Speeches

Madam President, like many Members here, I was outraged by the appointment of Ms Scott Morton as Chief Economist in DG Competition. Ms. Scott Morton is not only an American citizen, when we have to hire European citizens, but Ms. Scott Morton is a lobbyist for Apple, Amazon and Microsoft. And to put a lobbyist in the institutions of the European Commission to fight the GAFAMs and supervise them is totally outrageous. I call on Ms Vestager and Ms von der Leyen to cancel this appointment, which runs counter to the European Parliament’s demands for our digital sovereignty.

Madam President, I will keep my proposal. But, of course, I think that we in this Parliament have a common interest in providing a better framework for the work of the Commission, which, on this subject, has seriously lacked transparency vis-à-vis the European Parliament.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, as you know, the President of the Commission is currently in Brazil. His visit follows previous visits by the European Commission and European Heads of State or Government. Last month we had two delegations from this Parliament: one from the Committee on International Trade and the other from the Delegation for relations with the Federative Republic of Brazil, and we have known for months and months that the Commission is speeding up negotiations in an attempt to conclude. We have the European Commission which has proposed what in English is called a side letter, or ‘additional protocol’, which has never been discussed in a transparent manner with this Parliament. And for a very long time this Parliament has not debated an agreement that will have a clear and potentially dramatic impact on the climate, biodiversity and farmers, both in the Mercosur countries and in Europe. On behalf of the Group of the Greens, I therefore demand that we finally have a debate in this institution on Mercosur, with the name you mentioned, Madam President, 'Commission Statement on Mercosur: Additional Instrument on Sustainability and Legal Architecture’, as the third item on the agenda on Wednesday afternoon.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, are we run by goldfish? Goldfish who have forgotten all the lessons of the war in Ukraine and who repeat the same economic and political complacency. Economic complacency: Olaf Scholz, who goes to Beijing to repeat the same nonsense with Xi Jinping’s China as with Putin’s Russia, where ultimately Volkswagen’s interests weigh more than the survival of the Uyghur people. Political complacency of Emmanuel Macron, who will also defend private interests, but in addition adds a completely frightening form of non-alignment. It created the division of Europe, weakened support for Taiwan and Ukraine and weakened the alliance of democracies. And today he is supported by the far right, friend of Bashar al-Assad and Putin, and by all those who are so anti-American that they are ready to support all anti-American dictatorships. It can't be that, and it can't be non-alignment as a concept that will solve all the ambiguities. The question is not who you are aligned with. The question is what we are aligned with. We need to be aligned with our values, so: Unity of Europe on Human Rights. And we need to be aligned with our interests, so: it is the ‘Buy European Act’, it is the embargo on all products made with forced labour, and it is finally a European budget for industry on the scale of what the United States is doing. This is what Europe is all about: not non-alignment, which means nothing, but being aligned with our values and together.

Madam President, I would like to remind our colleague that when we talk about 'Green Khmers', we are referring to the Khmer Rouge. And two million dead, victims of genocide. So I would like our colleague, if he does not apologize to the Green and Green MEPs, to at least apologize to the two million victims of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.

Mr President, Commissioner, there is an absence in this debate, and yet it is obvious: this is the question of geographical preference in our public procurement. We are making a text to react, in particular, to the "Buy American Act" and we are not talking about the "Buy European Act". We promise companies and jobs on European soil, but we do not give ourselves the means to prioritise European companies over our strategic sectors of digital, medicines, obviously agriculture and especially renewable energy. It is an issue of sovereignty, it is an issue of fair competition. I even hear people in the Commission or in this Chamber say: But we're going to go into a trade war! But since when do we enter a trade war when we use an instrument that everyone else uses? Let everyone else use it! We therefore need – and I hope, ladies and gentlemen, because we have tabled it – an amendment to include work on the ‘Buy European Act’. We need it for the energy transition. We need to demonstrate to European citizens that we want businesses and jobs in Europe to make this great transformation of the economy.

Madam President, Mr Vice-President of the Commission, in recent days the press has echoed a meeting between the European External Action Service and the Governor of Xinjiang, Mr Tuniyaz. We learned a few minutes ago that, at the initiative of the Governor of Xinjiang, this appointment was – only – postponed. How can a body of the European institutions meet the governor of Xinjiang, who is complicit in crimes against humanity, who is involved in genocide against the Uyghur people? I therefore ask you, Madam President, Mr Vice-President, to ensure respect for the Uyghur people and respect for the European Parliament, which has said that the accomplices of crimes against humanity and the genocidaires of the Uyghur people will not be able to meet the European institutions.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, it has been four months, four months since the assassination of Mahsa Amini. Four months that women – especially women, at risk of their lives – young people and the Iranian people are demonstrating for a revolution. A revolution with extraordinary courage. A revolution of consciences, a revolution of hearts, a revolution of bodies. A political revolution for democracy and freedoms. A revolution against a corrupt regime that oppresses, tortures, murders, condemns to death and executes. A revolution against a regime that is afraid of women. A regime that is afraid of men. A regime that is afraid of young people. A regime that fears freedoms and turns its fears into terror against the Iranian people. It is time to defend the forces of life in Iran, as we intend to do with this resolution. But to defend the forces of life in Iran, we must punish the militias for death. And the death militia is the body of the Revolutionary Guards. It is the most rotten branch of a corrupt regime. While this Parliament is doing its job, it is time for the Commission and the Council also to do their job of sanctioning this regime.

Madam President, Mr High Representative, the question is: Can we have normal relations with a country whose regime oppresses its population and organizes genocide against the Uyghurs? Two years ago, the European Commission, Chancellor Merkel and President Macron said yes by celebrating the investment agreement with China. A few days ago, Chancellor Scholz also answered in the affirmative, considering that 12 million German cars numbered more than 12 million Uighurs. Well, that is not the opinion of the European Parliament. Take forced labour as an example. When the European Commission proposes a gas plant, which we do not understand if it will be effective against forced labour, the European Parliament calls for an embargo on products made from forced labour. The European Parliament proposes to consider forced labour as a state policy of the Chinese regime. So what we, the European Parliament, are asking the European Commission to do is also do politics. This is not naivety, Mr High Representative, it is greed when we want to trade at the expense of our values. So, in the face of forced labour, let's make a real embargo, including on products from Xinjiang.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, of course, today we must step up sanctions, step up all aid to Ukraine in order to achieve Ukraine's military victory and an end to the atrocities. The High Representative told us how much what is at stake is a conflict of civilizations, a conflict of values already staged by Vladimir Putin. Unfortunately, this conflict of civilizations, this conflict of values, it is also within European societies and this plays on the indispensable unity of the European Union. Look at the whole far right trying today to rebuild their accommodations, their complacency with Putin using rising food prices, rising energy prices and social injustices in the service of their vision of values. So the European Commission, forgive me, but on the question of the decoupling between the price of gas and the price of electricity, you have been too late. We must act faster also on the taxation of superprofits. An example? Total has already paid in advance 2.6 billion euros to its shareholders. This is more than what France's budget puts on thermal renovation. If there is no social justice in the energy transition for the climate, if there is no social justice in the face of the war in Ukraine, then we will lose European unity, and the conflict of values, there is little chance that we will win it too.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, how can we describe the extraordinary movement that women and young people in Iran have so courageously carried out since the assassination of Mahsa Amini and so many others since then? Some people talk about revolt. No, it's a revolution. Not this Islamist revolution, that of the mullahs which is only a regression, this regime of oppression and corruption, this regime of assassinations, the imprisonment of demonstrators, human rights defenders, journalists. This regime of fear of women, of their submission by the veil and by the law. What we see with so much admiration is a revolution of consciences, hearts and bodies that can no longer suffocate and suffer. A revolution of liberation and civilization where women, by plucking their veil, carry the banner of freedom, equality, fraternity, sorority. Then the European Union must not compromise. It must punish the perpetrators of these crimes. Against those who carry terror, support those who defend the liberation of women. The fights and the values they carry are those of Europe: "Woman, life, freedom".

Madam President, Commissioner, there have been very strong words in this Chamber this morning, including from the President of the Commission. On the atrocities in Ukraine, on climate chaos, on European values, on human rights and of course on the absolute need to get out of fossil fuels. So there is a project that is totally the opposite of everything we said this morning: it is this project in Uganda and Tanzania. It is the violation of human rights, it is the destruction of the climate, the destruction of biodiversity. And there is an oil group that is the opposite of everything we said this morning: This is Total Energy. Total Energy complicit in war crimes in Ukraine. Total Energy complicit in human rights violations in Uganda and Tanzania. Total Energy guilty of environmental crimes. This Parliament and the European Commission must demand that France, its President and Government stop assisting diplomatically, politically, financially, militarily, Total Energy in Uganda and Tanzania. Total Energy must emerge from impunity and irresponsibility. We are there in the responsibility and responsibility of the climate.

Mr President, Commissioner, a year and a half ago, the Commission and the Council presented the investment agreement with China as a success when there was already persecution and repression in Hong Kong. Almost a year ago to the day, this parliament blocked the discussion on the investment agreement with China and forced the Commission to include the issue of forced labour in the European debate. This is good news, and today we are indeed both strengthening corporate responsibility, but also thinking about a much more powerful and systematic instrument on forced labour, which affects 25 million workers, especially women workers, around the world. It is all the better if European trade policy starts to evolve. But in Xinjiang, forced labour is not just modern slavery, it is an instrument that participates in a genocidal strategy. And so we must immediately and very quickly, at European level, impose an embargo on imports from Xinjiang, where all sectors are affected by forced labour. An embargo on Xinjiang imports!

Madam President, Mr Vice-President, there is no French minister to greet, obviously, they will have really marked their absence permanently in this presidency of the European Union. We have an extraordinary opportunity, with carbon border adjustment, finally to have a climate policy that lives up to our carbon footprint by taking into account imports. And then, it's an extraordinary opportunity to set up a virtuous circle. Our industry will innovate, innovate in low carbon. Potentially, we will reindustrialize, create jobs around the fight against climate change. But for that, we must be up to the task of implementing carbon border adjustment. And, Mr Vice-President, as you yourself know, the Commission knows, as the Court of Auditors knows, these free quotas have been rotting our climate ambition for years and years. They are rotting the industry's ability to innovate, to have revenues to finance the climate transition. So, in that moment, I am appealing to my colleagues. We must vote as the Environment Committee did on maximum 2030 for the end of free allowances. On the expansion of the sectors impacted and on aid to the least developed countries. Let us rise to the challenge, let us stand with the European Commission and, I hope, with the Council at some point, on an ambition commensurate with the climate challenge.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, at this very moment, in the streets, in homes, Ukrainians are heroically defending freedom. They defend their democracy, they defend their territorial integrity. They are, for the whole of Europe, the front for security, peace and democracy on our continent. So let us massively sanction Putin and the oligarchs and immediately include Belarus in these sanctions. Let us support the resistance in Ukraine militarily. Let us recognise the status of candidate for Ukraine for the European Union. Let us banish Russia from the entire international community. Let us launch a major investment plan for climate and energy security, to put renewable energies at the heart of our mix, because they are energies of peace, and to get out of the energy dependencies and political complacency that kill democracy and that kill the climate. Let’s act now and be proud of Europe alongside Ukraine’s heroic resistance. Slava Ukraini.

Madam President, Mr President of the Republic, you have undoubtedly made a beautiful speech. Everything was there: economic sovereignty, European values, the civilisation project, even climate and biodiversity. Except that, Mr President of the Republic, you have been President of France for five years and, as such, you are accountable for a balance sheet – a balance sheet for France and a balance sheet for Europe. We all know it here: Global warming is the biggest challenge facing humanity today. Mega-fires, floods, drought, heatwaves... All over the world, all over Europe, we are hit in our very conditions of existence. But fighting for the climate is not just a survival imperative. It can be, if Europe decides, an extraordinary opportunity to restore meaning to our economy, to innovate, to create quality jobs, to develop our territories sustainably, to rebuild a just, solidarity-based, caring and democratic society. This is the path we environmentalists have chosen. Mr President, you are following another path, that of a climatic alliance with Poland and Hungary. You are promoting gas to save a bankrupt nuclear power plant and thereby sacrificing Europe’s climate ambition. You will remain in history, Mr President of the Republic, as the president of climate inaction. Because deep down, you are a climate-arranger. You prefer to sign armistices with the lobbies rather than wage the war against climate change. You prefer to procrastinate, like Meryl Streep in the movie Don’t Look Up, postpone, give up, fantasize about solutions in 10, 15 or 20 years rather than decree, as we want to do, the general mobilization. This general mobilisation is awaited by young people. This youth so terrified by the ecological catastrophe. And yet, this youth so strong in its creativity, inventiveness, diversity and commitments to climate and social justice. Mr President, you have rightly said how Europe is an unfinished project of civilisation and, that is the meaning of civilisation, a project of peace, a project of fundamental freedom, a project of human rights and democracy. So why, almost a year ago to the day, were you celebrating the investment deal with China, putting our businesses at risk in the face of China’s predatory appetite? You were celebrating this agreement when the Chinese regime bloodily repressed the protesters in Hong Kong, when the Chinese regime perpetrated, and continues to perpetrate, genocide against the Uighurs. Six years ago, Mr President, six years ago – and you were so right – you praised Angela Merkel’s courage in welcoming Syrian refugees. You know that: On 24 November, 27 migrants drowned in the English Channel, joining the thousands of deaths on our borders. Among the victims was Mariam. Mariam is a 24-year-old Kurd – an Iraqi Kurd, those Kurds who fought so bravely against the Islamic State and whom the West has abandoned. This Kurd, Mariam, joined her fiancé. She was driven only by the desire to live and love. She drowned. So why, Mr President, do you decide every day in Calais to tear up tents, to humiliate these survivors, to mistreat them, to condemn them to despair? Mr President of the Republic, stop listening to the smoky and nauseating theories of ‘great replacement’. Take care of the scientific reality of great warming. In truth, you have understood, Mr President, that we have a fundamental divergence on the Europe we want. Our Europe will never be yours, that of climate renunciation, that of glyphosate, that of the unhindered circulation of goods, services and finance, that of walls, barbed wire, watchtowers and humiliations for women and men. Our Europe will never be the one that gives in, in this very forum, on the right to abortion, with your liberals, with the socialists, the conservatives and the far right! Mr President, our Europe will always be one of innovation, one of democracy, one of dignity, one of freedoms, one of the future, one of youth! Well, I hope, Mr President, that this Europe... (The President withdrew the floor to the speaker)

Mr President, Mr Vice-President, Mr Representative of the Council, ladies and gentlemen, it does little to say that the agreement reached in Glasgow is very far from what is necessary. There is a gap between the agreement and the expectations, the demands of European citizens and the citizens of the world; a gap between the agreement and science; a gap between the agreement and what Europeans and global citizens experienced this summer, especially in terms of climate change. Of course, Europe is doing better than the rest of the world. But we have been saying for 20 years, 25 years, that Europe is doing better than the rest of the world, and that is enough. Well, no, that's not enough. Of course, Europe has not played a leading role, including in ending fossil fuel subsidies. How could Europe, with what it voted on the CAP yesterday, a climate change CAP? And how could Europe when it is so divided on taxonomy? I have never seen five environment ministers denounce France, Poland and other European countries in a COP. I have never seen Europe so divided and Europe held hostage by nuclear and gas. So it is time for the Commission and the Council and Parliament to do their work. The European climate ambition should not be dictated by the nuclear and gas lobby.

Mr President, Commissioner, Council representative, ladies and gentlemen, as we know, the planet is burning with megafires, it is sinking with floods and every European, every European, is now feeling climate change in its flesh. But we too often forget the famine in Madagascar or the floods in India. Yet we are only 1.2 degrees of global warming. At the current rate, 1.5 degrees is not for the end of the century, but for the end of the decade. If all commitments, all promises are kept, it will be 2.5 degrees and disaster. If we do not act, it will be 3.5 degrees and chaos. The IPCC tells us all about the responsibilities and the origin of this climate change. But what matters to us here is political responsibility, and today what prevents us from having a benevolent future for ourselves and our children is political conformity, complacency or, all too often, alienation from powerful lobbies, old-world lobbies, dirty energy lobbies or intensive agriculture. We see it every day from a political point of view: the common agricultural policy is not compatible, the trade policy is not compatible with our climate agenda. And what we have today are victims of climate change, victims of the energy crisis. So we need to invest in energy savings, in renewable energy. And if there is to be a war in Glasgow, it is the end of fossil fuel subsidies. At global level, at European level, 50 billion or 100 billion public subsidies to fossil fuels are unacceptable! For us, for our children, put an end to fossil fuel subsidies.

Madam President, Commissioner, Council representative, ladies and gentlemen, this is not the first scandal and yet we still have 11 trillion euros that are not taxed. They escape taxation because of the indecency, immorality and impunity of a number of our leaders, including a European Prime Minister – the Czech Prime Minister –, senior officials or business owners. At the same time, there has been the pandemic and the explosion of hunger in the world, affecting 10% of the world’s population. We were told that there was not enough public money to finance hospitals, doctors and nurses. Today we are told that there is not enough public money to isolate housing and address the energy crisis. Obviously, all this is unbearable. This generates populism and mistrust of politics. So there is no inevitability. There is no inevitability to tax evasion. There is no inevitability to corruption. There is, of course, no inevitability to the opacity of shell companies and registers. Commissioner, we need full transparency on registers and shell companies: who leads them, who hides behind them, who benefits from them. No inevitability to tax havens. We have had a European Council which has succeeded in reducing the blacklist of tax havens at the time when these tax havens are listed in the Pandora Papers. There is still no end to unanimity in the Council on taxation. And when I hear that the Czech Prime Minister is supported by his fellow European leaders, including President Macron, it is clear that the European Council is not in a position to fight tax havens. How many tax havens in Europe? Ireland, the Netherlands, Malta, Cyprus and all these countries contribute to tax evasion. There is, of course, no inevitability in capital control either. Billions return and leave the European Union without being precisely verified as to their origin and whether they have paid the tax. So no, no fatality to tax crimes, no fatality to impunity, no fatality to the end of solidarity and democracy.