Speeches

Dear Chairman, colleagues, Serbia is not committed to European values and has never been. You're wondering why he didn't impose sanctions on Russia. You want to know why he tolerates volunteers going to the criminal paramilitary Wagner. You do not understand how it is possible for Russian media, propaganda media on Serbian territory to broadcast freely. I'll tell you how it's possible. All that Russia does today for a hundred years and more was done by Serbia, not only with weapons like 30 years ago, but also with the theft of culture and the Croatian language. Just as Moscow denies the Ukrainian nation, so Belgrade denies more Southeast European nations. Just look at what they are doing to the Croatian minority in Vojvodina, creating an artificial Bunjevac nation to wipe out the Croats by the end. You can give Serbia billions, but it will still look to Moscow because this relationship is part of their history, identity and political mindset. The entry of such Serbia into the European Union would mean full membership of a small Russia that would undermine this community from within in the interests of a large Russia.

Dear Chairman, thank you very much for this. A woman is not just a body. A woman has her emotional aspect, intellectual aspect, social and spiritual aspect and that is all that makes a woman a person. And it is the gender ideology that separates these aspects from each other that makes the body itself, in male eyes it incites violence. Thus, it is the merging of all these aspects that makes a woman a whole person as I see a woman, that a woman is not only a body, but also feelings and intellect, and a social and spiritual aspect.

Dear Chairman, colleagues, on my question Mrs. Rafaela did not know how to list any country in which violence against women would be reduced because indeed in these 12 years no country that has ratified the Istanbul Convention has reduced violence. Thus, the Istanbul Convention does not factually reduce violence against women. Second, unlike the pre-Istanbul documents which mentioned gender and gender mainly as synonyms, the 53rd paragraph of the explanatory report, as well as Article 3 of the Istanbul Convention itself, explicitly define gender as something opposite to sex, which is the basis of gender ideology. Thus, the Istanbul Convention is the legal cornerstone of gender ideology and that is why you are pushing the Istanbul Convention. Perhaps most of you are not even aware of it, but the problem is that you do not care about the facts, but only repeat the popular floscules. Unfortunately, in this way, instead of really trying to protect women from violence, you are actually using women to promote gender ideology. (Member agreed to answer the question raised by raising a blue card)

Dear Chairman, forgive me for spoiling this apotheosis of yours, the promises of emotional blackmail and calling all of us fascists who are breaking everything as a soap bubble to the fact that in no country that has ratified the Istanbul Convention in the past 12 years has violence been reduced. So, my question to you is why would all people in the European Union trust you that in the future the Istanbul Convention will reduce violence if it has not done so anywhere in the past 12 years? And the second question, how do you think that the violence in the Netherlands will, say, decrease with ... (the President interrupted the speaker)

On 6 October 2021, the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg issued an opinion on the Istanbul Convention, according to which the European Union should respect the principle of subsidiarity and the right of the Member States to decide on the matter themselves, and Parliament and the Commission have no right to urge the Council to adopt this decision on the conclusion of this intergovernmental treaty. Right now, you're doing what the Court has said you can't, so I'm wondering if you have any counter-argument to what I've just said, or if you just want to keep it quiet and not answer this question because you don't have that counter-argument?

Dear Chairman, dear people, when you pay with a card, only your bank knows about that payment. When you make smart payments through your mobile phone, the central system, which is ultimately controlled by the state, also knows about it. Are you sure you want to provide politicians with information about all your transactions and give them the opportunity to ultimately control or restrict them? You think that's impossible? Just think about the Covid measures and how the politicians have limited you. Do you think it is impossible to limit your transactions in the future if, say, they conclude that you produce too much CO2 or eat too much meat and too few insects? Ask my colleagues on the left. Many of them will tell you that such restrictions would be justified to protect the planet or animal welfare. It is clear that smart payment is easier than a card or cash, but also leaving the unlocked house when you leave is easier than locking, and yet you lock it. So, do not be naive, keep paying by card and cash. Digital money and smart payments are a complete loss of your fundamental freedoms.

Dear Chairman, dear colleagues, yes, we need better energy storage and I am looking forward to all the innovations on this issue, from hydrogen to pumped hydropower plants. But how realistic are the estimates in this plan? For example, the long-term decline in electricity consumption after 2030 is estimated, while all cars should switch to electricity at the same time. It's not logical. Or another example: Until ten years ago in Croatia we had a lot of European projects of switching all city buses to gas, which was advertised as the most ecological fuel. Nowadays, it's as if gas doesn't count at all. Has anyone been held responsible for the miscalculation so far? And unrealistic estimates have led Europe to a lack of energy, to an energy crisis in which the dirtiest energy sources have reopened due to a lack of energy. So let's be realistic and respect the hierarchy of goals. Our first common goal is to provide sufficient amounts of energy, and the second goal is to ensure that this energy is from as clean sources as possible.

If I can just say a few words to see if there's a translation. Dear Chairman, colleagues, these days on Croatian national television in the children's program there is a cartoon that shows a woman who gets angry, removes the cross from her neck, leaves her husband, takes her children away and decides for a different life, becomes a lesbian, an abortion activist, and the highlight, of course, is when she opens the book of Karl Marx and experiences enlightenment. In addition, a young man who changes gender is portrayed, and this is equally portrayed as liberation and enlightenment. It's all part of your cultural war and it's a war for our children, for the children of heterosexual parents, because the biological children of a homosexual couple don't exist if I'm allowed to pronounce that notorious fact at all. So, the family is a universal theme too, so it is not in the jurisdiction of the European Parliament but of the national parliaments and you know it well and still bother us with this theme. Thus, history has shown and the future will show that your path is based on errors and you have already taken many good people on a foreign path with your propaganda, selling misconceptions under the same. In love and understanding we will continue to fight for the truth about man.

Dear Chairman, colleagues, these days on Croatian national television in the children's program there is a cartoon that shows a woman who gets angry, removes the cross from her neck, leaves her husband, takes her children away and decides for a different life, becomes a lesbian, an abortion activist, and the peak is, of course, ... (The President interrupted the speaker.)

Dear Chairman, colleagues, these days on Croatian national television in the children's program there is a cartoon that shows a woman who gets angry, takes the cross off her neck, leaves her husband, takes the children away and decides... (The President interrupted the speaker.)

Dear Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, we have been discussing for months the importance of energy savings and the transition to cleaner energy sources. We have set ourselves a very good goal of having 50 million new heat pumps in the European Union by 2030. But with this F-gas Regulation, we simply will not achieve this. And who will answer then? Due to increased prices, people will switch less to heat pumps. We will not save energy, and refrigerators will also increase, retail will suffer, agriculture and tourism will suffer. Yes, fluorinated gases are harmful, especially some. However, we need time to develop alternatives. What decision will you make, one that sounds good now, but is unrealistic, or one that brings good results for people and the environment? That is why I call on you to be realistic and effective, to reject ENVI amendments and to vote in favour of our amendments that can make this report good.

Dear Chair, Dear colleagues, thank you for recognizing the importance of this topic and for supporting my proposal to be included on the plenary agenda, especially since we are about to receive the Anti-Trafficking Directive, which finally puts illegal adoptions on the agenda of trafficking in human beings. I must say at once that some colleagues in the part of the speech went in the wrong direction. So, the topic of this point is very clear, these are adoptions from third countries and I ask you not to burden this topic with your ideological agenda in any part. Who should be a parent within the European Union, this is another topic. So this is a topic where we should be together, regardless of our worldviews, all children, and especially those from third countries, especially those who are victims of smugglers, are certainly more important than our differences. So we're talking about international adoption. The love that people are willing to give to abandoned children and adoption itself is something very noble. But only when the child's interests are at the forefront. A seemingly small change in which the desire for parenthood is put at the forefront, so people are ready to get a child from anyone and in any way, is very often reduced to buying a child as some goods with different prices. And then the adoption of children merges with human trafficking and that is why illegal adoptions under the Hague Convention are part of human trafficking, which is also discussed in the new directive, and according to UNICEF, over a million children are abused annually for child prostitution, pornography, slave labor and organ trafficking. Crime and pain screaming to the sky. Put yourself only in the role of the parents to whom the child was abducted or the mother who was told after childbirth that the child died, and in fact was given for adoption. That is why we are here today and that is why I must say that I am very pleased that the Commission to which I have sent a question has made such a statement that we are focusing on this topic. I invite you to ensure better international cooperation and better oversight of intermediaries and ultimately to motivate all countries and through... (Chair took the floor)

The Honourable Chairman, the Honourable Colleague, the Greens Colleague and let's say the French Colleague from Renew speak only about CO2 reduction, as if this was the only goal of this document. They are very ambitious in this green transition and so they designed the document. Every transition is costly, every deep renovation is expensive, much more expensive than partially. Madam President, I don't know why there is -15, since I speak just 15 seconds. Can you change the time there, please? Yes, yes. No, no, I haven’t asked the question. And on the other hand, you socialists are only talking about reducing bills. So, even if it had to be turned to the poorest, so I'm interested, isn't it actually a contradictory document? And who's going to pay for it? How will the payment of the energy performance certificate every five years and the introduction of global warming potential certificates cheaper these accounts? Who will pay for the introduction of this heat pump? After all, that's what I'm interested in.

The Honourable Chair, Honourable colleagues, this could have been a great report and that is why, as a shadow rapporteur, I invested six months of my work and over a hundred meetings in it. We should have used the citizens' motive to build smarter solutions by themselves in this energy crisis, which will reduce utility bills and help them have a warm and cozy home. This would also reduce energy consumption, increase energy security and reduce greenhouse gases. Unfortunately, this is a missed opportunity. This is a very bad report. It does not view citizens and Member States as partners, but as children who need to be forced into a dogmatic green approach. The obsession with the ultimate goal of zero greenhouse gas emissions is visible, and the reality and a number of quality intermediate steps are ignored. Forcing themselves zero emission buildings, tried-and-tested renovation model. More paper, administrative burden, unnecessarily frequent energy certificates, global warming material certificates and so on are required. Basically, instead of being a stimulus for better energy efficiency, this report has turned into a beating that drives everything exclusively to reduce greenhouse gases.

Dear Chairman, thank you for giving me the floor this time. It is related to the Istanbul Convention and the rule of law. I would just like to quote the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg of 16 months ago, which said that you should respect the principle of subsidiarity and the right of Member States to decide on the Istanbul Convention themselves, and the rapporteurs again, contrary to the Court's decision, urge the Council to take this decision. Therefore, the rule of law should also be respected when court decisions do not suit you. And you, therefore, clearly undermine this rule of law. Secondly, the promoters of the Istanbul Convention had the opportunity to mention in their numerous speeches at least one positive result of the Istanbul Convention, which was signed twelve years ago. They didn't quote any. So this convention is proven to be ineffective. But you have created a narrative that we who oppose the Istanbul Convention, must hate women and promote violence against women, which is a hard nonsens. Actually, I'd even say that's exactly the opposite. Since this document is ineffective, you who promote this document, you promote violence against women because you promote an ineffective document. So, I'm very interested in how long will this dogma last, in which you will ignore the evidence that shows that this document is ineffective?

Madam President, the Netherlands, as you mentioned, was one of the first countries which ratified the Istanbul Convention in 2014, if I’m not mistaken. So it's nine years that the Istanbul Convention is ratified and implemented in the Netherlands. And now you are speaking about the increase of violence. So can you tell me if you care about effectiveness, if you care about the results or just the papers? Now you want that Poland, Hungary and other countries ratify the same convention, which didn't decrease the violence in your country, but increased it. Where is the logic in it ? Please, tell me.

Dear colleague, any kind of violence against women is really something awful and completely unacceptable. But the Istanbul Convention is not a new document: 12 years ago the Council of Europe adopted this document. My very clear question for you is, if you can tell me: is there one single state which ratified the Istanbul Convention and that in this country the violence against women decreased? So, we are listening every few months here to your poetry about this whole document. But we are not here because of the poetry. We are here because of results. We need a result concerning this violence. So please, I asked a simple question ... (The President cut off the speaker)

Dear Chairman, Honourable Ladies and Gentlemen, first, we are discussing non-governmental organizations, and a good part of these organizations are mostly budgeted by governments, so they should in fact be called government organizations, not non-governmental organizations. Secondly, they are called civil society, and very often they have only a few members, so it can hardly be said that they are very close to citizens. They are much closer to the policy that finances them. And thirdly, above all, this ‘Qatargate’ affair has shown that these associations have a huge influence on politics, completely disproportionate to the number of members that these associations have, so it is also undemocratic. So, the way our civil society system works is completely reversed. He is fake, he is manipulative, and corruption is, in fact, just a consequence of that. And if you do not solve these fundamental problems, if you continue to fund these elite government associations and if you centralize all the power and all the money in Brussels, corruption will certainly only increase!

Dear Chairman, Dear colleagues, the key thing in the management of illegal migration is the message we send to potential illegal migrants and the consistency in the implementation of that message. Illegal migration will grow if we send a message: Only you will come, but someone like NGOs will help you, even if you cross the border illegally. If we send a message: We respect border laws and there is no chance of you illegally entering the European Union - then illegal migration will decrease. As far as legal migration is concerned, we need to think about the consequences. Immigrants have a very strong identity and European mainstream has been systematically working for years to destroy national, religious and even sexual identity. And in the encounter of a strong and weak identity, simply the strong one wins. So to expect the assimilation of this strong identity of these immigrants into the European identity is quite unrealistic, and this is confirmed by the reality that shows no-go zones and a further threat to identity and all values stemming from Christian traditional culture.

Dear Chairman, dear colleagues, the goal of every job is not only profit, but also community development, introduction of new generations into the business, solidarity and connectivity. Small-scale coastal fishing contains all this, and conveys tradition, has a cultural significance and above all provides fresh and healthy food. As a shadow coordinator whose amendments have all been accepted, I believe that this is a good report, which encourages the increasing participation of fishermen in the adoption of fisheries policies and calls for the conservation and further development of small-scale coastal fishing, which, for example, accounts for over 90 percent of total fishing in Croatia. I only call on all clubs to vote tomorrow against the subsequent proposed green amendments. They propose to end subsidies for fishermen with fossil fuel vessels. Although there are many of these fishermen, they account for only 8% of the tonnage of the European fishing fleet, so the proposed amendments would not bring any special benefit, and we would literally ruin small-scale coastal fishing because they simply cannot afford new vessels.

The Honourable Chair, the Honourable Colleagues, the reference to the proven ineffective Istanbul Convention, the desire to impose on all children, without parental permission, sexual education programs that are full of misconceptions and the desire to declare abortion as a universal human right, are all just the consequences of the fundamentally wrong approach to human rights in this report. This approach declares every human desire to be a human right. That's what I want. That's my right. This is how a spoiled child behaves, and this is not how the European Parliament should behave. There are school classes in which half of these 14-year-olds have exercised so-called human rights and changed sex and gender. Most of these children will not be able to become parents. Do you really think that such an approach to human rights is sustainable and good for society? Human rights are important, but we must reconcile them with the rights of other people and with the fact that man is not omnipotent. Without it, human rights are fueled by selfish individualism that destroys society.

Dear Chairman, dear colleagues, I have three short remarks. First, we should take care of Iran's growing influence on Bosnia and Herzegovina, which is clearly visible not only from the visit of the Iranian Foreign Minister to Sarajevo, where BiH Minister Bisera Turković relativized state repression in Iran, but also that BiH did not support the United Nations resolutions condemning violence in Iran, which certainly distanced itself from the European concept of democracy. Secondly, we should pay more attention to the Serbian rattlesnakes in Kosovo, and the third is migration, with some lobbies in the European Union continuing to strengthen so-called humanitarian NGOs linked to people smugglers, which in this way certainly make it difficult for Croatia to protect Schengen borders responsibly. So, I invite you all to send a message together that we will firmly uphold the rule of law, that is, laws that say that borders can only be crossed at border crossing points.

Dear Commissioner, I know this is difficult and I respect your every effort in this regard. However, I, unlike my colleagues on the left, do not see sustainability in the long term in the fact that the Commission will help these or those when food rises. So, only to allow the conditions to produce a sufficient amount of food in the European Union, not to be stricter towards our own, but towards those outside. So, my additional question: whether you prioritise domestic production above in... (the Chair interrupted the Member)