Speeches

Madam President, what a pity that Mrs von der Leyen could not have one more minute to listen to us. The European Union has urgently provided hundreds of billions of euros for rearmament, which is exclusively in the economic interests of the United States. The greatest urgency that the European Union should have at the moment is to end the genocide of the Palestinian people - which you have not even mentioned, Mr Costa - but for that there are no resources, there is no time and, of course, there is no political will. And they still dare to say that they are indications when we attend live the extermination of an entire people. Instead of defending human rights and citizens' rights, they strive to strengthen NATO by acting as Trump's vassals. Europe does not need to spend more on defence, what it needs is sovereignty, social justice and peace. Mr Costa, there are two urgent things that the European Union should do now: immediately break with the Association Agreement with Israel and send resources to help the Palestinian people, the people in Gaza who are being exterminated. I'm not asking you: People are shouting it in the streets all over Europe. Listen to them, please, and act now.

Madam President, Commissioner, one more month we come to the plenary session of this Parliament with the certainty that most of the decisions we are going to take here represent a setback of rights. European Union countries are being allowed to implement a hate agenda with total impunity: They enable LGTBI-free zones, attack women and our free right to abortion, deny climate change that is costing thousands of lives, restrict the rights of workers and send migrants to "Guantánamos" in third countries that say they are safe and, of course, they are not, because human rights are violated there. The citizens chose us precisely to improve people's lives, but in this Parliament the unacceptable has been normalised and we are going in the opposite direction. We are witnessing what Hannah Arendt defined as the banality of evil. Because when Europe's legs shake to say no to the far right, to people...

Madam President, for the first time in this Parliament, this hard-won word is being used: genocide. It took nearly sixty thousand dead and one child killed every forty-five minutes to move a single word. How many more dead are we going to need for you to move a single finger? The Israeli criminal regime is exterminating and killing an entire people, blocking the arrival of humanitarian aid, abducting and illegally imprisoning a Member of this Parliament – my colleague Rima Hassan – and you do not lift a finger. You still do not break the European Union's agreement with Israel, do not seize the arms trade and do not bring Netanyahu to justice. Today, Mrs Kallas, which is precisely your birthday, I believe that the best gift you can give to your conscience and also to ours is to act at once, because the citizens are fed up. And you know what? Of not moving a finger, of this complicit silence. The Israeli regime is taking an entire people ahead. Act before you also...

Madam President, Commissioner, the blackout showed that Spain needs to regain control of its energy system. A system that is in the hands of an oligopoly that puts its benefits before the security of all. Today we see how, in the face of citizen responsibility, public services and management that allowed light to be restored in less than fifteen hours, the right does what it always does: take the opportunity to lie, talk about climate fanaticism and recover expired recipes. If they had managed it, we would still be in the dark. And if not, remember the damage, with 228 dead. There's the data. And no, the solution, unfortunately - even if you wanted to - is not nuclear energy, which is proven to be polluting, costly and high-risk. The solution goes through a 100% public and green electricity network that puts an end to the privileges of energy companies, because energy is a right, gentlemen, it is. A right that – incidentally – is denied to the neighbours of the Cañada Real: Another example of how the right manages crises. A country that controls its energy is a freer, fairer country that protects its citizens from the benefits of private ones.

Mr President, hatred of the Roma people is one of the most entrenched forms of racism. More than 10 million Roma people continue to face structural discrimination in Europe. This Parliament is an example of this: This is the first time since 2004 that there is not a single Roma MEP among us. It is shameful that, in the 21st century, we continue to allow high rates of school failure, with segregated schools, underhousing in settlements and slums and low employment rates, especially among Roma women. In my country, for example, it is alarming that 89% of Roma children are at risk of poverty. However, the Commission has taken a step back by withdrawing the Anti-Discrimination Directive. Commissioner, without tools to combat anti-Gypsyism or remove barriers to access to rights, the Roma inclusion strategy will be an empty promise. How long will the gypsies be "the others" and not part of "us"? As the great Spanish poet Federico García Lorca said: O pity of the gypsies! / Clean and always alone punishment.

Madam President, today, as you know, there is no food in Gaza, no electricity, no drinking water. In Gaza today there is only horror. And you were a witness. I speak of more than a thousand people killed since Israel has broken the ceasefire for the petty interests of its criminal government. A government with which you, Mrs Kallas, have met shamelessly, with your Foreign Minister, merely asking for proportionality. Proportionality in a Genocide? Are you a mother? You say "proportionality" to a mother who has lost her children. Tell her by looking her in the eye. How many people have to be killed for you to do something at once? Stop the extermination of the Palestinian people at once. Do something now. You are a real disappointment. But we're not going to get carried away by this. We will continue to demand that they fulfill their responsibilities. Break the Association Agreement with Israel now. Apply all sanctions now. And, above all, enforce arrest warrants. Tomorrow they have a golden opportunity: Mr Netanyahu is going to be in Hungary, treading European soil. Stop him. We want to see him sitting on the bench of the International Criminal Court.

Madam President, today, the Saharawi people continue to resist with dignity in the face of exile, plunder and the violation of their fundamental rights, while the international community continues to look the other way. In the Tindouf refugee camps, 200,000 people are facing an extreme humanitarian crisis: child malnutrition skyrockets and only 1% of the population has access to adequate food. The miserable withdrawal of funds from the United States, which is the main donor to UNHCR and the World Food Programme, has further aggravated this situation. That is why we have sent a letter to High Representative Kallas and Commissioner Lahbib demanding an extraordinary European humanitarian aid fund for the Saharawi camps. Enough of double standards in international law. One continues to look the other way with the Sahara and with Palestine and the free self-determination of peoples is non-negotiable. We must stop being complicit in the occupation that the Saharawi people are currently suffering.

Mr President, in these first hundred days, the new Commission has started a fierce war against migrants and against international law. In these 100 days, it has given the green light to the suspension of the right to asylum at the borders, it has criminalized solidarity and, in addition, it also intends - with very innovative ideas - to open Guantánamos in third countries to expel migrants whose only crime is to have had no choice but to arrive by an alegal route. It seems that competing with the reactionary announcements of the White House, especially in immigration matters, is already a fact. And we know how history can follow, because when migrants are persecuted and criminalised, it also paves the way for backtracking on other rights – which are in the crosshairs of the far right – such as women’s rights, LGBTIQ+ rights or labour rights and civil liberties. Why do they keep putting the agenda on the far right? This only leads us to a model of authoritarian society and to jeopardize our democracy. From our point of view – and from a human rights point of view – the Commission does not exceed the grace period.

Mrs Strada, from your deep experience in migration matters and in matters of rescue with human beings, what do you think about whether this proposal will continue to encourage the persecution of people who the only crime they have committed is not having administrative documentation since they have not found legal and safe ways to reach Europe in a regular way because we have not offered it to them? Do you think that with this strategy presented to us here today, the only thing that is being done is to violate international law – or circumvent it – and to encourage the disappearance, more and more, of the right to asylum and the rights of the child?

Madam President, Commissioner, unfortunately, you have presented us with a proposal here today as a great novelty. However, nothing you have presented is new: everything is already more than failed and, really, the only thing we have seen as novelty is that they have given themselves to the most reactionary. Let's be clear: You are talking about returns, but it is a euphemism, because what we are doing is giving free rein to forced expulsions. Today, a further step is being taken to weaken the European Union's international obligations to guarantee human rights. There are several reasons why this proposal is unacceptable. Firstly, because it is anachronistic and does not take into account the positive contributions of migrants or the million people a year that, according to the Commission itself, we need to maintain our welfare state. Why are you going against the interests of the European Union? Secondly, because it is inoperative, since the inefficiency and disproportionate cost of expulsions are demonstrated in the face of options to regularize and give rights. And thirdly, it is cruel, because it externalizes human rights violations by generating Guantánamos in countries outside the European Union...

Madam President, I do not know if everyone here knows, from what we are hearing, that one in four children in Europe is currently growing up at risk of poverty. Do you think we can afford to continue arguing that we need to increase weapons when we have children in that situation? It's clearly embarrassing. We live in a European Union where more than 92 million people are still at risk of exclusion or at risk of poverty. They are not simple figures, they are human beings and it is a reality that challenges us and that we have to attend to. This European Social Fund Plus does this and you are tabling amendments to take away the guarantees of the most vulnerable, of children, of girls, of those who need us. You are asking us to lift this childhood out of poverty and you want more weapons. Of course, with this attitude they demonstrate the Europe they want, and this is not the one we defend progressive people who want an equal Europe for all.

It is very sad that they continue to use false figures to blur a reality that is not true. The data of the Ministry of the Interior – both your country and mine – say quite the opposite. I wish you only one thing: that the day you have to cross a border - if you have to one day - you will not find yourself in front of people who despise human beings as much as you and your group.

Madam President, Commissioner, this week Trump declared a national emergency at the southern border of the United States, describing migrants as invaders and associating them with terrorists and smugglers. With this dehumanizing and warmongering language, he justifies his immigration policy and the business of borders, despising human rights and people's lives. The ultra-right-wing international – financed by technology tycoons, with Elon Musk at the helm – uses fear and migrants to hide the real causes of the inequality that the system is causing, which generates a model of social and racist exclusion. And I wonder, Commissioner, do we want to follow Trump's path by funding arrests or torture, as is happening in Tunisia and Libya, with our taxes? Because this is also another way to criminalize people who are fleeing. Do you know the risk of spreading the mantra of the criminalization of migrants? Because we are putting European coexistence at stake, we are putting at stake the social peace of our cities, our neighborhoods, and, in addition, we are generating a apartheid for those who hate. I believe in another Europe, in the Europe of human rights that widen our democracy.

Madam President, Mr Costa, what does it sound like to you if I tell you that, during 2024, about 30 people a day have lost their lives trying to reach the Canary Islands? More than 10,000 people have died trying to reach Europe's southern border. That's an unacceptable figure, isn't it? And it is tremendously painful, but it is not an accident, a natural catastrophe or something inevitable. It is a direct consequence of cruel border control policies that are making routes increasingly dangerous. Policies that, supposedly, are aimed at orderly and regular migration. This is a euphemism - and you know it all too well - because without legal and safe pathways there is no regular migration that is worth it. We know that. Let's not deceive the population, the voters. We don't want legal and safe pathways. They don't want them and that's why they have to risk their lives. Meanwhile, in December, the Council, Mr Costa, removed the humanitarian clause, which is very worrying, because with this we are criminalising rescue NGOs, which are only trying to save lives. And, in parallel, the Commission has begun to dismantle the right to asylum, turning itself over to far-right policies under the guise of hybrid threats. This Parliament cannot be complicit. Human rights are sinking like the Titanic and we're going to stay like the orchestra, playing under the music of the far right. Don't count on me.

Mr President, thanks to the social dialogue in my country, Spain, the Ministry of Labour has successfully negotiated, together with employers and trade unions, fundamental agreements to improve the lives of the social majority. It has done so by agreeing on a labor reform that has improved the quantity and quality of employment, increases in the minimum wage and non-discrimination measures for LGTBIQ+ people in all companies. We regret that, in this process of continuity of improvements, now the employer has risen from the table of dialogue to reduce the working day, despite being a mandate of the polls for our Government. Because, I insist, in democracy there is dialogue, negotiation and agreement; Social dialogue is not used to block a measure that has the full support of Spanish citizens. We want to say from here to the bosses that the powerful no longer rule by phone. In democracy, politics governs the economy and not the other way around.

Madam President, I do not know whether the Council is aware of the situation that some of our neighbours are suffering, who are families like ours, schoolmates of our daughters and sons, who take care of our parents and elders or who took on the hardest jobs during the pandemic. Precisely today, on International Migrants Day, all of them are targets of the hate speeches of the extreme right. The Council has given itself to this narrative that criminalizes and dehumanizes them and, instead of guaranteeing fair policies that leave no one behind, is taking measures that represent an alarming setback in rights. In the face of hatred there is another more just Europe, such as the one represented by the more than 700 000 Spaniards and Spaniards who have signed up to present a popular legislative initiative that requires regularizing the situation of those who live among us without access to rights. We ask the Council to reconsider and, before giving in to the message of hatred, suspending the right to asylum or criminalising solidarity, as was done just last week, to defend courageous and just migration policies. Because human rights are not negotiable.

Madam President, what the island of Mayotte has experienced and the people of Valencia continue to experience today is not an isolated event. It is the clearest evidence that climate change is no longer a debate for the future, but for the present, no matter how much some, even in this Parliament, continue to deny what science shows. Therefore, we must decide how to face the challenge and for this there are two models: the model of salvese who can, of denialism and hoaxes - which we have unfortunately lived in our country with the right and the far right in command - or, in front of it, our model, that of the social shield, to leave no one behind. And leaving no one behind means that today almost 3,000 companies have applied for an ERTE in Valencia, protecting more than 30,000 Valencian workers. It also means strengthening Valencian social services to address the ensuing poverty. And it means, too, creating mental health units for emergencies. Because of course, solidarity is the tenderness of the peoples, but the people are really saved by good public services.

Madam President, today, more than 5 400 migrant children are trapped in the Canary Islands, in an overflowing reception system that cannot guarantee compliance with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which is precisely what we are debating today. Do you also know that, according to the UNHCR, 70% of these children are refugees? And the reason for this embarrassment? The racism and hatred that have sown the anti-immigration parties that sit in this Parliament today and that, in addition, are a majority and cause the blockade of a fair and solidary distribution throughout the Spanish territory, with the complicity of the rest of Europe, which does not want to welcome them either. Tell me how we are going to explain this to our children when they know the treatment we are giving to these kids of the same age, who simply need minimal living conditions to be what they are: children who need to dream, play and have rights, as contemplated by the Convention, which is precisely what we are dealing with here. Stop criminalizing them and using them as a political weapon, for electoral purposes. They're boys and girls. Because, do not hesitate, Europe will have to give explanations not only for these children, but for the forty children a day...

Madam President, the reactionary forces in Europe have no other project than hatred. They hate migrants, they hate free and empowered women, and they hate LGBTQ+ people, because when they hate them, they hate our friends and they hate our lesbian sisters and friends, and also our trans sons and daughters. Because when they hate them, they hate us, too. Wherever they can, they censor culture and attack the freedoms and rights of those who are, feel or think differently. We need to make funds conditional on respect for the rights of all people, because we are part of this society. The European Union of rights and freedoms cannot remain a mere slogan. The far right is being fought by expanding rights – as we have already done in Spain – with a new norm for equality and non-discrimination of LGBTI people in companies. Europe cannot be an accomplice. They want LGBTI-free zones and we want a Europe free of hatred and homophobia.

Madam President, today Europe has nothing to celebrate. A Commission embracing the far right, Mrs von der Leyen, is being approved here today. And, in addition, you give him a vice-presidency, which is not just anything. Do you owe them that much to give them such an important position? We are going to vote "No". And it will be a resounding and clear 'No', because we will not be complicit in a Commission that is whitewashing the heirs of fascism and the blackest history of our Europe. Today they are going to adopt a Commission whose priorities are far removed from the needs of the social majority. We voted 'No' to a Commission that whitewashes those who deny the climate crisis, those who consent to genocide in Gaza while drumming war on our borders, those who do not defend public services, those who foment hatred, racism and xenophobia, those who criminalise the LGBTI community and, moreover, deny diversity and equality between women and men. Today, the workers of Europe, the citizens who dream of a fairer and greener Europe, have nothing to celebrate.

Madam President, first of all, all my solidarity with the victims of the DANA in Valencia and with my Valencian comrades, who have been on the front line fighting and helping their people. This tragedy has made two things clear to us: the infinite solidarity of the peoples and that it is the public services that save the people, responding to those who have lost everything. What Valencians and Valencians do not deserve is the embarrassing spectacle that we are seeing these last two weeks and that we have also been seeing for two days in this Parliament. I feel deeply ashamed. Are you not ashamed to use this misfortune for politics and for your own political interests? Because, in the face of the negligence of Mazón and his government, in the face of shameful climate change denialist speeches and in the face of far-right hoaxes, our response can only be one: social shield, social shield and more social shield. We need more public resources, better services, because the only plan to protect people and to face climate change – which is present here and is not a Chinese tale – is tax justice, because tax justice today allows more than 12 700 workers in Valencia to have their wages protected, even if they cannot go to work, because it is tax justice that allows 10.6 billion euros to be approved to help the families who need it most at the moment. But, of course, these aids have to come, Mr Marzà. They've got to get here! That tax justice is what they repudiate from the far right and the right, preventing fair taxes. We've been saying it for a long time: The debate is not about raising or lowering taxes, but about who should pay them. We are going to make those who have more contribute to recover Valencia. Valencia, we're with you.

Madam President, Commissioner, the most repeated word in your speech this morning was return, return and return. Is that really the short-sighted view we want to apply to migration management? Building prisons for refugees in Europe is barbaric: concentration camps for human beings whose only crime has been to flee to save their lives. Can you imagine that we would have done this with the Ukrainian people who fled the Russian invasion? Mrs von der Leyen has crossed a red line in exchange for a handful of votes. How far are we going to allow Mrs Meloni to govern Europe? The proposal to open Guantanamo in neighbouring countries that do not respect human rights is illegal, immoral and inhumane. The agreement between Italy and Albania violates access to the right of asylum and international law, violating the principle of non-refoulement. These innovative formulas that we are now inventing to outsource asylum and borders are, in reality, a violation of human rights and a failure already demonstrated for decades. Do you really want to innovate? Apply international law, act humanely, open up legal and safe ways for people not to risk their lives at sea: that is the only effective management of migration, consistent with the European principles and values that Mrs Meloni despises, which we seem to want to buy from her.

Mr President, Commissioner, having a home is no longer a possibility for everyone. Having a home has unfortunately become a privilege for only a few. Having a home will be something we tell, if we continue like this, to our daughters and grandchildren as a thing of the past. If we do not stop this, Commissioner - and you have a great challenge in this matter - we will have to explain to our sons and daughters why from this Parliament we did nothing to prevent housing from being a right hijacked by hedge funds, by vulture funds and by all the large housing containers. The commodification of housing particularly affects the young people of the European Union, our young people, and it is the great black hole through which the family economy of thousands and thousands of working families is going. Half of the salaries will be paid a rent like the one mentioned here, of a flat of sixty square meters for more than 1,200 € in any neighborhood on the outskirts of Madrid. This is a social emergency. It is our moral obligation to put in place a directive, from here, to be able to shield access to decent housing as the fundamental right that it is and as a protected public service, as we do with health or education. And this measure must be accompanied by funds so that it can be carried out. This weekend, the streets of Spain - the streets of Madrid and many other cities - are going to be a clamor, because we are going to demand housing as a right and not as a business. Citizens must be listened to. Let's listen to them and do something.

Mr President, in the 1980s we were able to tear down the Berlin Wall and today, precisely, internal borders are being rebuilt, which are walls to detain people. And I say it like this: to people, to human beings. With a perverse discourse that links immigration with security, not only the Schengen area is threatened, but also our values, our coexistence and respect for international law, including the right to asylum, which is a sacred right that protects us all. We cannot allow borders to be places of non-rights, of infra-rights, where human beings are criminalized. And I say it again: to human beings, who need protection and who arrive in Europe as they can because there are no legal and safe routes, because we do not put in place such measures. Europe must now choose between walls that isolate and separate us, as the far right wants - and is already demonstrating today in this House - or bridges of solidarity, cohesion and coexistence.