Speeches

Madam President, Madam High Representative, for the past week thousands of Gazans have been demonstrating to be able to decide their future democratically, outside the Islamist and terrorist yoke of Hamas, the same one that has arrogated to itself, without elections since 2006, the monopoly of representation, made death a communication plan and used civilians as human shields in schools and hospitals serving as intelligence centres for terrorism. This tragedy takes place with the active complicity of UNRWA, a UN agency long infiltrated by Hamas, which covers tunnels instead of digging wells and participates in the indoctrination of children in textbooks, the diversion of humanitarian aid and the detention of hostages, thus collaborating with those who murdered in cold blood the youngest hostages in the world, the babies of the Bibas family. High Representative, I demand, together with my EPP Group – and I will be very attentive to your answers: first, the end of EU funding for UNRWA; secondly, the immediate release of the Israeli hostages as a precondition for any ceasefire; third, free elections in Gaza, out of the hands of Hamas terrorists.

Mr President, in accordance with the fourth paragraph of Rule 60 of Parliament’s Rules of Procedure, I would ask you to put the referral back to the vote in order to start the interinstitutional negotiations on the report on macro-financial assistance to Egypt.

Mr President, Commissioner, thank you for avoiding the pitfall of a 'Farm to Fork' bis. The tone is voluntarist, you talk about food sovereignty and you put production back at the heart of the vision and the cow in the middle of the field. However, intentions must be acted upon. On the ground, farmers are sweating and it is time for the administrations to make this real change of direction transpire in the texts, that they understand that we have changed mandate and that they themselves have changed commissioner, and not that they pretend to be a little deaf so as not to abolish the dangerous texts from the previous mandate: the regulation on the transport of animals, which would only impose insurmountable constraints on farmers, without any economic, social or environmental benefit; the Forest Assessment Framework, which proposes a gas plant to overwhelm our foresters, with no guarantee of results; the LIFE programme, which must stop funding extremist environmental NGOs, which are trying to weaken our agriculture under the guise of opaque and militant altruism. This is a way to save money by looking at agricultural budgets. Commissioner, this vision is the first stone to stop the infernal machine. We must now put common sense back at the heart of European texts and at the heart of the Commission's administrations.

Mr President, the geostrategic interest in bringing Mercosur closer to Europe in a context of trade war is undeniable. But hell is paved with good intentions and our farmers already taste too much the scent of sulfur: galloping normative inflation which, under the guise of ecology, deprives them of factors of production; lack of competitiveness affecting their mental and financial health; competition from agricultural powers that think of producing before thinking of regulating. Commissioner, what will you do to ensure the reciprocity of environmental standards when Argentina, as announced, comes out of the Paris Agreements? What will you do when this disastrous rebalancing mechanism directly threatens the legal sovereignty of the European Union and the Member States? What will you do to swallow the democratic coup when you split this agreement, thus denying national parliaments their legitimate right to ratify it? And what will you do for our suffering European farmers? A paltry compensation fund of 1 billion euros to buy you a good conscience by telling them "Die quiet, we pay you to disappear"? So enlighten us on your score before writing the requiem of our farmers fallen at the front of unfair competition.

Madam President, Commissioner, while the United States is conquering Mars, the European Union is funding NGOs to lobby. Five and a half billion euros to defame farmers, already burdened with standards disconnected from the field, to attack our companies already suffocated by burdens and obligations of all kinds, to denigrate our nuclear flagship, yet decarbonised and reliable. NGOs are profit-making. They have become professionals in capturing public money. Who are they? What are their goals, apart from denouncing those who create, produce and innovate on our soil? The Commission does not know this, as it did not know that Erasmus funds were allocated to Islamist entities. The left and the Greens didn't know either. They, however, so quick to denounce foreign interference, seem to accept without difficulty those of NGOs, particularly environmental NGOs, which are their armed arm and have fun breaking cops in certain demonstrations in France. I urgently demand consolidated data on the European funds allocated to all NGOs whose sole purpose is the destruction of our vital forces. Second, a precise evaluation grid to allocate those funds. Finally, if there is a lack of inspiration, CAP auditors can always be advised on transparency in their accounts. We are all subject to transparency. They must be too. Europe must be a power at the service of its citizens and not a distraught philanthropic club.

Mr President, thank you. And thank you, Commissioner, for listening in person to this debate on mental health in agriculture, a topic that is more than dear to me as it explains the very reason for my involvement in politics and my presence in this Chamber today: fighting for those with whom I was, less than a year ago, on the dams; I fight for my brothers-in-arms, my brothers of concern, who work more than all the other professions – between fifty-five and seventy hours a week – who earn less than all the others – since one third of farmers in France earn less than the income from active solidarity – who commit suicide more than all the others – one every two days, in France – and who undergo the permanent ‘agribashing’ of ‘there is only one way’. The issue of mental health is fundamentally linked to the lack of consideration and recognition faced by farmers – in media discourse, including on public news channels, where activist journalists are on the streets. It is to carry their voice that I leave my farm and land every week. Do we want more NGOs? Do we want more activists? Or do we want more farmers? Self-proclaimed environmental organisations are feeding our farmers, who are the most virtuous in the world, to create a buzz, to attract subsidies and to file endless legal appeals. That's why they're in my sights. My parliamentary work will therefore be divided into three parts: securing strong budgets to support production; the abolition of standards linked, in particular, to the disastrous Green Deal, in order to return to a logic of trust; the strict monitoring of EU funding for the NGOs I mentioned earlier. These are the first instruments of my parliamentary struggle to improve the mental health of those who want to feed, not die.

Madam President. Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, would the European Commission consider sponsoring terrorist organisations? My question is waiting for an answer. Despite the opposition of the left and Renew groups to the organization of this debate, despite the blindness to Islamism, which has killed nearly 1,000 civilians in Europe over the past 50 years, despite the drift observed in the deployment of Erasmus programs: EUR 250 000 to the University of Gaziantep as part of this programme, while the Rector was making anti-Semitic and openly pro-Hamas speeches, an organisation recognised, it should be recalled, as terrorist by the European Union; nearly €2 million to Gaza University between 2014 and 2019, despite its proven ties to Hamas; more than 100,000 euros to the NGO Al Sharq Forum in the same framework, while it called for paying tribute to the Hamas leader killed in 2024. How can the European Union, which was built for peace, which was touched in its flesh, in Paris, Brussels or Madrid, be the banker of Islamists or terrorists? How can it fund organizations whose terror swarms into the editorial offices of our newspapers, concert halls and schoolyards? The Commission's guilty negligence casts disgrace on the great success of our Union, the Erasmus programme. Finally, how can we tolerate such failures in the protection of the European funds for which we must be the guarantors? Indeed, it is not abstract funds from a computer spreadsheet, but money from Europeans. It is the same money that our farmers are denied when they have misunderstood a regulation or incorrectly completed a form, the same money that we should spend to protect our borders and our people, the same money that should allow our youth to access housing or be better protected from the scourge of drugs. Together with my EPP colleagues, we expect an extremely clear mea culpa and immediate commitments. We don't want words, we want deeds. Stop the financing of crime, stop the financing of barbarism, stop the financing of terrorism! Commissioner, it is time to put Europe right.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, dear European farmers, we are taking the same and starting over. You got "From Farm to Fork" and you didn't want it? Well, it doesn't matter. The policy dialogue on the future of agriculture is here to take up the torch – and worse. Assumed reduction of livestock farming and social plan for European livestock farmers, increased greening of agriculture with unidentified budgetary objects, barely veiled questioning of aid per hectare intended to support production: Here is the program. Competitiveness in Europe is at the heart of this new mandate, but farmers do not seem to be entitled to it. Their only strategic course is that of the maintenance of landscapes and nature. Finally, a role of field guard 2.0 or landscape manager. One would almost forget the nobility of the act of producing, sacrificed on the unique altar of the sustainable management of ecosystems. Yet farmers have taken to the streets all over Europe to demand more consideration, to demand dignity for their profession, to demand real economic tools for their future. The progress mentioned is to be welcomed and welcomed, even if the equitable distribution in the value chain and access to innovation are unfortunately drowned in a general vision that still carries too much the decline of agriculture and increased dependence on imports. I will strongly oppose my EPP political family and the European Commission participating in a common agricultural policy based on this document. Otherwise, farmers who are already getting impatient will have every reason to go back to the streets.