Speeches

Mr President! Agriculture is bad. Farmers across Europe are protesting, taking to the streets. And if I look at these speeches today: I don't think the farmers have any hope. You, Commissioner, have exceeded your speaking time by four minutes, but you have said nothing tangible. The situation is so bad because producer prices are constantly falling – milk price 45 cents, 50 cents. On the other hand: constantly rising production costs, energy costs, staff costs, fertilisers – everything is rising. It doesn't work out anymore. That's why farmers close the door every day. And then there is the bad policy that is being pursued in this House. They wanted to delete the common CAP fund. In the last structural period, farmers received a fixed guarantee of 387 billion euros through this fund. This was to be reduced and the farmers were to receive €91.3 billion in quotation marks at a time when they were really in a bad mood. Thank goodness we made a decision in the European Parliament two days ago and got a common adequate CAP budget. I'm curious to see what comes out.

Madam President, Madam Vice-President of the Commission, you really disappointed us today. I would have expected, if the EU-India free trade agreement were to be signed at the end of January, that you would at least present the cornerstones of this free trade agreement today and here. So you delivered platitudes. They didn't provide any details. And you know that farmers are demonstrating in front of the parliament in Strasbourg. Farmers demonstrated yesterday, farmers across Europe demonstrated because they are not satisfied with agricultural policy. Of course, a free trade agreement can also offer an opportunity, but it depends on the treaties. But you would be obliged to deliver content of these contracts once. And if you look at that in this period, there have only been two debates in this period. There was an internal debate in the Trade Committee on 19 March and a plenary debate on 7 October 2025 – that was all we as mandaters were confronted with. This is not enough for a democracy that claims to be the largest democracy in the world. This is completely non-transparent. A free trade agreement: There belong the cards placed on the table and about it belongs reasonably discussed what it looks like. And the farmers, the agriculture belong completely excluded from this planned contract. Learn about it today! The majority in Parliament has called for consideration of the proposed agreement, the Mercosur Agreement. And when I hear here today that the mandaters do not know what they are doing – sorry, we are all elected mandaters representing the interests. We know what we're doing. And we have to take note of votes like this morning on Mercosur. And please note that we, as a free party, urgently want the farmers to be protected and agriculture to remain completely out of this planned agreement.

Madam President, The causes of breast cancer need to be addressed. To the figures worldwide: 2.26 million new cases in 2019, forecast for this year: 2.6 million new cases and 3.2 million new cases by 2050, an exorbitant increase. A really big problem. We launched MEHA, a new European health initiative, in Brussels last week. Dr. Robert Malone was also present. Commissioner Jørgensen, you certainly know who Dr. Robert Malone is, a world-renowned scientist who also sits on the ACIP, the US government's vaccination advisory body. And this ACIP identified four main causes of COVID vaccinations that can cause cancer in September. As a result, the CDC stopped advertising the COVID-19 vaccinations in America. Commissioner, I would like to have this House finally discuss the disadvantages of COVID-19 vaccination in a fact-oriented, fact-based manner, because it is not for nothing that the advertising for it has been discontinued in America. This is necessary and important, and this is what I ask of this House.

Yes, that's the usual left-wing manslaughter argument that comes with playing against each other. If you had listened to me, you would have noticed that in the one-and-a-half minutes I had, I worked hard for the farmers, for the farmers. The rural area needs the farmers because they are the preservers of our cultural landscape, our tradition, and if the farmers are lost to us more and more, then the rural area becomes desolate. This is the basis on which we must build. This means that we must first of all see that, of course, farmers are also kept alive and have framework conditions with which they can operate. Currently, it is not possible for them to block eight farmers a day in Austria. This is a development that is disastrous and that we want to stop.

Madam President, esteemed Executive Vice-President! Everyone wants to strengthen rural areas. Only, a partial aspect: What do we do in rural areas without farmers? Cohesion policy has failed completely in this matter. I am from Austria, from Tyrol. Just one example: In 2000, farmers received about 0.34 euros for one liter of milk. Now they get between 0.40 and 0.55 euros, a little more, but much less in relation to 2000 adjusted for inflation. Revenues are going down massively. On the other hand, the costs, the energy costs, caused by the policies of the European Union are rising. Workers are becoming more expensive, feed is becoming more expensive. In other words, yields are going down massively. What happens? In the same way as in Austria, eight farmers are shut down every day. For statistics: In 2000 we had 18 000 agricultural holdings in Austria, and in 2000 only 14 000 – minus 22 per cent. Eight companies shut down every day. And your policy, Commissioner, will not change that. We must finally stop working against rural people, including farmers. Mercosur must be prevented. The Green Deal is the next thing that causes extreme problems for farmers, and the bloated administration is now unbearable. All the money you want to give to the regions through cohesion policy falls into the wrong hands and does not arrive where it has to arrive. Unfortunately, rural areas and farmers will continue to lose.

Mr President, Commissioner! I do not need to repeat everything that has been said so far. Certainly necessary, but Commissioner, we have 450 million inhabitants in the EU and our health systems are collapsing. That's the big problem. We recently heard from the Health Committee that 1.2 million doctors, nurses and midwives were missing in 2022 alone. So if we need doctors for the rare diseases now, they have to come from somewhere. That is, we need to see that we get additional doctors. The European Union's response to go into digitalisation and say we will invest €16 billion in digitalisation by 2027 will not solve the problem. People want to be treated by humans, not machines. Please, Commissioner, in addition to the need to eliminate rare diseases, please also look primarily at the fact that people will have a high-performance, fair health system in the future, where they do not need supplementary insurance, and that we do not have a multi-class society. That must be a priority.

If you were a member of the People's Party: The Bauernbund – your group – is against Mercosur, while the Wirtschaftsbund and the Österreichische Arbeiterbund – including your party – are fully committed to Mercosur and thus to the betrayal of agriculture. Do your job!

Mr President! Commissioner, do you really believe that with this vision the farmers' protests are going down and that with your vision you are taking away the fears of the future from the farmers? I'm sure: Not because the main problem many farmers have is the accession or takeover of Mercosur. We should and we must prevent Mercosur because Mercosur is the death knell for many farms. To prove this to you, I quote from a parliamentary question from me to the ÖVP Agriculture Minister Totschnig – not from our party, I am a member of the Freedom Party and the strongest party in Austria. I received this reply concerning Mercosur on 13 February 2024 – available on the internet. I quote from this what your colleague has to say about the possible accession to Mercosur and the impact on farmers: However, the Mercosur agreement negotiated in 2019 is not an agreement that strengthens the agricultural sector. Studies show that there are significant competitive disadvantages for agricultural production in sensitive sectors ...

Madam President, Commissioner! Of course, everyone will support you in the goal of having enough critical medicines and medicines for the European population at all. But the first step – this has already been mentioned – is to make an effort to relocate the active substances, 80% of which are produced by China and India, back to production in Europe – this would really have to be discussed separately. But the question that arises for me is: Why did this alliance have to be established? We already have enough health authorities in the European Union – besides the Commission there is the EMA, we have the European Health Authority, we have the HERA. Why create your own authority? And that makes me suspect a trace. Would you like to work non-transparently again, because this authority only acts as an adviser? And then the problem arises again and again that they say, ‘well, we're just advising anyway’, knowing that this is a billion-dollar business. And that is why it is important, Commissioner, that transparency is fully enforced here and that it is not the same as the procurement of COVID-19 vaccines – completely non-transparent – and you get the answer: ‘Confidentiality must be respected.’ Therefore ...

Madam President, As a reminder: The left side is constantly complaining about Trump. To your recollection: Trump was democratically elected for a program. Did the voters in America vote wrong from your point of view? First of all. Secondly, Milei – Argentina – is also leaving this disastrous World Health Organisation. If an honest reappraisal of the disastrous COVID policy were to be carried out here, Europe would also withdraw from the World Health Organization. Trump has said he is leaving because of a terrible mismanagement made during the COVID-19 pandemic. Now the WHO is gaining even more power. On 1 June 2024, the World Health Organization (WHO) clawed up additional power in Geneva and now wants to install a national WHO authority in each state. I advise you, ladies and gentlemen, to reject this plan of the World Health Organization! He started running on September 19. You have ten months: Reject this and make sure that health policy remains in national competence.

Mr President! We discussed a recent OECD report from 2022. 2022, where it was found that 1.2 million doctors, nurses etc. are missing. I wonder: Why have we not reacted in the meantime, now we are writing the year 2025? The demographic change mentioned in the report was known to be obsolete for doctors and nurses. What is never mentioned here is that during the COVID-19 pandemic, doctors and nurses were also expelled from the health sector in quotation marks because they were required to be vaccinated against COVID-19. This means: Qualified personnel have left the industry. How is the policy reacting? In essence, we are also talking about qualified staff. And what do we do? We are massively pushing digitalization in the healthcare sector, according to the motto: Digitally in front of outpatients and inpatients. That is, in the future, it is not the specialist who should treat a patient and then first give the analysis and diagnosis, but the first contact should be established via telemedicine. For example, in Austria, I call the phone number 1450 if I have a health problem and get information. However, what the patient expects is the direct contact between the patient and the doctor. That's what we want! That is why I also asked in the last Health Committee that out of the EUR 16 billion invested in the digitalisation of healthcare, a good part should also be invested in the qualification of staff, so that in the future we will have good staff who will take care of patients’ problems.

Mr President, colleagues! Health policy cannot be just a vaccination policy, and that was the case with COVID-19. If the European Union now wants to help, my question to you, Commissioner: How much vaccine against monkeypox will you order in total at what conditions? Finally, transparency must be introduced into this entire vaccine policy. The second crucial question is: These approximately 20,000 confirmed monkeypox cases in Africa were confirmed by a PCR test. How valid is this PCR test? That is the decisive question. In fact, we already had a test pandemic in COVID-19 because the validity of the PCR tests simply did not match. Where can you look up and read how valid these PCR tests are? And, Commissioner, the third crucial question is: Are these monkeypox vaccines effective and safe at all? A vaccine, like COVID-19, which causes collateral damage to the population, is neither effective nor safe – I am not helping. I also recently presented the official data and figures of the European Medicines Agency to the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety – data as of 2 September this year. You all know here in this House that the national health authorities have reported and continue to report to the European Medicines Agency the deaths, the side effects, the serious side effects related to COVID-19. So these are not numbers from us – you always refer to us as sworn or false reporters – these are your own numbers. I have presented these own figures to the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, again because the European population has been told, including by you, Commissioner, that COVID-19 vaccines are effective and safe. If you look at the EMA statistics of reported side effects, the exact opposite is true. For example, 29,000 deaths were reported and 2.3 million side effects were reported in total. So, where are the documents and studies proving the effectiveness and safety of monkeypox vaccination?