Speeches

Mr President, dear people of Europe! In the GDR, a suspicion was enough and the Stasi listened. Today it only takes a few clicks and Pegasus infiltrates the mobile phone of a journalist, a human rights activist, a member of parliament – including in EU countries. But what is almost as dangerous as this software is who decides who gets it – a single company. A company that does business with authoritarian governments, evades any democratic control, and has built a business model out of fear. Such companies do not sell software, they sell access to thoughts, to life, to strategies of people who are committed to freedom. They do this with a price list, but without transparency, without ethics, without remorse. If Europe allows it, we will soon no longer be monitored in spite of democracy, but because of it. Democracy needs protection, not espionage software, and not a free market for surveillance.

Mr President, dear people of Europe! In the GDR, a suspicion was enough and the Stasi listened. Today it only takes a few clicks and Pegasus infiltrates the mobile phone of a journalist, a human rights activist, a member of parliament – including in EU countries. But what is almost as dangerous as this software is who decides who gets it – a single company. A company that does business with authoritarian governments, evades any democratic control, and has built a business model out of fear. Such companies do not sell software, they sell access to thoughts, to life, to strategies of people who are committed to freedom. They do this with a price list, but without transparency, without ethics, without remorse. If Europe allows it, we will soon no longer be monitored in spite of democracy, but because of it. Democracy needs protection, not espionage software, and not a free market for surveillance.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen. I am very grateful to you for this debate, which has once again brought to my mind what the difference is between politicians and scientists. I think Choose Europe for Science This is a very important initiative, but it does not sufficiently address the real objective we are pursuing. Everyone knows that at the end of the day it is about the introduction of a fifth fundamental freedom: Freedom of Science. But this should be explicitly mentioned in this program. We should be able to create visions for the future with our freedom of science, and not just regulate the now in a fragmented way. The same goes for the smaller. It is right and important to specify the details of the recognition of research qualifications and the facilitation of visas. But we look too little at those who are not yet researchers, namely those who are currently in school. We need school subjects that are harmonised across Europe, such as digital literacy and media, so that those who can conduct excellent research in Europe in the future have all the necessary skills to do so.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, dear peoples of Europe, the single market is one of the best things in the European Union, but the market must be fair to all. Today there are new challenges: digital platforms, unfair practices, unclear rules. This resolution is important. It serves to help small businesses, to protect consumers and to have a well-functioning market. A modern market must also be transparent and open to everyone, not just the big ones.

Madam President, dear peoples of Europe, winter in Europe can be hard: Families need heat, businesses need safe energy. We need clear rules on stored gas because energy is part of social and economic security. Yes, the future is clean and renewable energy, but today we need practical solutions to protect people when it's cold and to avoid crises. More rules is not more bureaucracy, it's more security for everyone. As we change the energy system, we need stability.

Madam President, dear people of Europe, cohesion is not charity. It is a political promise that no region, no person is left behind. This report reminds us that the gaps between European regions are still real in innovation, in jobs, in future prospects, and that's not acceptable. We need a cohesion policy that matches the challenges of our time, green transition, digital transition and demographic change. That means simpler access to EU funds, stronger roles for local and regional actors, and long-term thinking, not just emergency response. Because when we invest in cohesion, we don't just invest in roads or statistics. We invest in dignity, in democracy and in equal chances all across Europe.

Madam President, my personal statement will be quite short. I hope the colleague over there listens. I just want to tell you that I am, in fact, in psychological treatment, because you can go to therapy here in Parliament for free. I think, in this toxic work environment, with the long hours that we have, it's good for everyone. So, go to the medical service, go to therapy like I do. Highly recommended.

Madam President, dear people of Europe, Commissioner! I thank you and all my colleagues here for the important work. Finally, I would like once again to shed light on two aspects that have also been raised: One is education, and the other is psychological care, which can become relevant in the environment of diseases. We have just seen a shining example in the speech by Mr Mazurek, who obviously did not have the courage to carry out an important vaccination because of a lack of information, and was then forced to stay at home for a long time, torn from social life and to this day has visibly suffered serious after-effects. I think we all need to work together to give people in Europe the health they deserve, because health is something that concerns us all.

Mr President, dear people of Europe, I always thought that we are actually fully united, until I moved to Belgium, because I became a Member of the European Parliament. And therefore the first time of my life I experienced the situation that you live in another country where you do not speak the language. So every time I get the invoice for my electricity, for my water, I have a big problem. I cannot read it, and I missed several of the payments already because I was not able to read the invoice. The internal market has several core components, and one of those core components is the freedom of mobility. But how are you free to move around to seek a home in a different part of Europe when there you cannot speak the language. So we need to motivate the Member States of the European Union to impose laws to actually give the right to communication to those Europeans who choose to live in another European country.

Thank you, Madame, for accepting the blue card. My question would be whether you also count yourself as part of this EU elite, as a Member of the European Parliament.

Mr President, dear people of Europe! We Germans know our history. We know the crimes of our people under the National Socialists. And that's why we sometimes have a human but dangerous habit: We tell ourselves that our ancestors did not participate, did not know anything. We tell ourselves that we fought in the resistance. But the truth is: Most of the German families had members in the SS, and most of us would have been there. Look at me. My ancestors lived exclusively in Germany. I volunteered for military service after school. I love my country, my language, my culture. If I, Lukas Sieper, had been born 100 years ago, I probably would have believed the propaganda. I probably would have been another soldier in Hitler's armies. We are always just an election away from a dictatorship. "Never again" is not a reminder. "Never again" is now.

Madam President, Commissioner! You are about to give a speech, and in this speech you will tell us a great deal about the importance of dialogue with Parliament and the Commission as a whole. They will talk about how much we need these genetically modified products to maintain our agriculture. You will tell us a lot about all these things. I bet you're not going to talk about one thing, and that's how your behaviour is giving a boost to the populists and extremists in this Parliament. It's really easy for those forces that want to destroy our democracy to go out there and tell people that the Commission is fooling them if you act like that. Why are you doing this? Why are you ignoring this Parliament's repeated expression of opinion? Why are you giving water to the mills of populism? If you could lose a word or two on this, I would be really interested.

With all due respect, colleague, I didn't misunderstand you wilfully. So I think if it's now being said that I wilfully misinterpreted him, that's also something about me that's wrong. Maybe my English is not good enough, but that's what you said for me. I meant you no harm, no disrespect. I hope you can just take to your heart what I said.

Madam President, dear colleagues, I would hereby say that I really support this motion, but I'm a little bit surprised about what my colleague Mr McNamara just said. You got the circle at the end a little bit better, but freedom of religion is not a Western idea. Freedom of religion is not something there are multiple opinions about, that you have to have a dialogue about. The oldest proof of religion is 100 000 years old. Even before humans were humans in the modern sense, they believed in something. They had religious practices. And every single death, every single act of violence, every single persecution since then because of religion was wrong. So that's something that is not negotiable, where we do not need to understand the other side. That is something where we have to be steadfast in every situation.

Madam President, this is 'To the mothers and fathers': 'They tore the children from the light and vanished them into the night; No final hug, no last goodbye, just silence where a mother cried; They took them far to foreign lands, with stranger words and strangers' hands; They cut their hair, they changed their names, and fed them guilt and fed them shame; But truth does not forget its home and blood remembers where its from; Though uniforms may hide the face, a beating heart won't lose its place; These children stolen, scared, alone, still carry Ukraine in their bones; They are not his, they won't be his – no matter what the tyrant does; Because beneath the ashen pain, the love of home will still remain.'

Madam President, dear people of Europe, when I was a small child, I had a window to Tanzania. My father was there and helped the people with Magicians Without Borders and treated Tanzanians in the bush. He came home not with photos but with a way older technique, showing me the joyful people of Tanzania, their culture, the love that they have for each other. Tanzania itself has been an island of peace, of stability, compared to the region around it. But now Tundu Lissu, the opposition leader, is put in jail. He faces a death sentence. And that's always wrong. So with all my heart I support this urgency and thank the authors for their important work.

Madam President, why exactly are we letting the Chinese keep TikTok? A fine is good. A fine is right. But why exactly do we give them access to our youth, access to our population in a way where they clearly misuse it? And don't get me wrong, I am normally not the guy who wants big enterprises to be taken away by the state. But if this enterprise, this platform is such openly misused to poison our democracy that the wifi of this Parliament even needs to block it, that the majority of the Members of this Parliament even decides to ignore this platform, even though there are millions and millions of citizens using it, then why do we let the communist regime of China that puts Uyghurs in concentration camps keep this platform? Take it away. Force them to give European TikTok to Europe.

Madam President, dear people of Europe, when Donald Trump decided to slap new tariffs on clean tech imports again, it reminded us of one simple truth: the world doesn't wait for Europe to finish its homework. While American banks go ahead, backed by one unified system, European banks are still stuck in 27 national frameworks, 27 rulebooks, 27 different risks. It's no surprise that our capital leaves Europe. A real banking union means three things: a joint deposit guarantee so citizens trust their money is safe no matter what; a smarter supervisory mechanism that lets us act fast and together; and harmonised financial market. Because otherwise we might as well put 100 % tariffs on ourselves. Let's finish the banking union before the next crisis finishes us!

Madam President! Dear people of Europe. Food should be cheap and good. But right now, the food is too expensive for many people. When people can't afford food, anger comes. Then comes crisis. Governments will fall. This happened in France during the Revolution. It happened in Tunisia when the dictatorship fell. We have to act now! We need strong European rules. Rules for fair prices, fair trade and fair support for farmers. Food is not just a commodity. It's life. Life should be for everyone.

Madam President, my dear peoples of Europe, last week in Spain and Portugal there was a major blackout. Many people had no electricity, no train, no internet. It was not an attack, perhaps; It wasn't a storm. It was a problem in the power grid. We switched to green energy, but we didn't make the connections right. Now we need better cables, large batteries for energy storage and help between the countries of Europe. This blackout is a clear sign: Europe needs strong, safe and clean energy. Let's act now.

Madam President, dear people of Europe! Peace as attacks on infrastructure continue. Peace, while hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian children are being held in Russia. Peace, while more Ukrainian soldiers surrendering are being executed than ever before. We want peace – a peace that Ukraine does not extradite to Russia. We will remember the end of the Second World War. In Moscow, the Victory Parade will be held tomorrow, not in honor of the Russian armed forces, but in honor of the Red Army of the Soviet Union. Nearly 25 percent of the Red Army's soldiers were Ukrainians. Putin has not forgotten that. His war is nothing less than a betrayal of this common victory over National Socialism, a betrayal of peace. Therefore, peace cannot be based on its will, but only on the free will of the Ukrainian people. Slava Ukrajini.

Mr President, sorry, it's a bit broken today. Dear Thomas, thank you for your very important work on that file. I think it is a great step forward, and I'm also happy that I can see one of the main tasks that we defined in our party programme be concluded here. Dear colleagues, I would use this opportunity at the end of this debate to also broaden our view. Three to four weeks ago, I was in Syria, and I saw that the people in Syria are facing a serious shortage of water. Their water is cut off. But without going too deep now into international politics, I would like to stress why this is also important for us. It is important for us because it's bad for the environment. It is important for us because it's bad for the people there. It's important for us because it's bad for business. And it's even important because some of us do not want the people there to come here. So accessible water, clean water, is not only important inside our Union, but also in the countries bordering our Union. Let us always keep this in mind.

Madam President, Commissioner Kallas! I should like to return once again to Mr Sonneborn's book criticism, which you have just had to endure. I hope you don't take them too seriously. The colleague Sonneborn has long exceeded his journalistic zenith. He recently published his own book, the Handbook of European Values. This is just white on 80 out of 100 pages, so not the most profound joke at this point. I don't agree with everything you do, and I'm sure we could talk forever about what's right and what's wrong here. I think that you have the competence to recognize that this question is more complicated with regard to Cuba than what we see here from large parts of the plenary, namely, on the one hand, communism good, USA evil and on the other hand communism evil, USA good. So, if you have a say in this, if you are thinking about whether or not to continue this agreement, I would ask you to think on one question alone: Does it lead to the freedom of the Cuban people? Yes or no?

Madam President, dear people of Europe! The year is 2025, and a US president is fabulated by neo-imperialist ideas about taking Greenland. 79 years ago, it was the troops of the first US army that liberated my hometown of Wiehl, a small town in North Rhine-Westphalia, from the Nazi reign of terror. My grandparents learned then that the United States is liberators. My parents have learned that they are friends and allies. A few weeks ago, I asked Commissioner Šefčovič when the US would cease to be our allies in the current situation, when it would cease to be our friends. And he told me that you couldn't just throw 80 years of friendship and 80 years of alliance overboard. I agree with that. But I would like to remind you all once again of this question through this debate: When is the United States no longer our ally?

Mr President, in the same way as mentioned in other budgetary debates, the biggest mistake that was done in the budget was lack of transparency. EU funding is enormous. It affects millions and millions of people. In the same way, we do not even have sufficient data on how much the public actually accesses our publication when it comes to the budget. At a time of rising populism and attacks on democracy, the people feel our travel in their wallet the most, and therefore we need to show them more what we do with their money. We need obligations by our institutions to publish what they do with our money on social media. We need more accessible websites also for people with disabilities and for young people. We need to ask ourselves, how much do we really invest in the future instead of the present?