Debate contributions by Maria GRAPINI

Mr President, Minister, Commissioner, very important words have been used here: competitiveness, innovative industry, jobs, raising living standards. I hope that next week's Council is not like that, just to tick the Draghi report and talk about competitiveness. How can we do, Commissioner, how can we do, Minister, with energy that is three times more expensive than in the United States? How can we have the same equality that was talked about here, in the single market, for which we no longer even have a portfolio? For the first time, the Commission does not have a portfolio for the Single Market, when we have a fragmented Single Market. Besides the costs we have with energy, entrepreneurs in my country also have costs with the state for hours at the border, because we are not in Schengen. Do you propose, Minister, by the end of the mandate, to discuss this issue as well, that we no longer have two spaces in the European Union, Schengen and non-Schengen? Do you propose not to introduce border controls in the countries that are now in Schengen? This is what we can talk about in order to have competitiveness, to have economic growth, to have secure jobs and, of course, to have an increase in living standards.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, this is possible! If we act, we can. This Apple penalty is an example that we have to go down this path, to recover the money, tax evasion. I voted for a lot of things here: profit to be taxed at large companies, where they do it, to pursue tax havens, not to kill SMEs, because when we protect these tax evasions at large companies, obviously we no longer have, as you said, Commissioner, equal ground in the internal market. I want to congratulate the Commissioner, who managed, at the end of her mandate, to do this extremely good thing, which can also be taken so that, if you want, a prevention for others, to stop doing these things. And yes, maybe the money we are recovering now, during this period – we also have the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, we also have OLAF – from evasion, should go to, look, the people who are now suffering from calamities.

Mr President, Commissioner, first of all, let me express my condolences to the families of Romania and other Eastern countries who have lost loved ones and sympathy for those who are now standing in the water and in the rain and without homes. Commissioner, you said, among other things, that we need to make an assessment of the impact on farmers and reduce the effects of floods. I ask you, after five years, do you think that everything has been done to put into practice concrete measures to adapt to climate change? You believe that the common agricultural policy, which I have asked many times to be changed, to be fair - the farmers in my country have another subsidy - is not a common agricultural policy, and I ask you specifically, Commissioner, you have probably heard that in Romania animals, sheep, because of diseases, the answer I received from the AGRI Committee was that we do not have a vaccine, we do not have solutions. What shall we say? I'm going to meet the farmers tomorrow. Tell them what? Leave something for the next commissioner?

Mr President, Commissioner, we have discussed here and there have been pros and cons on the issue of the Hungarian card and the Schengen area. I'm not going to add anything. I will relate to what a colleague said: "the biggest conquest is the Schengen area" and on this statement I will put a question to the Commission and a question to the Minister. Commissioner, I know that it is not you who should give the answer, but this House has voted seven resolutions for my country, Romania, to be in the Schengen area. If this is the greatest conquest, then why are Romanians, millions of Romanians and Bulgarians, kept out of space? Maybe the Schengen area is safer if they come... (The President interrupted the speaker) I have a question for the Minister I just met today. Minister, all the states that have held the presidency, at least since 2014, since I have been here, have committed in plenary that yes, until the end of the mandate, Romania will be in Schengen. What can you tell us from this point of view? What can I say to the people of my country?

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I can only begin by offering my condolences to the families who have lost their lives in the countries of the East. There are 8 dead in my country. It is a disaster if one doubts the magnitude of the disaster. Look at the pictures: children who remove mud from school; soldiers, gendarmes, volunteers work to take people out on their arms. Commissioner, maybe you are listening to me, it is important not to call for solidarity, but to do it by deeds. That is why I believe that funds must be allocated immediately, not as much as we have in the budget, but as much as we need, because nothing is more important than people's lives. They can't stand in the cold, in the rain, in tents. Commissioner, and I challenge you, tell the President, let us all show solidarity. Donate your allowance for a month. We calculated and we would make 1,000 houses if we all donated the allowance for a month. People also need support through deeds and to increase confidence that we are not only debating and apologizing or praying for them here, but making concrete helpers. Not every single country will be able to cope on its own, and you must immediately give the money.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, we are talking about a subject that is extremely important, because on energy, you know, Commissioner, competitiveness depends, the possibility of reindustrialisation depends and, in the end, people's lives depend. That's why I allow myself to say something from the Draghi report. Mr Draghi tells us here that Europe's fundamental values are prosperity, fairness, freedom and peace. If we take them in a row, we don't really have them, because if the cost of energy is two or three times higher in Europe than in the United States, in my country, in the east, than in the west, we don't really have the possibility of prosperity for very many citizens. We have no equity, we have no freedom, because poor people, from my point of view, cannot be free, and there is no peace. What do I think, as an engineer and former industrialist? Commissioner, the pace at which we are moving from conventional to green energy must be managed in such a way that we can invest, as Mr Mario Draghi said, to be able to change technologies. No, we're not tearing down the house until we build another one. Then, I would ask a concrete question: you said ‘50 % of carbon-free sources’; we have reached 50% of carbon-free sources, but then why is energy more expensive? And we must stop having two Europes, as Mr Macron wanted, we must have a single energy market.

You talked about the Draghi report, which I also listened to carefully. My question is: one point in the Draghi report is that we have strong education and health systems in Europe, and it said this as a strong point in the report – do you agree that we have strong education and health systems? From my point of view, precisely here is the weak point and, if we are talking about competitiveness, without a strong education system and without a strong health system, we cannot reach competitiveness.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, it is sad that we are witnessing fake news live. Colleagues from the far right called this document, which has been extensively worked on, censorship, although the Commissioner announced from the outset that there was no moderation of the content. I know this document very well, as Vice-Chair of the Committee on the Internal Market, and I tell you with all my faith: I believe that you have either not read the document or you are creating fake news as you have created in your country to be elected. We want to remove, through this regulation, in fact, illegal activities and the spread of disinformation, which disrupts all elections, which disrupts, if you will, the scale of values in any European state and in the European Union. So it is sad for me today, when we should be discussing differently – how we apply in each Member State and how we apply this uniformly, that no more children die. There were children who committed suicide precisely through falsely transmitted information. There were women raped, there were people killed for money. So, dear colleagues, read before you speak.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I condemn from the outset, I condemn war and the killing of innocent people. Romanians are also dying there because part of Ukraine... in Ukraine, part of the historical territories were Romania's. What I want to say, Commissioner, is: I was very attentive to communication. I believe that we need to change the way we communicate in order to have the support of the citizens. Summing up sums of money that we give without explaining to citizens why Romania, my country, has helped Ukraine more than, perhaps, sometimes, it has helped its own citizens, because we understand that we need to help – the question is what is the European Union doing, what pressure is it putting on the UN, the United States, the other world powers to get Russia to stop this aggression and mass killing of people? This is important for the citizens to know, because otherwise we will not have the support of the citizens. We don't give money out of our own pockets. We give money to citizens, in fact, and we have to stop this hideous... the most hideous form of manifestation is war.

Mr President, you have said what is right and what is wrong from your point of view. What needs to be done? Tell the Commission, tell us, what are the steps to stop the slaughter. Because it's... (The President interrupted the speaker) You have said what is right and what is wrong from your point of view, but what is the concrete measure or what are the concrete measures? Tell them here: What do we have to do to stop the slaughter? Because that's what this is all about. Should we let Ukraine be conquered by the Russians or give nothing more? What needs to be done? That's essential, that it's easy to make a statement. You have to say from your point of view what needs to be done.

Commissioner, President, ladies and gentlemen, we are discussing an extremely important document, we are talking about the future of agriculture. Commissioner, you have made some very important points, but know that there is still the concern of the European Agricultural Community and I will tell you why. You talked about fair incomes for farmers. Well, how can they have fair revenues when, on the one hand, they do not have money for investments, on the other hand, they have permanent unfair competition in the internal market? I have been Vice-Chair of the Committee on the Internal Market for 10 years and I am fighting for all products, not to have unfair competition. On the other hand, you talked about the bureaucratic burden. Do you know how many hundreds of pages a small farmer has to submit when he has to access a national or European fund? Very many ... enhanced veterinary supervision: In my country, animals die, in the last commission, because I have here the members of the commission, it was said: “We don’t have a vaccine”. How do we protect the farmers? How do we protect agriculture? The CAP also needs to be reformed. You were talking about fair incomes, but shouldn't we also have fair subsidies to farmers? My country has been a member since 2007 and has other subsidies than the other farmers. In conclusion, I believe that this document must be worked with farmers and put in place concrete measures so that we can really reach an internal agricultural market that will ensure our food future, for us, for the European Union.