of sexual violence, including one on his 12-year-old sister, entered Mégane’s house to beat and rape her with a broomstick. Perforation of the colon, small intestine, peritoneum, diaphragm, pneumothorax, fractures at the ribs and high risk of septic shock. The abuse was such that the caregivers were shocked and in tears. On 14 October 2023, in Argenteuil, Samir B. broke into the rooms of women aged 93 and 95 and sexually assaulted them. Already known to the police for similar facts, he is released 48 hours after the facts. Both women died shortly after the violence. Here are two images of the mosaic of daily horrors that European women experience. A special feature is that we are taking steps in horror. The aggressors no longer just want to enjoy, they want to destroy, and dirty. These are not miscellaneous facts. What is different, banal, is your cowardice. The cowardice of not acknowledging that immigration has contributed significantly to the 170% increase in sexual violence in ten years. The culprits are those rapists, but the culprits are you! You are the one who sees immigration as an election manna or cheap labour. You who refuse to see the extent of the hatred of some and who make them come with great support from laws, NGOs and subsidies. You who encourage this submersion, you bear a responsibility. So if you want violence against women to decrease, have the courage to stop these human flows gangrene by inhumane elements, whose violence is matched only by the contempt they have for us women.

Madam President, hell is paved with good intentions, and so is this regulation. While the objective of reducing pesticides is laudable, the fact remains that achieving it poses significant scientific and social challenges. Noting the failure of a previous directive, the European Commissioners set constraints by proposing a regulation to reduce pesticides by 50% by 2030. These numbers came out of nowhere, without any justification. This 50% decrease will be compared to the average consumption of the years 2011-2013. Since 2011, the consumption of pesticides has increased. So imposing so many constraints so quickly will not work without causing huge problems, especially in the agricultural world already greatly affected by your standards. Funding for the search for alternatives is also very insufficient, and the question of implementation will also arise. Will we review the tolerances for imported coffee and tea, or will they be banned? Will quotas be established for pesticide consumption per farmer, still sovietizing the agricultural market? Again, we deal with eco-friendly fads without any sense of reality or scientific basis.

Mr President, it is gratifying that the European Union is deciding on a strategy to protect our protein supplies. Finally, relocation is in the spotlight! Let us hope that European policies will bend to this new situation, namely: stop multiplying free trade treaties with the whole planet, which overwhelm us with lower quality and low cost agricultural products and suffocate our agriculture. Or also: to put an end to this rengain on the reduction of livestock and the cessation of meat consumption, which is only the killing of our farmers and millennial pastoralism in Europe. Also, how dare you, the left, ask for a decrease in the consumption of animal proteins? In France, the excess mortality of farmers by suicide is 28% compared to the general population, and it amounts to 127% – 127%! – for cattle farmers. Your amendment is a disgrace, a spit on the grave of herders and on the face of their orphans. You have accustomed us to indecency by your diminishing ideology, but do not try, by your undermining amendments, to drag us with you into abjectness.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, we are all aware of the financial impact of the energy transition on the key sectors of our European industries. The transport industry is undoubtedly the sector that is being asked to do the most to reduce carbon emissions today. Despite a clear desire to develop alternative energies, the European Commission's delegated act on the taxonomy for the financing of green energy takes into account only electric energy in the field of transport. This is totally disloyal compared to research and development investments and the efforts made by European manufacturers to find less polluting solutions, especially in sectors where the "all-electric" is embryonic, if not impossible at the moment. In aviation, the use of hydrogen-based alternative fuels, which are four to eight times more expensive than conventional kerosene, is now mandatory. In shipping, some have spontaneously invested in natural gas. In view of the efforts made, why prevent these sectors from being able to meet the criteria of the taxonomy for green financing? This text, which the Commission deliberately limited, will also result in higher production and operating costs for consumers. Let us not close the doors to new solutions or condemn in advance technical progress that will reduce our industrial and commercial pollution. Do we not have a political responsibility in building our industrial and environmental future? Yes! It is for this reason that my group has tabled this objection, which seeks a much more accurate recognition of the contribution of alternative fuels to the fight against global warming, in the same way as electric energy. They must therefore be taken into account in the new criteria set by the Commission for European green funding. We therefore ask you to support this objection.

Mr President, in a world where fresh water accounts for only 3% of the world stock, where the least optimistic forecasts estimate that the flow of rivers in the Paris region or in the French South-West, for example, could fall by 50%, it is becoming necessary to worry about this essential element for all life on Earth. As such, Europe, in its entirety, must recognise the universal nature of water in order to extract it from the speculative logics of pre-emption by NGOs or privatisation. This means that waste must also be tackled. First, there is an urgent need to repair the damage to the supply structures, some of which may lose 40% of their water, as is the case in Martinique. The work is colossal but necessary: The population cannot be forced into sobriety if the pipes leak. It is also time to involve agriculture and industry, without fines or constraints: automatically integrate rainwater harvesting systems in construction sites, develop wastewater reprocessing systems, provide foam taps in plumbing and seize the CAP, finally, to open a line dedicated to the protection of our water resources. Indeed, we need to encourage, including financially, reforestation and replanting of hedges to combat soil drying and sealing. "On a cosmic scale, liquid water is rarer than gold," said the late Hubert Reeves. It is up to us to guarantee, today and tomorrow, this blue gold to all European nations.

Madam President, if, according to Talleyrand’s famous reflection, ‘everything that is excessive is insignificant’, the fact remains that we must rightly be concerned about the rise of extremist propaganda speeches that threaten the stability and civil peace of our European democracies. But once again, the target must not be mistaken and the EU institutions would be well advised not to play firefighters. Indeed, we are witnessing an accelerated and genuinely delusional criminalisation of Europeans who, on the pretext that they intend to defend their identity, culture, values, social protection, environment, security and the sovereignty of their country, are now accused of extremism, and are sometimes silenced by discriminatory and liberticidal measures. In short, if we decipher the title of this debate session, the problem would be that political groups that do not correspond to the ideological norms of a small European elite, which is becoming smaller and more and more decried by the peoples, are not immediately thrown into the camp of evil. I do not believe that in this House, fortunately, there is room for racist or anti-Semitic discourse. And those who are afraid for their term next June, rather than calling their opponents extremists as easily, would do better to question their policies, which have inflated the ranks of the bearers of misfortune and violence. If some teachers can no longer address the Holocaust in class, it is not because of the extreme left or the extreme right, but because of extreme collusion with populations from countries with beliefs and visions that are often hostile to Jews, Christians and, more generally, Westerners. How many times have the European institutions funded and promoted openly anti-national and Islamist associations and NGOs, structures led by foreign powers and whose ultimate aim is to crack our social pact and European civilization? I therefore invite the great consciences who have initiated this debate on the fight against this normalisation of discourse to sweep their doors. For many of them, they have contributed to the spread of a totalitarian and deadly ideology, without ever accusing the real culprits.

Madam President, the European Union has a strange tendency to deplore the situations to which it contributes through its policies. We are worried today about the extreme temperatures that workers experience, but less than 24 hours ago, the European Union signed a free trade agreement with New Zealand, an agreement that is expected to lead to a 30% increase in trade with one of the most distant countries in the European Union. Without being a guess or a climatologist, we can say that this kind of decision is lamentable from the point of view of the carbon balance which should mechanically inflate, in addition to being a criminal decision vis-à-vis European agricultural jobs. As long as the EU practises the religion of global free trade, its choices in large-scale environmental policy will be sabotaged. As long as the European Union encourages the concentration of individuals and the mechanical concretisation of this necessarily urban concentration, we will not stop fanning thermometers. We can and must reforest. We can and must slow down the flow of rainwater to the seas and oceans. But what use if our countries are only rural deserts punctuated by furnace metropolises? If we do not break with this logic of crowding or urban sprawl that degrades the quality of life of Europeans, impoverishes the soil, is unable to retain rainwater, causes flooding or raises mercury, we will only make cautères on a wooden leg. Wanting to cover Europe with business districts such as defence or Bankenviertel or industrial and commercial areas made up of sheet metal cubes acting as offices and shops where strolling will always condemn workers exposed to high temperatures. We therefore have on the agenda a subject to give environmental pledges. But, basically, nothing will change, because you do not want to change the philosophy of this union. Long live 2024!

Madam President, Article 4 of the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings states that trafficking in persons ‘means the recruitment, transport, transfer, accommodation or reception of persons, by threat or use of force’ or any other coercion such as abduction, abuse of a situation of vulnerability or by offering or accepting payments or benefits. Exploitation includes the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or slavery-like practices. The consent of a victim of trafficking in persons does not matter when one of the stated means has been used. What is pregnancy for others? GPA is the contracting of a human life, here of a baby, at a cost ranging from $10,000 to $100,000, after a sorting process that is none other than eugenics. Is the woman reduced to an incubator, to an object, which is often stored, particularly in Asia, on baby farms, for the time of gestation, after promises of compensation equivalent to three to ten years’ salary? In light of the texts and our ethics, it is clear that surrogacy is human trafficking. Those who use it are therefore traffickers, in the same way as pimps or slave traders. Everyone who operates in the surrogacy market breaks with any humanist or feminist value. They exploit women’s bodies, their economic or psychological misery, to make a child a marketable good. Our legal system cannot endorse this despicable trade and cannot make life easier for those who are nothing but traffickers. Because yes, imagining a European parenthood certificate, in addition to being a legislative hold-up on national rights, is the way to organise these trafficking of children from surrogacy. Just because some people are holding European law hostage, and obviously our natural empathy for babies, does not mean that we have to give in to our fundamental principles of respect for women and children. The future of the world lies here, in our women's wombs. That is why, in the name of our humanity, neither the market, nor rights-of-way, nor trafficking have a place in our bodies – neither in fact nor in law, ever. Article 35 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly states that States Parties shall take all appropriate national, bilateral and multilateral measures to prevent the abduction, sale or trafficking of children, for any purpose or in any form. So the European Union must now take a firm decision: Is it on the side of human dignity, here of women and children, or is it on the side of traffickers?

Mr President, between palm oil, soybeans and beef, EU imports account for 16% of global trade-related deforestation. The result? We are the second responsible for the destruction of tropical forests in the world. To give an image, the area of soybean crops affected by these imports reaches the area of France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands combined. The deforestation regulation that you are presenting here is a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, it runs into huge contradictions and serves as a sex mask for the European Commission's nefarious activity in the field of ecology. Indeed, for years, the European Union has multiplied trade agreements with countries around the world against environmental interests. How can we not think, for example, of the one with Mercosur that, in addition to killing our economy and our farmers, will accelerate deforestation in South American countries? Faced with this threat, we must categorically reject all these destructive market logics of peoples, natural resources and the wider environment. In return, Europe must preserve forests by ensuring sustainable use, thereby ensuring the sustainability of all natural ecosystems.

In this case, death threats are made against people who speak like me. In the present case, today, J.K. Rowling and Dora Moutot. Yes, death threats, ma'am. So we may not be going to reverse the accusatory burden, because in this case, the people who are threatened are just those who say that a woman is a woman and a man is a man.

Madam President, this quote from Simone de Beauvoir, 'We are not born a woman, we become one', has long guided feminist activism. However, it is a decoy that breaks out in the open of violence against women who refuse to be monkeyed or denied. For the reality is this: you are a woman and you assume it or not. Feminist militancy is plagued by the smoky concept of convergence of struggles. This idea that all minorities, because minorities, have common interests, regardless of whether the objectives are contradictory. Yet it is from these contradictions that feminist activism is dying. The convergence of struggles explodes in the collision of struggles. Indeed, which feminist can walk alongside Islamists who want to make women's bodies invisible? Which feminist can accept surrogacy, which is none other than renting a uterus? Which lawyer can plead for a rapist in transition to join a women’s prison? Which sportswoman can celebrate the victories of transsexuals sweeping all the chances of competitors? Which pubesity may not laugh at men’s menstruation and pregnancy? The fractures of activism are gaping and numerous. And worse, they now generate death threats, such as against J.K. Rowling or Dora Moutot. So yes, let’s say it again, we’re a woman and we assume it, or not. (The speaker agreed to respond to a blue card intervention)

Mr President, this text symbolically marks the end of globalisation, which is supposed to be happy, but which in reality has only compartmentalised the world into zones: industrial production areas, consumption areas, service areas and trash areas. Asia, legitimately asking for more respect and respect, has returned European and American waste, making it necessary to review our economic and ecological model, which is at least wobbly and unfair. The waste trade market represents more than €80 billion, with 182 million tonnes traded worldwide. Waste that, for the most part, is sent to poor or developing countries, where recycling conditions are not guaranteed, where workers' rights are violated, where traffickers and operators of all kinds are rife. This waste often ends up buried or dumped into the sea, further exacerbating the pollution of our oceans. They are transported by container ships, which are responsible for a large proportion of greenhouse gas emissions. This is the reality of waste shipments and of a world without borders that go as far as absurd. Because yes, it is absurd to find French milk bricks on the other side of the world, German batteries or used Spanish cartons, when we advocate a virtuous ecology over time and COP. Free trade and the free movement of goods without hindrance or reflection have come up against their gigantic trash can, and that is a good thing. At the foot of the wall, let’s organise the relocation of an activity that is fundamental to our future: recycling. By restricting exports, this text acknowledges the need to curb globalisation, strengthen our European industries and foster the circular economy and short supply chains, which we have always defended against you. Let us hope that the European Union becomes aware of the urgency of these relocations to respond to the industrial and climate emergency we are experiencing.

Madam President, the protection of all minorities, whether ethnic, national, religious or linguistic, is fundamental. I note, however, that there are more majority minorities than others on the media-political agenda. This prioritization is unacceptable. There is a lot of talk about Uighurs or Rohingyas, rightly so; But why, then, do we systematically ignore the Christian minorities, whose members are the ones who suffer the most violence in the world? Expulsion of Afghan Christians by the Taliban, attempted murder of Christian refugees by Muslims on migrant boats, purification of Christian Serbs in Kosovo, or repression of Armenians. The list is still long, alas! Sixteen Christians are killed every day. Here's the record. Meanwhile, the European Parliament is preventing a debate on the massacre of a Nigerian woman killed a few months ago, when the Commission took more than a year to appoint a special envoy for religious freedom. When it comes to protecting minorities, it is imperative to remain impartial and not make a deal based on the political interests of the moment.

Madam President, this commemorative EU-ASEAN summit is based on, I quote, 'common values and principles, effective multilateralism and free trade'. The European Union could have been satisfied with the last term, because in reality, its action is motivated only for and by the market – a market that, unfortunately, is caught in the savagery of free trade, destroying our industries and our agriculture in favour of a logic of low costs and immediate gains. The only common value is that of the container ship, on a path contrary to your wishes to defend the environment. Of course, you promote your purely commercial exchanges by advocating cooperative work on human rights. In truth, these are flouted in many countries with which we trade and which ignore your shy and often hypocritical rodomontades. Business first. Nevertheless, it is imperative that we have balanced diplomatic relations with the ASEAN countries in order to break the face-to-face relationship between the Chinese bloc and the US bloc. But is there only such a balancing power as the European Union? Apart from the fact that you do not have a mandate to exercise it, our national sovereignties, which are the basis for it, have been lowered and replaced by a European impotence, which is illustrated in particular by our subservience to Washington, which also reduces the diplomatic relations that we could develop with other countries in the world, including those in South-East Asia.

Madam President, for decades the European Union has been striving to establish and promote free trade and globalisation. For this, it has multiplied the free trade treaties, which have been constantly impoverishing our agriculture and breaking up our industry. The impoverishment of our campaigns, which have been abandoned in favour of the start-up nation, in the words of our French President, is a direct consequence of this. On the world market, French or European agricultural and industrial products are no longer competitive. That is why our campaigns have been abandoned in favour of major cities. The findings are as follows: desertification of rural areas, catastrophic demography, closure of public services and persistence of white areas. However, these are realities largely attributable to EU policy. And what does it propose to remedy it? A rural pact, a rural test and a European rural observatory. But what are these terms? Rural Europeans are not laboratory rats that have to undergo tests and other observations. In addition, the CAP and the EAFRD exist for this purpose. I therefore infer that they do not work, since the Commission is proposing a new pact. Moreover, at a time when Mr Macron is planning to settle entire populations of migrants in our neglected countryside, the Commission is seriously considering basing its policy on, I quote, ‘inclusive communities of intergenerational solidarity, fairness and renewal, open to newcomers and promoting equal opportunities for all’. They're chimeras. In order to develop a healthy vision of rural areas, the European Union should question the ultra-liberalism and globalism that characterise it, in favour of smart protectionism and the relocation of activities in rural areas.

Madam President, there is a certain irony in advocating for more and more of the European Union when, precisely, the European Union has proved that it is unfit to do better on certain subjects, in particular the COVID-19 and health crisis. Do not displease, in the context of the COVID-19 crisis, the most appropriate, quickest and most effective responses have been community-based solutions. To want to preempt a subject that belongs only to sovereign states in order to be even more awkward, ever more distant from patients and above all less transparent, as during the COVID-19 crisis – which resulted in an oversized order for vaccines, negotiated under conditions to which even MEPs could not have access – is thus a matter of hubris. You care about serious cross-border health threats: start by re-establishing borders – this is a first prevention – and make sure that the European Union does not spend its time relocating the pharmaceutical industry. Indeed, how can we not worry that 80% of the active ingredients in our medicines come from India or China? Let the states manage their health systems and instead make the European Union a tool to strengthen our drug independence and these agencies joint research hubs whose aim is to create, move forward together, not to split the Member States.