What Clare spoke about.

20 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Union certification framework for carbon removals

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Mr President, what we risk doing with this EU certification process for carbon removals is creating a system that actually promotes greenwashing, instead of actually stopping it. I mean, of course, we need to ban offsets – grand – but there is another problem. If we call everything we like a carbon removal and given an EU certificate of approval, then we will end up with a certification process th…

20 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Common rules promoting the repair of goods

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Mr President, (start of speech off mic) ... really was a neoliberal dream: produce something, make sure it doesn’t last, and then force the person to buy it all over again, and on and on it goes. But this way of living has no future. Global waste is due to grow by 70% at today’s levels by 2050 unless we act urgently. And where is it all going? To places like Toxic City in Ghana, a former wetland t…

20 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Framework of measures for strengthening Europe’s net-zero technology products manufacturing ecosystem (Net Zero Industry Act) (debate)

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Madam President, the Net Zero Industry Act is presented as Europe’s answer to the Inflation Reduction Act, the USD 360 billion so-called clean-technology investment initiative launched by the US last year, which completely caught the EU off guard, enacted as it was when Europe was on its knees from the repercussions and the energy crisis triggered by the sanctions on Russia, and raising the prospe…

20 Nov

2023

EN Speech

UN Climate Change Conference 2023 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (COP28) (debate)

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Madam President, I think many people will be watching the news about COP28 and wondering what’s the actual point of it, not just because of where it is, but because year on year we fail to act. Of course there needs to be a dedicated space for multilateralism, but COP isn’t working, and one of the key reasons for that is that the Global North has failed in its responsibility towards those areas of…

20 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Children first - strengthening the Child Guarantee, two years on from its adoption - Reducing inequalities and promoting social inclusion in times of crisis for children and their families (joint debate – International Day of the Rights of the Child)

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Madam President, it’s World Children’s Day, the day when we commemorate the signing of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child – the most widely ratified human-rights treaty ever; the world united around the protection of children. Well, aren’t we great? It’s about time that we wake up and smell the white phosphorus, the burning flesh of children torched alive in Gaza. Wake up and hear their …

9 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Strengthening the right to participate: legitimacy and resilience of electoral processes in illiberal political systems and authoritarian regimes (A9-0323/2023 - Nacho Sánchez Amor)

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Madam President, I voted against this file. Promoting the right to participate is obviously a noble goal, but this report twists it into an excuse to pretend that we are somehow in charge to sit in judgement of global south elections and interfere if we don’t like the results. And to be honest with you, after the last month, I am finding it difficult to understand why anybody would think that the …

9 Nov

2023

EN Speech

System of own resources of the European Union (A9-0295/2023 - José Manuel Fernandes, Valérie Hayer)

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Madam President, I voted for this report because, in principle, I do not have a huge problem with the EU raising money through things like taxing corporate profits because somebody has to and, God knows, Member States like my own certainly are not going to do it. But there is an elephant in the room, and that is the question of why the EU needs to raise all this money for itself. It just got a EUR…

8 Nov

2023

EN Speech

One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

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Madam President, we need to talk about Israel. Joe Biden says that if Israel didn’t exist, the US would have to invent it – and he’s right. It’s a rogue state, vested in ensuring instability in the region and US geopolitical goals. And the result of this? In the last month, it’s bombed Palestine, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria – all the while claiming it’s the victim. It has occupied parts of these countri…

8 Nov

2023

EN Speech

State of the Energy Union (debate)

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Mr President, every year that passes brings us closer to the deadline set by the Paris Agreement necessary to limit the climate catastrophe. And yet a new study has shown that the carbon budget today is less than half of what we thought it was in 2020. So if we continue at the present emissions rates, we have only six years to remain within the 1.5 degree limit, and it is fossil fuels that are at …

8 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Conclusions of the European Council meeting of 26-27 October 2023 - Humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the need for a humanitarian pause (joint debate - Conclusions of the European Council and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the need for a humanitarian pause)

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Madam President, a month has elapsed since the commencement of the unrelenting mass murder of Palestinians in Gaza. It’s not a spiral of violence, Frau von der Leyen. It’s genocide! Openly declared and carried out by the apartheid State of Israel. Starvation, bombing hospitals, ambulances, journalists, humanitarian routes: 10 000 dead, 1 in 200 Gazans killed. A Palestinian child slaughtered every …

19 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Rule of Law in Malta: 6 years after the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia and the need to protect journalists (B9-0449/2023)

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Mr President, I voted for this motion. We have resolved to never forget Daphne Caruana Galizia for her exceptional journalism, holding those in power to account, brutally murdered six years ago in a car bomb explosion in Malta. The token of our commitment to protect the freedom of journalism is a vital component of democracy. But as far as I’m concerned, it’s undermined by a refusal of a majority …

19 Oct

2023

EN Speech

The despicable terrorist attacks by Hamas against Israel, Israel’s right to defend itself in line with humanitarian and international law and the humanitarian situation in Gaza (RC-B9-0436/2023, B9-0436/2023, B9-0438/2023, B9-0442/2023, B9-0444/2023, B9-0445/2023, B9-0447/2023, B9-0448/2023)

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Mr President, I voted against this motion. After a week of horror in Gaza and the EU diving in headfirst, draping our Parliament in the Israeli flag, aiding and abetting in war crimes, including the bombing of a hospital and still we find it impossible to say that Palestinian lives matter. We’re still privileging one category of victims over another. We talk about the humanitarian situation in Gaz…

19 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Commission proposal for a Council recommendation on developing social economy framework conditions (debate)

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Mr President, there are 2.8 million social economy enterprises in the EU, employing over 13 million people, or 6% of the workforce. The Belgian film Le Ballai Libéré tells the story of a group of cleaning ladies in the Catholic University of Louvain who set up their cooperative and we’re going to be showing that in the European Parliament in the coming weeks. I really hope that colleagues come out…

19 Oct

2023

EN Speech

European Citizens' Initiative 'Fur Free Europe' (debate)

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Madam President, every year, millions of animals are bred and killed in the EU for fur, the main species obviously being mink, foxes and raccoon dogs. The whole idea is so utterly repulsive and hard for so many citizens to understand. This is wanton cruelty. There is no basis for it whatsoever. This initiative has massive support across all Member States for a European ban on the farming and killi…

18 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Fighting disinformation and dissemination of illegal content in the context of the Digital Services Act and in times of conflict (debate)

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Mr President, for years, we have been warning of the dangers of a massive EU power grab over public discourse in our societies. There is disinformation, it is a problem, but the European Union is the last institution that should be deciding what’s true and what’s false. Political culture here is so intolerant that anything that contradicts the official narrative is vilified as disinformation. It i…

18 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Outcome of the SDGs Summit (18-19 September 2023, New York) – transformative and accelerated actions leading up to 2030 and beyond (debate)

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Madam President, there is no sustainable development without peace. Apart from climate change, war is undoubtedly the biggest threat to our human development and that’s why we have Sustainable Development Goal 16: promoting peaceful societies. We know that the SDG Summit in September showed the world how far off we are from achieving the goals, but in terms of peace, we’re absolutely plummeting. B…

17 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Water scarcity and structural investments in access to water in the EU (debate)

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Mr President, Article 16 of the Drinking Water Directive is the EU’s response to the European citizens’ initiative on the right to water. And I think, read it and you’ll see that there’s no way that this article can be considered a sufficient response to the demands of the first successful European citizens’ initiative in this area. I mean, Article 16 is essentially the bare minimum obligation to …

17 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Effectiveness of the EU sanctions on Russia (debate)

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Madam President, those who told us eleven times that sanctions would bring Russia to its knees, that they were a necessary gesture of solidarity with Ukraine, part of the toolbox to end the war, are still clinging to the lunacy that maybe the next round will work. We’ve heard colleagues say, ‘Ah well sure look it, we know they never fully work.’ Or, ‘Well, we need to add a load of named people to …

16 Oct

2023

EN Speech

One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

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Madam President, I have been involved in politics for 40 years, but I have never seen anything like what is being unleashed in Gaza in full public view while the world watches it unfold. Ten days of relentless airstrikes, 1 in 1 000 people murdered by the Israeli Government in a week, open declarations of siege, 24 hours of fuel, electricity and water left, collective punishment on innocent people…

16 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Fisheries control (debate)

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Madam President, our oceans are in crisis and fishers are suffering the consequences. The common fisheries policy was supposed to ensure that fishing and aquaculture are environmentally sustainable and managed in a coherent way to achieve long-term economic, social benefits and employment. So yes, while we can agree that the agreement on the Fisheries Control Regulation was necessary in order to m…

16 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Establishing the Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform (‘STEP’) (debate)

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Madam President, behind yet another cute acronym, STEP, this proposal aims, among other things, to allocate yet another EUR 1.5 billion of public money to the European Defence Fund, now totalling EUR 10 billion. For years, the European Union has been militarising, all the while presenting itself as an actor for peace. And now, at a time where there’s an unfolding and escalating crime against human…

16 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Establishing the Ukraine Facility (debate)

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Mr President, there’s no doubt about it: reconstruction of Ukraine must be dealt with, and the European Union – which hasn’t lifted a finger to work for peace, but has done everything to keep the war going – certainly has a role in that. But I think the question is how and why. And if you read the European Court of Auditors’ report on this, in accountants’ language it is the equivalent of them jum…

5 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Taking stock of Moldova's path to the EU (B9-0407/2023, RC-B9-0408/2023, B9-0408/2023, B9-0410/2023, B9-0411/2023, B9-0417/2023, B9-0420/2023)

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Mr President, I’m in favour, in principle, with Moldova or any other country, for that matter, joining the European Union if they want to, but I abstained on this proposal because it contains a lot that is objectionable: demands for deregulation of the economy; banging on the geopolitical drum against Russia when Moldova has been traditionally neutral; expediting the timetable for access talks pre…

5 Oct

2023

EN Speech

Situation in Nagorno-Karabakh after Azerbaijan’s attack and the continuing threats against Armenia (B9-0405/2023, RC-B9-0393/2023, B9-0393/2023, B9-0397/2023, B9-0399/2023, B9-0400/2023, B9-0402/2023, B9-0404/2023)

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Mr President, two weeks ago, Azerbaijan launched a military offensive into Nagorno-Karabakh, where most of the people are Armenian. Reports of detention, torture, attacks, 100 000 people, two-thirds of the population have now fled in the space of a week. Caravans of desperate people filling the roads, trying to get out. Ghost cities with abandoned pets left to roam the streets. And last week, the …

5 Oct

2023

EN Speech

European green bonds (A9-0156/2022 - Paul Tang)

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Mr President, I voted for this file because the intention is clearly to stop greenwashing and speed up decarbonisation, which we support. But we have to be honest about it. Climate change, social inequality, and the democratic crisis are all linked to an economic system dominated by financial markets. Global financing is causing a lot of the dispossession of rural and urban communities, destroying…