Speeches

Mr. President! Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, you are here, and you are here, dear Commission. What do you really want? In future, will the circular economy be the formula for all waste treatment in the EU? That we use international trade as a lever for environmentally sound waste treatment worldwide? That the paper jungle is replaced by digitalisation that frees up resources for more innovation in the sector? That we tackle environmentally harmful waste treatment, whether within or outside the EU immediately? That we only ship waste to non-OECD countries when we know that they can carry and want the task? Creating better conditions for research and innovation in waste technologies? That we consistently tackle the waste crime that is now easier to commit than it is now to avoid getting speeding fines on the German car lanes? And that we are looking closely at the challenge of exporting plastic waste, so we are really pushing the development of sustainable, circular use of plastic in ways that the rest of the world can live on? What would you prefer? No, you do not have to choose, because you can have it all with the proposal that the European Parliament is now putting forward as our proposal to revise the Waste Transport Regulation. The results have been achieved through a negotiation that has been characterized by respect for the technical complexity of the older and very linearly oriented law, which so much needed to be updated and get into today's climate reality. All political negotiators deserve a great deal of thanks for their cooperation, because we have certainly not been in agreement all along. But instead of fighting blindly, we have opened our eyes to the real opportunities and mechanics of the waste sector and the law that governs being an open economy in trade with the rest of the world. In this way, we have seen the possibilities of finding balanced and pragmatic solutions that are both ambitious and realistic and full of professionally sound arguments that provide us with a safe and self-confident starting point for negotiations with the Council. We got a pretty good proposal from the Commission, but we want more than that. Against this background, we have created a broad and coherent set of amendments that address all actors needed for waste transport to become a sustainable link in the circular economy. Thus, everyone from national authorities to the recipients of the recycled waste resources must be best placed to play each other strong and more innovative, and the balance between different stakeholders, both environmental and climate, resource and economic, must be found so that together we can future-proof ourselves. Because now that we know that the EU's waste exports have only increased over the last several years, even 75% between 2004 and 2020, and when we know that it is our waste that, in many places, floats stray on beaches and landfills far away from Europe, then there is no excuse for not doing anything about it. A significant part of this waste is plastic. And when, in other proposals that are currently on the tables of our various committees in this House, we are working to reduce our consumption of unnecessary plastic, then it is natural that we should also address our exports of this. But it has also been a prerequisite for me that it happens in a way that is realistic and supports innovation and development of business models that are truly innovative and develop business models that are truly sustainable and circular in their dealings with plastic. It is simply not a matter of simply moving a problem from one place to another, but of turning a problem into a resource here in the European Union and, in the long term, throughout the world. I am personally very proud and grateful for that part of our many proposals. With these introductory words, I look forward to the debate and, in particular, hope to hear the Commission welcome our amendments and constructively go to the upcoming trilogue negotiations. Thank you.

Madam President! We have invented so many deep plates in the EU. There are also many new energy technologies that are better for the climate and the environment. We just don't have enough of them. For many reasons. Too many reasons. Because we are messing around with one-off projects that are unrelated to the rest of the energy sector. Both in the Member States, but also across them. We are messing with too low a rate of approval of critical infrastructure, and we are messing with political signals, regulatory instability and the sizes of possible investment projects to such an extent that even European investors would rather spend their money outside the EU when it comes to green investment projects. It hurts to say that! So, dear Commission and Council, as my colleague, Maria Carvalho, said at the beginning of the debate: "Make a plan and get started!" For what is the use of having large parks of giant wind turbines, building groups of energy islands, building large Power-to-X plants, etc., if the clean and renewable energy that can be produced cannot reach the market across the EU via plenty of piping, learning opportunities, ports and other transport routes? In this way, we will never get energy prices down and security of supply up. It's so banal. So, clean up, set the pace and start now!

Madam President! A resolution on diabetes? Yeah, why not. After all, it has been ten years since the last one and the challenges have not diminished, nor has the scale diminished. Today, 33 million people in the EU have diabetes, and by 2030, 38 million will have it. Most of them are related to lifestyle: How much we eat, what we eat, sleep, move, and so on. Everything we try to prevent or ban - depending on political standpoint. But also depending on whether we dare to shift gears in the diabetes debate and understand that diabetes is a symptom that we have not yet understood that severe obesity is often the cause. A reason that is NOT about the fact that everyone with overweight has chosen it and can change it themselves. No, being overweight or precancerous is actually a chronic condition that almost 60 percent of adults in the EU have. That's a wild number. A chronic disorder that many never get rid of again - no matter how much they change their diet or move differently. A chronic disorder that still lives under the cover of our fear of talking about being overweight. A chronic condition, which therefore contributes to an increasing number of citizens developing diabetes, which could actually have been avoided. A chronic ailment that costs the box! They also lost their quality of life. As a nurse - and as a European politician - I am simply tired of treating selected diseases without addressing the very cause of the more than 200 other diseases - besides diabetes - that weigh on the individual, the family and the economy. However, let us recognise throughout the European Union - as the WHO has proposed a long time ago - that obesity is a chronic condition and must also be treated as a chronic condition.

Mr. President! There are so many things to say over and over and over again. But we must never stop, we must deliver, including a strong decision as a reminder of all that we are going to achieve in Egypt next month. And this year we are actually very well prepared, because we have made a more concrete and actionable decision than ever before. And it is important at a time when more and more citizens are losing confidence that we politicians can figure out how to come together for solutions instead of competing for who is the most green in our mouths. Let me therefore highlight two of the important, firm messages of this year's COP decision. One is about the fact that water is a critical, challenged and challenging resource that we simply need to get better at tackling. We must do everything we can to make our society more water-smart in the true and diverse sense of the word. Secondly, and very briefly, it is gratifying that there is a great deal of focus and proposals on small and medium-sized enterprises and the competitiveness of the European Union. Both as topics for the green transition, but also as a tool for the green transition and the path to achieving the Paris Agreement.

Madam President! Ocean Governance - i.e. the area of policies and activities relating to the sea and coastal areas and the abundance of marine resources - is now receiving a report from the European Parliament. It does so, among other things, because for too many years we have not prioritised marine biodiversity and opportunities high enough. We must not continue to do so, because in the long term it is about the survival of the planet, and in the short term it is about the Europe that our children and grandchildren will take over from us. But also because much of our economic and ecological sustainability depends on how we treat the seas in and around the EU. The report has become rather long because it repeats a great deal of what we have already said that we agree on in relation to biodiversity. But it also says something new and important, namely that we need to boost the roll-out of wind energy – also the floating part of it. Of course, we must also continue to drill wisely in the seabed, so that we can get hold of the energy we simply cannot do without right now. We must also continue to drill wisely in the seabed to create development for CO2 rather than storage. Several analyses show that this can easily be done without destroying marine ecosystems. And then, in general, we must adopt a much more innovative approach to the treasures and opportunities of the sea. The blue economy, with shipping, tourism and as yet unknown and not widely used green technologies, must be given more focus, and they will hopefully get that with this report.

Madam President! Since this year's State of the Union speech does not mention industrial policy in a single word, we must, of course, do so, and that is why it is good that we now have a broad and solid blanket of recommendations on how the EU develops and maintains our economic muscle. The muscle that must enable us to do all the good and indispensable for each other and the next generation such as the climate, nature, the education of our children and young people, social safety nets, peace and freedom, which must never lack resources because we have not cared for our economic muscle. The report's chief negotiator stresses the importance of cooperation with public and private companies. And the report says a great deal about research and innovation. All are essential ingredients. It is also a regulatory respite for legislation, as my fellow Members have also mentioned in their speeches. However, no one has yet mentioned the patent rights, the IP rights. Inventors, entrepreneurs, businesses throw astronomical amounts into developing ideas that they never know will ever come to fruition. It is of no use that IP rights in the EU are worse than those of our global competitors. So if the Commission is to start in a good place, on what you now get with our industrial strategy, then grab the IP rights. We must not dilute them.

Mr President! Ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner Gabriel. "We shape our buildings and then they shape us," Winston Churchill said. But as the daughter of a carpenter and a nurse, I also grew up precisely in the logic that people and bricks influence each other. In fact, I have also been an expert on how architecture affects people who are hospitalised or people with dementia living in a nursing home for many years, so the Bauhaus concept makes perfect sense. But it must also create value for ordinary people and the generations after us. It should not be an elitist tasting judging something as more Bauhaus-like than anything else, without it being able to qualify its starting point and its essence in evidence-based methods. That is why I am very pleased that the report that we are now presenting from the European Parliament to the Commission contains specific proposals on how to get more knowledge, more facts, so that we can create the value that the Bauhaus can do for the European Union.

Mr. President! Energy efficiency has long been known as the most cost-effective way to reduce CO2 so that we reach the climate target on time. Now it has also been recognised that energy efficiency is indeed a powerful weapon to defeat the EU's energy dependence on Russia and other hostile suppliers. And every week, families and large and small businesses across the EU feel that energy can – and must – be saved so that money can be spent at a time when not only energy prices are raging against the sky. Energy efficiency has thus become an indispensable instrument in all countries, all businesses and all families, against an unfortunate background and with an excessively long lead-up, and this takes the revision we are now proposing seriously. We have made a broad agreement, and we have put our arms in the right places, so that we now have high ambitions, plenty of tools and all the flexibility that it is only reasonable to make available, when we also say to the countries that now nationally binding targets apply, so that no country can hide behind others, so that some of the countries must draw a greater load than most. That is the best part of our agreement, for which I would like to thank you, on behalf of the EPP Group. And I look forward to a swift and effective negotiation with the Council.

Mr President! So, if we are now pouring natural gas and nuclear energy out of the EU's taxonomy for sustainable investment, what does that really mean? That we, like those who adopted the world’s most ambitious climate law on behalf of voters only two years ago, are now pushing the goal of climate neutrality far into the future – far beyond the promised 2050! Then we are also the ones who, despite better and scientific knowledge, bind the EU to coal and oil for longer than is good and possible. In fact, with the taxonomy in hand, we can demand that gas plants that receive investments with the taxonomy use 100 per cent renewable or low-carbon gas by 2036. Are we really going to say no to this opportunity? And should we ignore the fact that the IPCC recommends that we include nuclear energy on an equal footing with other types of renewable energy? And should we turn our backs on the EU's own research centre, which last year concluded that nuclear energy is a sustainable type of energy? No, of course we should not, and that is why we should say no to saying no!

I have the supplementary question and the invitation to the Commissioner that I think you should deal with the fact that the markets are asking for a new chapter to be created in the taxonomy for 'enabling technologies'. It's missing! We don't have that yet. I also think that you should listen to the fact that many stakeholders are asking for fast-track approval procedures in the Commission in relation to the new innovative solutions, which look different from what your employees are used to seeing. It's not working yet, and I would like an answer on whether you can answer the market at COP-15?

Thank you for being here, Commissioner Sinkevičius. Now the COP is very much about agreeing on high ambitions, but it is also about reaching out to each other with tools and with initiatives. And I would like to hear - because we haven't talked about that much in this debate: What will the European Commission send signals to researchers, to entrepreneurs and to investors about what kind of community it is, what kind of agile cooperation we would very much like to have in the EU, also with researchers and companies who are inviting new solutions – for example biological solutions such as biological pesticides instead of chemical pesticides, more digitisation – also of our food production, so that we are better able to take care of both the climate and the environment with an impact on biodiversity? What will be the message to those investors and companies that we simply cannot afford to lose from the EU, so that we can make the difference to the world that we would like.

Mr President! This is not the easiest task, but it is also the EU's biggest and most important task to date. What we vote on must work so that we comply with our part of the Paris Agreement and live up to our own climate law, without destroying our cohesion or our economy. It's time to show the rest of the world how 27 independent countries can help each other with what no country on this planet can do alone. Through the work we have had many elevator trips down the toolboxes of the individual directives. We have discussed ambitions and goals, and we have forced ourselves into the details. Thankfully. Because it is necessary, even if it is difficult. That's politics too. Especially politics, which must not only suit its own country, its own voters or its own climate-political one-liners, which may sound green, but cannot keep the litmus test of whether they can now also function in the complex realities of reality. The CO2 targets must be met and the outcome of our votes will determine whether we succeed. Not only because CO2 is actually reduced as agreed, but also because we do it in ways that make our economy and competitiveness bigger, stronger and healthier. The green transition is not only necessary, it is also costly. And without money, it hurts, even on everything else we would like to be able to afford in the future: health, defence, research, migration. And then we also have a war in Europe and the energy crisis. The outcome of the vote is still uncertain. The compromises that lie on the table seem to balance on the knife edge to do what it takes. Let's hope we vote with reason.

Mr President! It has been many years since it was the men who earned the money and the women who spent it. Fortunately, this division of labour belongs to another time, and today each of us can, will and must relate to how the economy is connected. For the EU, the conscious use of society's economic muscle is crucial in order for us to be able to afford, into an increasingly uncertain future, everything we want and what we need to be able to afford to protect: the climate, the environment, health and, not least, freedom, democracy and peace. That is also what is at stake when, with this report, we consider that Europe has become a continent with a low level of entrepreneurship - especially when it comes to female entrepreneurs. In fact, in the EU, women account for only 30% of start-up entrepreneurs and only 34% of all self-employed. This has a negative impact on the EU's competitiveness, our capacity for innovation, sustainable growth and job creation. I have been an entrepreneur myself, and I have been a business owner for 12 years, and I know from my own experience that there are plenty of women who would like a life as entrepreneurs. It is women who can create business models, workplaces and corporate cultures that are more fit for the future than those we have seen so far. But there are some significant barriers and challenges that need to be removed now. First of all, far too many women think they are less competent than they actually are. Often, women are quite well dressed for the task as self-employed. They just don't know, they have too low entrepreneurial confidence and find it difficult to get an overview of what they need to know and be able to do, and where to get what they may be missing. Therefore, the report makes several recommendations to promote competence building through entrepreneurship programmes, training and networks. Both the Commission and several Member States have launched entrepreneurship programmes, and there are indications that this has a positive effect. But we still know far too little and need more data so that we can see exactly what is working. Just as it is important to learn more about entrepreneurial women's motivation and drive - and not least to recognise, promote and make visible the role models. Secondly, there are far too many investors who have not found out that it is even a very good business to give women entrepreneurs a financial boost. Men receive the vast majority of capital in the EU. Startups, which have only men as founders, in 2018 received as much as 93% of all the money invested in, for example, the tech industry. In contrast to what it says, women's companies actually have a higher turnover despite a lower investment. This underlines that there is huge potential in investing in women's business models, and our report must match that potential with the many solutions that have been proposed to us in an incredibly good cooperation between the political groups over the last few months. I would like to acknowledge this with a big thank you. Finally, of all that we are proposing, I would like to emphasise that gender-sensitive investor networks should be set up, preferably networks that, in their design, bring investors closer to the everyday lives of entrepreneurs. The whole ecosystem needs to be activated and everyone needs to know where they find each other when they need it. Let me also conclude with a pledge to the Member States and to the responsibility that you have and in which the European Union should not interfere: that life as an entrepreneur, whether for a man or for a woman, is also about that there is a proper work-life balance and an everyday life that is connected to private life and especially to the family with children. Many of you can do better. Unfortunately, in 2020, more of us knew someone who closed their business than we knew someone who started a business. It's just not going to work. We need to nurture and nurture and develop the breeding ground for much more entrepreneurship in the EU. We are now voting on the report in the European Parliament and I hope that we will get at least 83% to vote in favour, because that was the excellent result that we achieved in the Committee on Women's Rights and Gender Equality when it voted on it.

Madam President! A lot of decisions need to be made in the European Union in order for us to be able to get out of the energy crunch that Putin has put on us. Today's debate makes no difference if we don't act on it – and we act on what we know works. We've known for a long time: The less energy we use, the better for our wallet, for the environment, for the climate, for health, for productivity. And now we understand that energy is also a security policy that could potentially turn off the lights of our free and rich world. Therefore, it is urgent to have the revision of the Energy Efficiency Directive implemented, and here the rule applies that it is not enough to sprinkle higher targets with a loose hand. Ambition alone does not do this. This is done by tools that respond to the fact that energy efficiency improvements require skilled labour, competent advice, funding and flexibility in order for each and every country in the EU to get started in ways that work for it. The directive must therefore be crammed with tools that are concrete, accessible, clear and logical. The worst thing in crisis and war is having to do things in ways that don't work and don't make sense. Hopefully we can agree with the Council before next winter sets in. We simply have to!

Madam President! Ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner. Right now, I am preparing the European Parliament's proposal for an absolutely necessary revision of the Waste Transport Regulation. It must have a circular economy in its DNA, and digitisation must replace the old-fashioned paper milling, which hinders a harmonised and sustainable internal market for the transport of waste. Also textile waste - of which we have everything, too much in the EU and in the world around us. That is why I welcome the Commission's initiative for a strategy for sustainable textiles. But I also agree with the impatient criticism of Mr Ehler and Mr Fiocchi. The challenge is great, and it is necessary, because only 1% of the world's clothes are recycled into new clothes. 1%! And along the way in the overly linear life of textiles, huge amounts of water are used. Too much water. And raw materials. And energy. It just doesn't work anymore! Moreover, there are indeed enormous business opportunities for the EU to solve these very problems that no one in the world has yet found the solution to. The textile industry is already huge. 160 000 small and medium-sized enterprises and 1.5 million jobs in the EU alone. This means that the EU can - and must, if we want to - show the rest of the world how. The textile industry is so global. This provides a good opportunity to show the way forward and thereby strengthen European competitiveness and technological leadership. Therefore, it is also important that we take a systematic and ambitious approach to the task. We need to find new production methods and processes, new designs and new materials. We need research and we need to support innovation much more. And then we must give the single market a shake-up, so that the entire value chain in the textile industry - from the designer to the consumer - puts climate and the environment at the centre in a truly sustainable way. Yes - the necessity and the possibilities are enormous. These are also the expectations of the Commission's proposal. This time: Please don't fuck us.

Madam President! Used batteries have long been problematic for our environment. Therefore, this is not the first time that batteries are on the agenda here in the European Parliament. This time, however, it is different, because since the last time we have really understood what circular economy can do and how central batteries are in the green transition. We must therefore create ecosystems for batteries so that they stay in orbit away from harming nature, our health and safety. In this way, they become raw materials that can get a ride more or more in a new battery in circulation, supporting the EU's self-sufficiency chains of what we cannot do without when there is turmoil in the markets and when we have to show respect for the fact that nature's resources are not infinite. That's really good! What is also good is that we strengthen the efforts for the environment and increase consumer safety by distinguishing much more clearly between which types of batteries should be replaced by whom. And then we strengthen and structure the internal market for batteries and ensure a level playing field. This is done with ambitious standards and harmonised rules, and it will give the European battery sector much better conditions to develop into a global leader. This is important for the EU's competitiveness and economy, and it is crucial for the EU to be able to push the rest of the planet in a better direction. That's really good! We must never forget that it is and will remain the private sector and its innovative companies that are the strongest engine for driving the world forward in a cleaner, healthier, greener and richer direction. We politicians must ensure the framework, the rules and the incentives to make it possible, and we are doing so with this update of the EU Battery Regulation, which we are now adopting, and we in the EPP are very pleased with that.

Madam President! More than 40 years ago, I rode my bike around Jutland. It was in the summer when we children did not make sand castles on the beach and got black feet from the oil cakes that washed in from the sea. Like two little ducklings, my sister and I biked behind our parents on the road. Bicycles weren't invented yet. At one point, my father pointed, and my mother began to sling on her bike: "Inside live the hippies!" shouted Dad and stepped harder on the pedals - "Inside the windmill!" which at the time was both unique and rather strange. Fortunately, windmills are no longer there. Because we need them. Especially in large sizes and large chunks out at sea, where they, together with other ocean energy technologies, can help meet our huge need for green energy. The climate crisis and the energy crisis must be resolved now. The Paris Agreement and climate goals must be achieved on time. Europe is crying out for self-sufficiency in green and clean energy for ordinary families and businesses to pay for. As rapporteur for the EPP Group, I am particularly pleased that we have a broad agreement that ensures a life-cycle approach to ocean energies and that puts them into the absolutely necessary scaling up of green hydrogen production so that marine energy can really be of use in the energy-intensive sectors around the EU. We also agree that public and private money must find each other around projects that are large enough to become a good business. And then it is an agreement that prevents clever wind turbine hippies from getting out to sea, without civil society and other consultative organisations and stakeholders getting a fair chance to shout, follow and hopefully back up on the fact that in the future we will bring in lots of green power from the sea around Europe instead of destroying our landscape and the good mood on land.

Madam President! Let me start by underlining that the recommendations we are debating today are full of constructive proposals on how we in the EU are doing more for animal welfare and thereby inspiring the rest of the world to do the same. This is important because animal welfare is far too bad in many places and something needs to be done about it. But like everything else in this world, animal welfare is not an uncomplicated matter. Therefore, it is also a matter which in the political debate may be misled by simplistic, but also sometimes popular approaches. This is particularly true in two areas: Firstly, it shows an incredibly poor overview and very little insight into all the factors surrounding animal welfare when some colleagues set out to be more pro-animal welfare than the rest of us by proposing a maximum journey time without taking into account, for example, geographical factors. What the heck are the animals going to use it for, when we know that it is more about how the animals are transported than for how long? Secondly, another suggestion in the recommendations is whether the word ‘animal welfare’ should be explicitly mentioned in the working title of an EU Commissioner, as if numerology has now become the ‘missing link’ to better animal welfare. That's nonsense. The European Parliament should not use its time and the voice of its citizens to interfere in the organisational structure and titularity of the Commission. Honestly, the Commission itself must be held accountable for this. Just like the fact that water and air and biodiversity, personal data, climate and the rule of law and so on are on the Commission's worktable, without it hanging on the titles of the Commissioners.

Madam President! The pharmaceutical strategy is a report. It is not legislation – yet – on medicines for the needs of Europeans and on how to ensure that the pharmaceutical industry chooses the EU as the home for its activities. Therefore, this is an important report that says a lot about what we want the pharmaceutical industry to keep doing – and more. It is also the easy part of political craftsmanship. The difficult part is about pointing out how companies should be able to deliver what we ask for. For me, who has worked on ITRE's contribution to the report, there is no doubt that the main task of the report is to ensure that the pharmaceutical industry and the thousands of associated SMEs continue to choose the EU as their seat in the future. For the sake of the patients, for the sake of the many jobs, and not least for the sake of the economy. The pharmaceutical industry throws in annual sums into the treasuries, which we simply cannot do without if everything we also promise the citizens is to be possible. That is why I would have liked the report to have become a little more precise about the business conditions offered by the European Union to the pharmaceutical industry in the future. Honestly, I didn't think it did. On the contrary, the report is unclear where it applies: the future protection of patents and other business incentives. It's problematic. Also in a broad sense, as IP rights for most industries are crucial when choosing where to place your business or investments. It is therefore time for the European Parliament to understand that logic before we turn to what will become legislation. The chance is there now – and I think we should use it.

Mr President! The Glasgow Climate Summit will hopefully result in far more and far better international agreements than the Madrid Summit in 2019. After all, the coronavirus gave us an extra year of preparation – a year that hopefully has not been wasted. COP 26 is about how to reach the Paris Agreement. In particular, it is about getting joint agreements in place and into the calendar. And then COP 26 is about inspiring each other by doing what each of us can do much better together. And we can actually make the European Parliament's decision even better and more result-oriented. Indeed, we can all vote in favour of Amendment No 15, so that it is merged into the text that we are taking with us to Scotland. Right now, the proposal risks losing so-called green and business-friendly support from Renew, and further to the left in the Chamber, yes, there I hear that you do not like the amendment and the good idea of a climate-CO2 label, because it does not come from you. Honestly! That is not how we win the climate fight, throw away vanity and support Amendment No 15. So the EU is proposing to the world that we join forces to develop a carbon label that provides clear and credible information on the climate footprint of products. Evidence-based and fully research-based life cycle assessments of course include a carbon label that removes green washing from all trade once and for all. That is what is needed, so vote in favour of Amendment No 15 now! Everybody!

Madam President! I've said it before from this place. We are getting fewer and fewer, we are getting older and older – and we are getting fatter and fatter in the EU. Almost 60% of EU citizens over the age of 18 either have precursors to obesity or are already obese. Therefore, it is good that the EU Farm to Fork Strategy – or Farm2Fork – has as a key objective to reduce overweight by 30%. Overweight simply threatens the quality of life, the capacity of health care and our economic resilience, in combination with declining birth rates and increasing life expectancy. That is why it is also good that the Farm to Fork Strategy is now seriously introducing product labelling into the internal market, which informs us about both health and sustainability. They must, of course, be based on evidence and facts, and it must be followed up with knowledge and education about nutrition and obesity, so that the individual can use the label in ways that support their individual needs. Otherwise, we will never be healthier and stronger – so the next generation will not have to bear that burden too.

Mr President! Should the EU have an asylum agency instead of the current and so-called asylum support office? Many - who naturally worry about the increased influx of illegal migrants and many of the problems that unfortunately exist in too many Member States due to the failure of integration of asylum seekers and the return of those who do not have a need for protection or have come through the right door to the European labour market - will certainly ask more worried questions. If the EU now creates an asylum agency, professionalising and improving cooperation in the field of asylum, does that create more challenges? Challenges that could eventually destroy the Europe we know and want to pass on to the next many generations? Yeah, that's the question. The far right in this Chamber will claim it, because it is your position - whatever the hell is on the agenda - to distrust the European Union in general. The same thing, but with the opposite sign, the extreme left will say, because they also want to get rid of the EU and throw Europe into the multicultural blender as a step towards the global communist Nirvana. None of the parties will be right, but until we see it, your allegations can help to destroy the constructive cooperation that can get the agency up and running so that it can clear up all the gaps and flaws in the current way asylum processing is conducted across the EU. Because right now it's not working! And changes that can protect Europe from the negative and directly dangerous elements of migration are going too slowly. Too many people are coming into the EU too easily and too many are coming out of the EU too slowly. This is the challenge that a strong and proactive asylum agency is far better able to cope with than the current support office, which is from the time when the refugee and migratory pressure on the EU had a size and seriousness that was manageable. Unfortunately, we are not there today.

Madam President! Energy prices are rising. Gas and oil are getting more expensive week by week. The fact that the EU must be geared up to achieve an Energy Union, which must be self-sufficient in green and clean energy, is underlined with alarming brutality. Concerns are rising with potentially hundreds of thousands of families and businesses, and here the European Parliament must focus on solutions that work as soon as possible. One of the most efficient solutions is energy efficiency, because the best energy is the one we do not use and therefore do not have to pay for. This forces energy prices down. In addition, energy efficiency is also the most cost-effective tool for achieving the EU’s climate objectives. Two birds in one stone. But there's a third fly to go. Energy poverty is also about the fear of losing one's job and thus the ability to pay fixed basic expenses. Here too, energy efficiency is the tool that has been proven to create more jobs and strengthen the EU's competitiveness. There are therefore opportunities for a big fly-floping hat-trick through more energy efficiency in the EU, and of course we should take advantage of that.

–Mrs President! Thank you for the last word, which should be that many of my colleagues have already said it very clearly, so I would just like to say it very briefly: The EU must be more active and visible in the Arctic. Everything else is thus reckless dealing with Europe's security, well-being, peace and freedom. It can, and must, be done in many different ways. Several have already been mentioned, and I would just like to point to innovation and research cooperation, because the Arctic needs it, and because the EU tends to be good at it, and because it will be in line with the strong ties that historically and constitutionally exist between the Arctic and the EU. Currently, the EU is being overtaken in the Arctic by China and Russia, which are certainly not burdened by the love of genuine European and pro-rata values. Add to this the fact that, in the long term, it is extremely dangerous for Europe if the EU does not also retrain its own innovative muscle in its cooperation with the Arctic. There are plenty of options. The Arctic is an obvious place for the development of green technologies. The EU research programme Horizon Europe has the instruments. Use them, even in the Arctic!

Madam President! A defense is no stronger than the weakest link. This rule is both banal and vital. COVID-19 taught us this in a brutal way, and it is the EU's most important task to take all the experience we have gained and do something about it. We have done very well because we have the instruments in the Member States and in the cooperation between the EU institutions and in a strong life science sector. But we need to get even better. We were not properly dressed. Our binoculars weren't sharp enough, and it didn't look far enough either. We have to note that supply and demand for critical biomedical needs did not correlate and were too heavy in the gear shift. We have therefore acknowledged that we can learn from the United States, which, on the ruins of September 11, 2001, set about making sure that they would never be taken on the bed again. That is why it is crucial that we get used to sleeping with our boots on here in the European Union. The boots here are called HERA, so they must be the ones that ensure that we are fully prepared for any health, cross-border emergency and that are ready with all relevant and necessary responses. That is why it is good that the Commission has embarked on what should develop into a strong and autonomous agency. Anything else becomes too obscure and risks being subject to suspicion and lack of efficiency and value. We need to avoid that with HERA. We Europeans and the many companies that depend on a health crisis not destroying health, the workplace or the EU's cohesion and the single market must be able to sleep soundly at night, knowing that HERA really works. This requires recognition based on broad democratic support. This means, of course, that the European Parliament must be involved in the design of a HERA agency. If this does not happen, we risk HERA becoming the unforeseen weakest link in our joint crisis response to a new pandemic, and we cannot put that support for the EU at risk again. That is why the EPP's message in today's debate is that the Commission must continue its work on HERA. The provisional boots must work, but there must be an end date for the Commission alone to carry on with the task, and a political design process must be presented involving Parliament as co-legislator. This is what democracies do, and the European Union must also show here that we are masters.