Debate contributions by Klára DOBREV

Madam President, I'm sorry. Competitiveness, deregulation, simplification on the Hungarian and European right, these words have been flying back and forth in recent months. But somehow in the end, this whole debate is always about how to make it worse for the workers, how to pollute the environment better, how to make more profit for the capitalist. Work more for less. – the company is immediately more competitive, so it will immediately make more profit. We are free to pollute our water, our air, our land. Simplification is achieved at that moment, there is no need to comply with all sorts of rules. Do you really want this world? And I see that you are moving in that direction. The right, the European right and the Hungarian right are moving in this direction, which is why they voted down the directive on the just transition, which is why they are going against the Social Fund. Do you remember him? Years ago, we were told that your goal was to build an economy that serves people. Well, what they're doing right now is making people the servants of the rich. We on the left won't let that happen.

Madam President, dear fellow Members, everybody can see how fast our world is changing around us. Natural disasters, artificial intelligence taking away the jobs of millions, wars. And just look what Donald Trump has done in the last two weeks, it's a disaster as well, even if it's not a natural one. In times like these, politicians have actually two options. First, what we do on the left and the progressive side: we are looking for solutions, protecting people, preparing them, preparing society for the future. The second one is the populist right's way: Orbán, Bardella, Weidel, you name them – what they are doing. They are exploiting the situation to gain power. They are plotting people against each other, distracting their attention from injustice, from environmental crisis and everything in the interest of those billionaires who are financing them. Climate change and digital revolutions are here around us, it's here already. What the right is forcing upon us, but with the name of competitiveness, simplification, or however they call it, is an updated recipe of the last century. Dismantling the welfare state, weakening workers' rights, freeing large corporations from their social responsibility – come on, we have seen this, and I will call it for what it is and its name: it's a simple surrender to 'big capital'. It will lead to the most savage and most brutal form of capitalism. It will lead to those forms of capitalism that we wanted to overcome already. Come on, people, this is not us – Europe is a continent of humanity and freedom and justice. So we, on the left, are united behind the just transition directive. Now I am looking at the European People's Party. Are you with us, with the people? Or with the billionaires? It is your turn now.

Madam President, I'm sorry. This debate, for us, is not just about principles and not about an abstract concept, but about our everyday life, about the security of our everyday life. The rule of law causes us gastric insecurity every day, and the absence of the rule of law ruins our lives. We became the poorest country in Europe in 15 years because a one-party, two-thirds majority destroyed our country and took away the rule of law, which is why we got poor. That is why today Hungary has become the poorest country in Europe, and that is why it hurts me when I see that the Hungarian right does not seem to regard the rule of law as important. We are accustomed to Orbán, we are accustomed to Orbán, he talks a lot about the fact that this is just a rude stick that Brussels is using to take away European Union funds. I remember how many more yachts and castles they could buy for the pereputty and the Orbán family. But it hurts and hurts that the opposition right, the Tisza Party and its leader, Péter Magyar, also see the rule of law as not so important. Let me quote: “No matter if it is a democracy or a rule of law, I don’t like these words, they are completely useless,” they say. Is it completely unnecessary? If there were a rule of law in Hungary, Orbán would not be able to govern without parliament, the offices would not be able to mess with the people, the bosses would not be able to eviscerate the Hungarian people and the Hungarian workers everywhere. The Orbán family could not steal Lake Balaton, Lake Neusiedl, castles and lands, and hundreds of thousands of Hungarian foreign currency borrowers could be compensated according to the ruling of the European Court of Justice. If there were a rule of law in Hungary, it would not be the stolen European Union billions or the filthy pedophile criminals who would come to everyone's mind about the Fidesz-KDNP government. The rule of law is about our lives.

Dear Madam President, Let me tell you a story, especially to my fellow Members on the right side of the European Parliament. Viktor Orbán has been telling us about competitiveness for 15 years. On the altar of this, he sacrificed the Labour Code, created the "Slave Act" and supplied Europe's cheapest and most vulnerable workforce, primarily to billionaire corporations. It has virtually eliminated environmental protection. The world’s dirtiest battery factories are polluting Hungarian agricultural land, land and water almost without limits and, for example, are not introducing the euro to help multinationals compete with a weak forint, I want to say its profit. So he's been talking about competitiveness for 15 years. You have taken all these steps, and I see that sometimes you are also preparing. So we can ask the question: but you did it? And my answer is no. Total failure, total failure. 15 years ago, Hungary was one of the coolest countries in Central and Eastern Europe. Today we have become the poorest country in Europe, and this is all due to right-wing economic and social policies. That is why I would propose to the European Parliament that tomorrow they follow the path of the left, the proposals of the left: decent salaries, pensions, housing, healthcare, education. This is what makes Europeans competitive. Instead of big companies, let's be on the people's side.

Dear Madam President, On June 28, the last summer of the Orbán regime began. Nothing will be more like it was before, as the streets of Budapest were filled with an unprecedented crowd to show that Orbán is not the same as Hungary, and that this squeezed-out right-wing ideology has not yet utterly infected the souls of the Hungarian people. A lot of people have done a lot of things to make sure that this is not the case. The ruling right has banned the Pride. Members of the European Parliament are sitting here. Well, hundreds of thousands of people laughed in our faces that day, happy, liberated, and did not ask for a ban. But the opposition right also tried to slip away and did not mobilize for Pride. And I am really shocked to see that we are discussing the rights of Hungarian LGBTQ people in the European Parliament for the second time, and for the second time, representatives of the Tisza party are missing from this meeting. That's not gonna work. The Hungarian people showed in Budapest that it is impossible to slip away. Hundreds of thousands have shown that human rights, freedom, free love, are not rubber bones, and a Democrat must stand up for these rights. Ladies and Gentlemen! The last summer of the Orbán regime started on Saturday, and I can promise you that even though summer was hot and it will be hot, autumn and winter will be just as hot politically.

Dear Madam President, The majority of the European Parliament has stood up for the freedom, rights and democracy of the Hungarian people countless times, and I thank them from the bottom of my heart, because perhaps it is because of them that we European Hungarians and Democrats feel that we are not alone. But I must also tell you my disappointment, because I feel that in recent times, when we are talking about support for Europe, we are talking primarily about support for the left-wing, green and liberal parties. They are the ones who speak their minds boldly and decisively, and I see that there are more and more people who seem to snuff out these debates. Because of the right-wing factions in Parliament, it was not possible to include gay rights in the title of today's debate. It's just about freedom of assembly, they say. They are the ones who think that talking about the rights of LGBTQ people is divisive, maybe losing votes. And so the right-wing President of the European Commission, I see that he does not dare to turn to the European Court of Justice to ask for immediate intervention in order to save Budapest Pride. I can tell you that what you often call real politics, whether on the European or Hungarian right, is nothing more than cowardice and self-surrender. And they know that if a power makes people believe that it can only be defeated by self-surrender, that power has already won. That is why we leftists will never surrender, we will never be willing to give up our principles, and we will not be willing to give up the people who, I see, can only trust us today. We'll be at the Pride. Leftists, Greens and Liberals. Dear colleagues of the People's Party, right wing, will you be at the Pride?

Madam President, I'm sorry. Today I just wanted to be happy that the agreement on strong European defence was reached last week, but unfortunately for us Hungarians, last week the world became a more dangerous place than before. Because while Europe has joined forces, because it understands that only here can its citizens be safer, in the meantime Viktor Orbán has taken another step towards leading our country out of the European Union. It is no longer enough to disintegrate it from within, to reject everything that is about supporting Ukraine on the basis of Putin's instructions, but last week a bill was initiated that will allow Hungarian citizens, civilians and politicians who do not like the government to be banished from the country. This would mean the immediate withdrawal of my country from the Council of Europe, which is a huge step towards leaving the European Union. But we will not let it happen: Europe will be stronger, and thus Hungary will be stronger without Orbán.

Dear Mr President, I love my kids. Yet the moment comes when they must be let go, because an independent life, an adult, responsible life requires an independent dwelling. You can't have children, plan a family, or even think about the future when you don't have a place to live. And yet I see that for the masses of young people it remains only a dream. I was shocked to hear the representatives of the Hungarian government beating their chests about the fantastic things they had done on the subject of housing in Hungary. Well, I would like to tell them that they may live in another country, but real estate prices in Hungary have tripled under the Orbán government. Check your salary to see if you've kept up with it. It is therefore time for Europe to step in, for the right to decent housing to be a European right, and for all financial assistance to be provided. The people of Europe, including Hungarians, are counting on us, and I am counting on you.

Dear Madam President, Well, I can tell you, Prime Minister, that was awkward. It was awkward to listen to him try to explain, but there's something he's right about. European citizens, European politics and the European Parliament are not interested in the programme of the Hungarian Presidency. He doesn't care, because he is considered frivolous, because we have heard clichés – and the ceiling has not been torn off from lies – from which we have already known you in the past. You know, sometimes it's my job to listen to Orban's speeches. It's not very easy. And what I've seen in recent years is that he's constantly moving away from reality. He fights imaginary enemies, created by him, while ravaging his true friends and allies. But the biggest problem is that it devastates them from my country, it devastates Hungary. And while he is fighting his imaginary enemies, there is one thing in these Orbán speeches that has been recurrently lacking in recent years. And this is the problem of people, ordinary people, because quite simply you do not care about it. The history of a country is made up of the everyday lives of ordinary people. That's what you never talk about. You don't care if tens of thousands of Hungarians go to hospital with stomach cramps from anxiety, if they get out alive at all. You don't care about pensioners, you don't care about babies who are hundreds of them in health institutions and hospitals because you have destroyed the social institution. You simply don't care about these things. However, in recent years the Hungarian people have been living worse and worse under the Orbán government, not because there is some kind of secret international conspiracy, not even because there is some kind of special Hungarian misfortune, but because you govern badly. And you govern badly because you don't care about these things, you don't care about them, so you won't be able to govern well. And of course, the question arises: if it is good for a prime minister not to try to make people's everyday lives easier and better, then what does he do? Because there's something that you're dealing with quite intensely. This cannot be said in the Hungarian Parliament because the Fidesz Speaker takes the floor. But I can tell you that what Viktor Orbán is dealing with extremely intensively is how he can betray our European values and how he can betray Hungary. How do you tell the Russians, while vetoing not for the Hungarian people, but for the Russians, for the Russian oligarchs. How do you tell Putin when we're the only country that's even increased expensive Russian gas and energy imports, and that's how you're financing Putin. There may be Russian citizens all over Europe, but I'm sure they don't have access to the State Department and secret service systems, because that's what's happening here. A crowd of agents invaded the country through spy banks. So I can tell you, Prime Minister, that nobody really cared about your programme, because it is frivolous. We look forward to the end of your presidency. But there's one question for everyone: So many prime ministers have met Putin in Europe, and none of them have become his loyal servants. Answer a question you did not answer yesterday to 19-year-old Hungarian municipal councillor Márton Gyekiczky. Tell me, because that's what everyone's asking, but more politely, what are the Russians blackmailing you with?

Madam President, I'm sorry. The first word is thank you. Thank you to the many people out there, especially the tens of thousands of volunteers. Because we always know, see and feel that we cannot protect our houses and homes alone. We need neighbors, friends. Sometimes we need complete strangers. And that's why this flood shows how much we need each other in Europe. We can close ourselves off to large European nations, we can say that everyone should stop at the border, we can say that we are only counting on ourselves, and we will solve everything on our own. But try to tell the Danube, in the vicinity of Hegyeshalom, to stop. That is why we in Europe have a much more important task than just looking at what is happening at home. We in Europe need to show that the people of Europe can count on common European help. Just as a home cannot be defended alone, no country can be defended alone. That is why we have work to do here in the European Parliament. Solidarity Fund, Civil Protection Cooperation, Emergency Aid, all this is now needed by the Hungarian people as well. We will not let them down, Europe will not let them down!