Speeches

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner Schmit, the European Commission wrote in the latest report on the Netherlands (and I quote): ‘Subsidies for social housing lead to an underdeveloped private rental market.’ This is how the European Commission looks at living in the Netherlands, only as a market, not as a right. House prices in Europe rose by 7% this year and in the Netherlands they are rising the fastest. The housing protests in the Netherlands show that people are tired. Homelessness continues to rise. Access to social housing and combating homelessness are clearly described in the European Pillar of Social Rights and I therefore call on the European Commission to take swift action on the following three points: encourage countries to invest in social housing through the Semester; provide sufficient budget for the European Platform on Combating Homelessness so that we can really get to work on ending homelessness by 2030; and help cities curb illegal holiday rentals by requiring platforms to share data with municipalities on rental addresses. Living is a human right. Show that in the policy as well.

Madam President, for years, platforms have been profiting from the large—scale spread of disinformation and hate, and their decisions are driven by profit, image and shareholder value. Any impact on society or democracy is just collateral damage. And as the courageous whistle—blower Frances Haugen revealed in the past weeks, Facebook’s algorithms are programmed to promote and spread content that feeds anger such as hate, fake news and shocking content. People with many followers were exempted from all of Facebook’s rules and could post whatever they liked, including fake news. And this while Instagram is worsening one in three teenage girls’ body issues and impacting a generation’s mental health. And they know the impact of their algorithm but refuse to do anything about it. These same big corporations are acting as guardians of our online space and miserably failing, and this is why we shouldn’t look at them to fix the problem for us. Incentivising platforms to delete even more only reinforces their power over our free speech. We have to tackle the root causes, which are a small number of very large and powerful platforms controlling our public debate and amplifying fake news and hate on a large scale specifically targeting certain people for profit. What we get to see online should not be up to CEOs and shareholders. We need to break big tech’s power over internet users. Let us ban manipulation by toxic algorithms, microtargeting and dark patterns and give people more meaningful control over recommender algorithms. How we regulate today’s tech companies can only protect and strengthen our future society if we make bold choices. We need to take the power over what we see online out of the hands of private companies and place it firmly back in the hands of the people.

Mr President, without knowing, we are all being tracked, followed and identified on the streets by facial recognition cameras. This is dangerous, intrusive and disproportionate. Imagine waking up one day with the police barging into your house after AI has flagged you as a suspect. Then it’s up to you to prove your innocence. It is you versus the computer. And the myth that a calculation is more ethical than a human is dangerous, especially where decisions impact people’s lives. So to my colleagues from the EPP: let’s be realistic. AI is not a quick solution to fight crime or terrorism. An AI camera will not detect radicalisation, and automating police work is not a substitute for police funding and community workers. Looking at the US, in New York City and Boston, replacing AI-driven predictive policing with community policing lowered crime rates. And San Francisco and Boston have already banned biometric surveillance in public spaces. So not only is a ban perfectly feasible, we in the EU are far behind in our ethical AI choices. And if we as Parliament are serious about making the EU a leader in ethical AI and fundamental human rights, let’s ban biometric surveillance in public spaces.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner, I would like to start by congratulating the FNV and the Dutch Uber drivers for the victory they won today in the lawsuit against Uber. Uber has to hire its drivers and pay the overdue wages. This is a great result. I will now continue in English. The verdict in the Netherlands adds to over 100 court cases across the EU, and with these court cases platform workers simply ask to be treated the same way as other workers, with the same social benefits and opportunities, and the cases have overwhelmingly been won by the platform workers. You might think that Uber, Glovo, Deliveroo and other platforms would then bury the hatchet, play nice and hire their workers. But instead they do everything to keep operating outside of the law or to even change the rules in their favour with workers paying the price. And in the long run we actually all risk paying the price because this business model undermines our social security system. Platform workers going to court are fighting an uphill battle against the platforms’ army of lawyers and resources, and that is why we, the lawmakers, need to step in, and that is why I am very pleased with this report because we give a clear mandate to the European Commission for strict rules and to once and for all tell these platforms how we protect their workers and that we have a model based on solidarity. That's why I also really would like to thank my shadow co-rapporteurs and the rapporteur for the great cooperation while writing this report, because if we stand together we can really make a social Europe happen. So what do we want? We start by putting in place a presumption of employment relationship for platform workers. This may sound complicated but it simply means that it should be up to platforms to prove that someone is really an entrepreneur instead of the workers. And for me, it's quite simple. If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's likely a duck. So why give workers some basic rights rather than the full rights of an employee? It should’t matter when you are cleaning someone’s house if you’ve been hired through a platform or an agency: You should have the same rights. And next it is important to clarify what distinguishes these platform workers from other workers and namely the fact that an algorithm dictates what happens. A Dutch judge explained today being subject to an algorithm is modern employers’ control. Workers are constantly tracked, monitored, proactive and even fired by algorithms without even knowing why the algorithm assigns them certain tasks and what the price is actually based on, and as a result platform workers are under extreme stress. We need to protect workers against algorithmic management. Workers must be able to know that not only does an algorithm exist, but also how it assigns tasks and sets the prices. Important HR decisions should always be made by a person and not a computer. These issues are not regulated deals with in the AIF and have to be addressed in the Directive on platform work. Colleagues, it is important that we have this legislation and when it comes to the future of work and the future of a social model this is one of the first battlegrounds; The outcome will be important for how we will regulate the labour market in the future.

Mr President, when my niece was born I gave her a picture book called Filola wants a crocodile. In this book, Filola’s mums go out on a mission to find her a crocodile for her birthday. Mums, yes, because I want her to know that having a gay aunt isn’t something to be embarrassed about, but can give you a life full of adventures. In Hungary, from tomorrow onwards, this is a crime, because it’s forbidden to teach children about different sexualities and identities. And I’ve heard the Commission say over and over, ‘this is not in line with European values’. So do something about it. Launch an accelerated infringement procedure, freeze EU funds, make use of all the tools you have. But I’m also calling on the Member States to act because you have been bystanders while bill after bill has diminished the rights of our community and not only in Hungary and Poland. But using our community as a distraction to undermine the rule of law will not change who we are or who we love. Our community is strong and we will continue to fight for our rights together.