Speeches

Mr President, Commissioner, it is five years after the COVID-19 crisis and, unfortunately, we would probably face the same situation if a new health crisis were to occur today, and the same shortcomings in access to medicines. We therefore need this text to protect Europeans and ensure access to medicines, both in times of crisis and in normal times: This is a matter of European sovereignty. We need an incentive policy to encourage the production of medicines in Europe; however, we do not need a text for the pharmaceutical industry, but a text for citizens. To this end, we need to have a rigorous framework, clarify the definitions of critical medicines and shortages, ensure the transparency of the value chain, have conditionalities in public procurement and foster European-wide procurement or collective purchasing – in other words, European solidarity. Perhaps the most important thing for socialists is to guarantee everyone in Europe access to medicines – their availability at an accessible price, and available stocks – everywhere, as close as possible to the people. Through this text, it is a public health policy as well as an industrial policy.

Very simple question, hon. member: Do you think the goals of climate policy... it doesn't work?... Do you think that the objectives of EU climate policy were based on lobbying by environmental associations or on scientific data produced, in particular, in France, by the IPCC and many other organisations of scientists from universities? Thank you for answering this question.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, there is no scandal in Europe over the management of European funds by environmental NGOs. The only scandal would be to stifle civil society and the diversity of its voices. Yes, the same rules must apply everywhere. But if you think that these associations and NGOs should not be financed by the funds of sectoral policies, then make direct funding to allow them to play their role of counter-power and independent expertise! We need diversity, we need checks and balances, we need to face the power of money and industry with the power of citizens engaged in society. And you need it, as the Commission, if you want to bring European democracy to life and feed your work with this expertise. Last element: When all of us walk the streets of Brussels, do we feel overwhelmed by the lobbying of environmental NGOs and citizens? No. You see on all the street signs the financial lobbies, the industrial lobbies, en masse, who spend billions. So, if you want transparency, make a law to moralise public spending on lobbying at European level!

Madam President, Commissioner, my request, together with the Socialist Group, to hold this debate is to mobilise the European Parliament in support of the Commission, to resume negotiations and obtain a binding treaty on plastics, to reduce their production and eliminate dangerous products. And I hope that these deserted benches, on the right and on the far right, are not a sign of disinterest in this major subject. We know very well why the negotiations failed in Busan. They have failed because of pressure from oil lobbyists, who see plastics as a new alternative outlet in the face of the planned decline in carbon fuel consumption. So yes, if we do nothing, plastic production will double or triple by 2050, the associated greenhouse gas emissions will be multiplied by 4 and represent up to 15% of emissions. Everyone should bear in mind that 22% of existing plastics have ended up in the environment and oceans and only 9% have been recycled. Today, microplastics are everywhere: in water, in air, in our body and in our brain – yes, in your brain too. So today we need a strong mobilisation. The failure is due to the refusal of some countries to cap production, the refusal of the management of hazardous substances, the refusal of financial assistance to the countries of the South and the refusal of a majority vote (not consensus). So for the European Commission as a whole, the challenge is: make Europe an exemplary continent in restricting hazardous substances in plastics – this concerns the REACH Regulation – with associated mirror clauses to protect itself from hazardous products from the rest of the world, and develop recycling and re-use. I hope, Commissioner, that the Commission and the Council as a whole will mobilise to relaunch these negotiations and bring them to a successful conclusion. We need a binding treaty that limits the global production of plastic.

Mr MEP, can you please give me the reference to Leon Blum’s words which argued for the superiority of the white race, since you mentioned it? And since you talk about civilization, can you tell me what was the skin color of the Egyptian pharaohs and what was their geographical origin?

Mr President, I will tell you: I am a little tired of this debate which is limited to blaming women and wanting to deprive them of their rights or to refer to the issue of migration. Why doesn't anyone here, other than socialists and environmentalists, want to talk about fertility? Why does the Council and the Commission refuse to talk about fertility? Quite simply because we are being concealed from a scandal at European and global level. The scandal is that the consequence of environmental degradation is the decline in fertility of women and men, and that this is one of the major reasons for the demographic crisis. If you want to address the demographic crisis, there's a lot to do, but tackle these environmental causes. Review the REACH regulation, fight against the presence of phthalates, bisphenols and PFAS everywhere in our environment. There you will have done a service to Europe, to Europeans.

Mr President, Madam Vice-President of the Commission, since the extreme right is allergic to reality, I will remind her of this. There is not, there will not be economic competitiveness in countries hit by climate change, by the collapse of biodiversity, by new chronic diseases linked to pollution and dangerous products. IPBES has just pointed out that 50% of global GDP was based on nature, and all citizens and business leaders know this. The competitiveness of European industry is low-cost energy thanks to the massification of renewable energy. New nuclear is at least twice as expensive, carbon is five to ten times more expensive – at the heart of the Ukrainian crisis. The competitiveness of agriculture is restored, living and productive soil, and the future of European industry is clean and decarbonised industry, not the industry of yesterday. The right and the far right must stop lying to workers. What puts competitiveness at risk is unfair competition from China and weak demand in Europe, not the Green Deal.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, crisis preparedness is a matter for society as a whole. This is at the heart of the Niinistö report and I think it is extremely important. We first need social cohesion and citizen mobilization, and insisting on the involvement of associations, but also trade unions, on citizen engagement in civil protection and local solidarities is an essential element. I would also like to emphasise the role of local, municipal and regional authorities, without which there is no crisis preparedness. And finally, insist on vulnerability analysis. Without understanding environmental, social and territorial vulnerabilities, we cannot adapt crisis preparedness to the realities of each territory. And we see every day that disasters do not have the same impact in one region or another. Finally, a word about the message of the far right: no European defence, no European security, no European solidarity. Their message is clear. And what does that mean? It means: Europe alone, crumbled, divided, left to external aggression and unable to respond to climate change.

Madam President, my point of order is based on Rule 10(3) of our Rules of Procedure. On Wednesday, November 6, during the hearing of Mr. Costas Kadis, our colleague Mr. Droese placed in front of him, clearly for all the deputies and especially for the cameras, a red cap bearing the famous political slogan of Donald Trump. The US is our historical ally, but Donald Trump is not a friend of Europe. Like many of you, I am concerned about the progress of his ideas in this Chamber and about the possible constitution in this Parliament of a right-wing or far-right majority where his friends would weigh heavily. But for today, Madam Speaker, I would ask you to remind our colleague that such fireworks are prohibited during our work, even when they appear on clothing.

Madam President, Commissioner, two weeks ago, together with my colleagues from the European Parliament Intergroup on Seas, Rivers, Islands and Coastal Areas, we hosted Ocean Week in Brussels, organised by NGOs. Here is what they told us: First, there is an urgent need to mobilize to restore the health of the oceans. Secondly, there is a need to enforce existing laws – which today are not enforced – and to closely monitor how states are working on the Nature Restoration Regulation. Because 2030 is going to happen very, very quickly. Thirdly, Commissioner, the ocean and its management must be treated as an ecosystem, but this ecosystem approach is not possible under the current Maritime Spatial Planning Directive: it is therefore urgent to initiate its revision. Lately, we need a global ambition – the famous European Ocean Pact promised by Ursula von der Leyen, which will reconcile the health of the oceans with the activities of the blue economy – carried out with this Parliament, with local authorities and with all stakeholders, associative and economic actors.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, on Thursday morning, I was in my hometown of Nantes, alongside the employees of General Electric, which is preparing to cut almost 400 jobs in its factory and research and development centre dedicated to the production of offshore wind turbines. More than a decade ago, when I was vice-president of my region, I worked to create this sector and showed citizens that ecology can create hundreds of jobs: workers, technicians and engineers. Today, I see these jobs disappearing because Europe and France are unable to develop offshore wind projects at a price that would make it possible to remunerate a value chain and European jobs, unable to impose European content where there is, however, significant public support. Our plants may close when we need them to equip new offshore wind farms. Meanwhile, the Chinese are building factories in Scotland and Italy to assemble wind turbines mostly made in China. We talk about industrial policy and competitiveness, but in real life we let green industries collapse and we sacrifice jobs. Will Europe finally wake up, or will it lock itself in this slow collective suicide? It is time to react and fight.

Madam President, Commissioner, I too would like to offer my solidarity to the victims and to all the local structures, local authorities and volunteers who are at their side, to offer my greeting to the staff of the European Civil Protection Mechanism who organise European solidarity in the face of these crises, and to say, in the wake of Younous Omarjee, that yes, we need a sufficient solidarity fund, but also a repair and reconstruction fund that does not empty the coffers of cohesion policy. Again, I would like to welcome Commissioner Lenarčič's action because he has implemented the EU's disaster resilience objectives. Now we are waiting for the hearings as we are promised a European preparedness plan, a European civil defence mechanism and a European climate change adaptation plan. It will be necessary to ensure the coherence of all this and to have a real strategy of anticipation, preparation, response and adaptation. In these debates, we must denounce the hypocrisy of the extreme right which confuses the consequences and the causes, which demands a strong intervention but refuses the budgets, which refuses to accept that it is also the consequence of climate change and agricultural policies. Mr. Vondra tells us that we should not deal with mitigation, but only with adaptation, what a cynical and absurd view of things. And finally, I would like to tell you that in Africa, at the moment, there are four to five million people who are affected by floods. There are hundreds of deaths all over Africa and here too, we must stand in solidarity, we must intervene, we must stand with them and finance Africa's development and climate change adaptation policies.

Mr President, yes, the time for change has come. This is the first principle put forward in this report. It is a good principle and it is a good report. But now we're gonna have to take it seriously. I say this to the Commission and to my EPP colleagues: it will be necessary to go to the end of each of the ideas that are proposed. Let me take an example: question the system of aid per hectare and really do more for those who need it most, for small farms, for family farming. Will we find this in the Commission's roadmap, will the EPP defend it in this Parliament? I hope so. I understood that on the far right side, there was nothing to expect: They have no idea, no proposal. They simply want to get rid of this text, which proposes a new path for European agriculture. So yes, let us open the debate in this Parliament, but also in our countries, in our regions, with all the stakeholders, those who have reached consensus in this Strohschneider report. Let us take the consensus seriously, follow these paths and radically transform European agricultural policies.

Madam President, the President of Parliament will receive a letter from the Committee on the Environment to refer the cocktail effects of pesticides to EFSA. This concerns a major public health issue, the co-formulant/active ingredient pair, but also low doses that, combined, have significant health effects. With the support of the S&D Group, I asked EFSA two things: a review of the scientific literature, but also the development of guidelines for the evaluation of these cocktail effects. Only the first request was accepted by the ENVI Coordinators meeting. Under Rule 147(2) of the Rules of Procedure, it is for you to decide on the nature of the referral to EFSA. I therefore ask you to reconsider this position and to request EFSA on both sides of my application. This is non-partisan, useful for advancing science and protecting the environment and human health.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, first of all, I would like to thank the rapporteur, my colleague Isabelle Carvalhais, Martin Häusling and the other Members who have done this excellent work in the AGRI Committee, which, as you recalled, makes it possible to have a success where, ten years ago, there was a failure. This success is linked in particular to the collective capacity to provide a legal framework that secures the reproduction by farmers of seeds for their own needs and exchanges between them. This is a key element and this Parliament will have to resist the ridiculous last-minute pressure from Copa-Cogeca to table amendments against it. The second balance we have all found together is a balance between innovation and protecting seed availability in their diversity. It is this biodiversity that is the main resource for adapting agriculture to climate change. Much more than the new GMOs, it is biodiversity and the fight against the stranglehold on life that will help agriculture adapt to climate change. I am pleased to have been able, together with the ENVI Committee, to contribute to this collective success.

Madam President, they want to impose on us here a reform of the common agricultural policy, without debate and without a vote. We want to get rid of the ecological aspect of the CAP, without debate and without a vote. This was the case with the delegated act on the reversal of permanent grassland proposed by the Commission and for which the Agriculture Committee voted an early non-objection. This morning you opened the procedure to oppose it. I am pleased and honoured to announce that tomorrow morning there will be more than 80 signatures by Members to oppose this early non-objection and to ensure that we have a debate and a vote in April II in Strasbourg.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, ecology is not the enemy of agriculture. The enemy of agriculture is liberalism, liberalism that leads to a decline in agricultural income. Income, income, income: This is what should be at the heart of our debates. For this, we will need another CAP, because aid per hectare and the sale of products on unregulated and unpredictable markets do not work. But right away we can: – change the implementation of the CAP by capping support to better support smaller farmers and breeders; – use European market regulation and anti-speculation tools, including rehabilitating stocks; – impose a distribution of value vis-à-vis industry and distribution, which guarantees farmers’ income; – suspend free trade agreements and generalise mirror clauses and the carbon remedy at EU borders to combat unfair competition; – Finally, to pay farmers for their work in protecting nature and removing pesticides and glyphosate. Yes, agroecology needs to translate into more income for farmers.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, the Global Gateway strategy is an ambitious initiative to support the development of the Global South, which is to be welcomed. However, it is not so simple to understand what underpins it from a strategic point of view. Is it about competing with the Silk Roads? Taking positions in critical resources or infrastructure? To accompany a geopolitical priority that could – in my opinion – be Africa? Or to meet the basic needs of the population? The interventions of my colleagues reflect this form of indeterminacy. Beyond the strategy, its implementation sometimes raises questions. Massive investment alone is not a policy. What is our understanding of the partnership associated with this deployment? Are we really supporting projects that are linked to a global sustainable development strategy and that have the support of civil societies and people? Finally, do we not run the risk of promoting inequalities in access to credit ourselves? We know that a lot of aid goes to the most advanced countries at the expense of the most fragile, to which private investment does not turn. In conclusion, I believe it is important to put Global Gateway into perspective in a comprehensive development assistance strategy and to ensure that official development assistance is reinforced as a complement to that strategy.

Thank you, Mr Dorfmann, for talking about wine, and that was my question. Can you tell me how the new GMO-NTGs will affect the wine sector? If you have a Chardonnay NGT, will a great Chardonnay-based wine still be a Chardonnay? Or will the specification for the geographical designation have to be redrafted?

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I am in favour of innovation and NGT legislation. New genomic techniques are certainly useful, but I refuse to play the apprentice sorcerer and to take away all freedom of choice from consumers and peasants. In the debates on this text, we have made progress on some points: for example, on the non-patentability of these new GMOs, which the rapporteurs have not defended before the Commission and which I am defending here. But we need to go further: ensuring traceability, informing consumers, effectively protecting non-GMO sectors, including organic farming, and monitoring environmental impacts. All this is common sense, it is prudence, it is fidelity to decades of struggle by this Parliament, which has always fought for consumer rights and for recognition of the diversity of agriculture. So the European Economic and Social Council agrees with what I have just said. The European Committee of the Regions agrees with what I have just said. Tens of thousands of citizens are speaking out and sending you – sending us – emails to say so, and should we remain deaf and blind to this mobilisation? No, no! The worst part of this debate is that we will vote tomorrow. While the scientific underpinnings of the Commission proposal are in full scientific controversy, the French agency ANSES has published a study that radically challenges the criteria proposed by the Commission to distinguish between categories 1 and 2. This study must be serious as we will discuss it in the ENVI Committee after the vote. It must be serious since Parliament will ask EFSA for a scientific opinion on the ANSES opinion, which will have to be delivered in July. You can clearly see the absurdity of this debate to be voted on while the very terms of the vote are still in full controversy. So yes, this situation is absurd, but yes, we must give tools to farmers, but yes, we must be accountable to citizens, because they will not want to eat GMOs without choosing it and without knowing it. They're also holding us to account. The appointment for the accounts, it will not only be tomorrow, it will also be June 9.

Mr President, a fraud, a lie, a failure. I would like to refer here in this Chamber to the situation of Nestlé Waters, which for years has concealed the use of prohibited methods for its mineral waters. This company filtered and purified its mineral waters like a vulgar tap water, but selling it a hundred times more expensive. The French government covered up this scam and was preparing to legalise these practices, which deceive and steal from consumers. These frauds must be punished. But how many brands and sources are involved in Europe? We do not know, we urgently need an investigation by the European Commission. Why did they do that? Because water quality is declining, because pollution is increasing, because pesticides are everywhere. Thousands of jobs are now at stake because we have failed to protect the environment. A lesson to remember in the midst of the agricultural crisis: the massive use of pesticides is a danger to health, the environment, but also to employment.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, on 29 November the European Commission reauthorised glyphosate. This decision was taken by the Commission on the basis of an incomplete risk assessment and incomplete information. It did so on its own because the Council was unable to take a decision, and it did so without complying with European case-law, the Blaise judgment, which states that a full assessment of the co-formulants of a product such as glyphosate is absolutely necessary. This Parliament had the opportunity to oppose it and to request an appeal. He didn't. But this fight continues, we will not leave Europe condemned to another ten years of glyphosate. What Parliament has not been able to do, I hope that European civil society, NGOs and citizens will do and I will be, together with my colleagues from the Socialist Group, committed to stopping the use of glyphosate in Europe as soon as possible.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, the general debate on pesticides is interesting, but the practical debate on glyphosate is even more interesting. As a new Member of Parliament, I have been very surprised in recent weeks to see that the Commission’s proposal never changes. You have never taken into account the positions of Member States, the positions of parliamentarians and the positions of stakeholders. I have found a form of blindness and stubbornness that will lead to legal action and I call on all parliamentarians to support the approach taken before the Court of Justice, in particular by the toxic secret associations. You tell us that decisions are based on science. Many of us consider that we are in a situation of scientific uncertainty and controversy. The Director-General of EFSA told this Parliament that the resources mobilised to assess the risks associated with pesticides were insufficient and that his agency did not have the means to work properly, 80% of scientific publications are now excluded from the databases taken into account by EFSA to assess the risks. So no, Commissioner, we do not consider this opinion to be based on science. You did not even take into account the EFSA opinion, you just handed over the baby to the States, which will have many difficulties in doing better than EFSA to assess the risks related to the products and protect health and the environment.

Madam President, Mr High Representative, ladies and gentlemen, have we made a cross on 1.5 billion women and men, who will soon be almost twice as many? Have we decided to remove an entire continent from our horizon? When we talk about a geopolitical Europe, we should look to the future and face the obvious: Africa, Africa, Africa. Everything brings us closer to this continent, and our destinies are linked. But do you want, do we want partners at our borders or a barrel of powder ready to explode in our face? Have we decided to leave Africa to its chaos, to leave it to Russia and China? So the question before us, Mr High Representative, is the one you mentioned earlier: What do we have to offer? After the bad drama of the signing of the post-Cotonou agreement, with our contested development aid policy – because it serves only our interests –, with the French bankruptcy in the Sahel, the question is how Europe can take up the torch of this partnership fight with Africa and affirm a new Euro-African policy.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner, we cannot condemn Europe to ten years of glyphosate, ten years when there are so many uncertainties! Ten years when there are so many dangers! Ten years as science advances every day and brings new information! There is a double failure in this case. A failure of the risk assessment. Because EFSA did not give a red light, it did not give a green light. And in France, when the fire is orange, you don't go to the crossroads because it's dangerous. It was said by my colleagues, lack of information, lack of protocol, but on what subject? Human exposure through food, water protection, health of small herbivorous mammals, protection of aquatic plants, impact on biodiversity. And all this while EFSA has not been able to evaluate the reference product and its co-formulant. And before this Parliament, the Director-General of EFSA told us that he did not understand the gap between the place of pesticides on the European political agenda and the weakness of the resources devoted to risk assessment, including the resources given to his own organisation. And the second bankruptcy is a bankruptcy in risk management because you are discarding the Member States. What are you actually proposing? You tell the Member States: Take each EFSA alert and manage to integrate it into the assessment of the products that will be placed on the market. And what do they say to you? How would we do better the work that EFSA has not been able to do? And that's why many of them today refuse your proposal. So the dramatic difficulty we are facing is that we no longer know who in the Commission is defending the precautionary principle. Who, in the Commission, defends the highest possible level of protection of health and the environment. So you, the Council and the Commission, are about to abandon the precautionary principle. We will object and say no.