Debate contributions by Julien LEONARDELLI

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the war in Ukraine has settled the debate. Drones have become a central tool in modern conflicts – inexpensive, massive, decisive. But this observation should not be used as a pretext to resurrect an illusion: European defence. We are against it. Defense is the responsibility of the nations, of their army, of their sovereignty. On the other hand, it is essential to invest in drone research and production: for our national armies, for the protection of our borders, for the security of our infrastructure. Today, Europe depends on foreign powers for key military technologies. This is a major strategic vulnerability. The answer is not Brussels centralisation, but reindustrialisation, support for SMEs, European preference in purchasing and the end of the standards that are stifling our industry. Sovereignty is not delegated: It builds and defends itself.

Madam President, today, thanks to Jordan Bardella, this Parliament is finally debating lumpy skin disease. I come from Occitania, from an angry and distressed rural area. Last Thursday, in the Bordes-sur-Arise region of Ariège, I was the only member of parliament alongside the farmers, facing mobile gendarmes, drones, a helicopter, tear gas, to prevent the execution of nearly 200 cows. When a power comes to send those who protect us to confront those who feed us, it is no longer a crisis management, it is a human and political impasse. Tonight again, the French Minister for Agriculture was in Toulouse. Farmers came out with a clear feeling: She's been deaf. The message from the field is clear: it is a disaster, the movement will grow. As early as last week, they took responsibility: union unity, concrete proposals, credible solutions. Today I support a clear four-point solution: quarantine, vaccination, refusal of complete slaughter, disinsectisation. Let’s stop the hypocrisy: animal health must be protected, yes; to sacrifice farms, families and rural territories, no! Because without farmers there is no food sovereignty and no future.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, today we are debating a possible European ban on fur farming and fur products. It is a sensitive subject and nobody here disputes the importance of animal welfare. But we need really effective measures. First, do not confuse prohibition with progress. European farms are subject to strict and controlled rules. Closing them would not eliminate demand, it would simply move it to countries where farming conditions are far below European standards. That would be a misunderstanding: animal suffering is not reduced by relocating production outside the EU. Above all, we cannot claim to improve the world situation by weakening the only actors who already meet the highest standards. Second, economic coherence. Prohibiting a sector from our country while continuing to import products manufactured under unacceptable conditions would once again put our producers in a situation of unfair competition. The Union cannot simply impose internal standards without applying the same requirements at the borders. The reasonable route exists: harmonize import standards upwards, strengthen controls and support our sectors so that they remain exemplary and competitive. Labelling, traceability and transparency are better than prohibitions. Animal welfare deserves better than symbols. It deserves consistent decisions that protect both our standards and our producers.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, twice a year, the French, like millions of Europeans, move their watch forward or backward. Twice a year, we are imposed a measure that no one understands and that everyone rejects. This, in my opinion, is the perfect illustration of what has become of the European Union, a technocratic machine deaf to the people, obsessed with absurd, useless and always decided decisions from above. The change of time is the symbol of a disconnected Europe, a Europe that deregulates clocks as it deregulates nations. Remember, in 2018 the European Commission promised to end this system after extensive consultation. Nearly 5 million Europeans responded and an overwhelming majority demanded that the time change be abolished. And what has happened since then? Nothing. Nothing but endless new discussions, new postponements, new bureaucratic excuses. It's always the same story. Brussels listens, consults, debates, but never decides in the direction of the people. And meanwhile, the French, the Europeans continue to suffer. Sleep disorders, fatigue, health effects, disorganization of work and life patterns. All this for what? For an alleged energy saving that has not existed for a long time. Worse still, we come to ridiculous situations, children that we wake up in the middle of the night to go to school in the dark, workers who go to work before dawn. Artificially offbeat days. What nonsense! So yes, changing the time may seem like a small topic, but it says a lot. He spoke of the inability of this European Union to reform itself. It speaks of the contempt with which it treats citizens. He says this distant, technocratic governance, which imposes without listening. Politics is the art of repetition. Then we will repeat it as many times as necessary. The peoples of Europe want to take back their hands. They want a Europe of free nations, respectful of everyone's choices. Not a Europe that standardizes, that infantilizes, that uproots. If the European Commission finally wants to prove that it can hear the voice of the peoples, that it shows this with a concrete act, that it renounces the change of time and that it finally leaves to the nations the right to regulate their own clocks.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, today there is something profoundly ironic about the Renew Group, founded by Emmanuel Macron, claiming to give lessons in the rule of law and democracy to Bulgaria. Because finally, who in France concentrates power in a few hands? Who bypasses the popular will? Who governs in contempt of the people? Well, it's the same Emmanuel Macron. And now its representatives, here in Strasbourg, are erecting themselves as guardians of democratic morality, while supporting a European system that tramples on the votes of nations when they do not go in the right direction. We patriots for Europe, together with Jordan Bardella, affirm that true democracy cannot be decreed from the corridors of the European Commission. It is rooted in the sovereignty of peoples and in respect for their choices. Europe will not save itself against the nations, but with them. This is the meaning of our struggle: to defend a Europe of free peoples, faithful to its roots, its voices and the democratic dignity of each of its States.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, Europe is now discovering that it is no longer protected. Diseases from elsewhere are spreading, carried by mosquitoes and ticks, which the borderless globalisation you have created has brought about. In France, Italy, Portugal, Romania, every summer becomes a calvary: locals barricade themselves, tourists flee and diseases advance. This is the true face of a Europe open to everything but the protection of its peoples. And what does Brussels do? Studies, reports, pilot programs. Meanwhile, infections are exploding and the most modest Europeans remain helpless. We therefore call for a real strategy for vector control and eradication of invasive species in all our territories and affected areas. Protecting our Peoples, Lands and Ecosystems: This is true ecology.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the European Union is about to deny one of its greatest industrial successes: the automobile. The ban on thermal engines in 2035 is not progress, it is strategic folly. Under the pretext of ecology, you weaken our manufacturers, destroy hundreds of thousands of jobs and deliver our markets to China, the world's biggest polluter. That's the reality. Everywhere on the ground, workers, engineers, contractors say it, the von der Leyen calendar is unrealistic. Costs are skyrocketing, infrastructure is not keeping up. This brutal transition is no longer an ecological ambition, it is a social punishment. It hits the popular and rural classes, those who need their cars to live and work, while Brussels sacrifices our competitiveness on the altar of ideology. We patriots for Europe, together with Jordan Bardella, propose another path, that of technological freedom, biofuels, hydrogen and innovation. The future of the European car must be built with our nations and our workers, not against them.

Madam, all European and world leaders must come together to engage in de-escalation and prevent war. For it is not the people sitting on these benches, in these cozy lounges, who will go to the field to take bullets. It is our children, children from France, Italy and all over Europe, who will go on the pitch and take bullets from the buffet, unlike you. We must do everything possible to preserve peace and, above all, embark on the path of de-escalation.

Madam President, Mrs von der Leyen, ladies and gentlemen, the recent intrusions of Russian drones into the European space must alert us, but they must not precipitate us into a logic of escalation. While Brussels is agitating and dreaming of a Europe of defence, it is unable to protect our borders and prevent more than 380,000 illegal entries in a single year. My country, France, knows that peace is built through reason, dialogue and independence. Today, the European Union has become a toy for the world’s great powers to play with. A puppet that stirs without direction, without strategy, without depth. True strategic autonomy is not decreed in Brussels. It is forged in Paris, Rome, Budapest, Vienna, Helsinki, respecting the sovereignty of free nations. Mrs von der Leyen, we do not want war and we refuse to be dragged into a dangerous gear. Because it is not the European Commissioners or the technocrats in Brussels who will go to the front; It is the people, the little people, our children and those in our villages who will pay with their blood for the consequences of your decisions. Our duty is not to expose them to the irreparable, but to protect them and preserve peace. This must be our only compass.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the allocation of European funds today is a real scandal. France contributes massively to the EU budget and yet our territories are too often forgotten. At home in Occitania, the reality is simple. Transport infrastructure is deteriorating. Our rural areas remain landlocked. Water is missing a little more every year and every summer our countryside burns, while our firefighters lack the means to protect the inhabitants. This is the real life of our fellow citizens. In this context, we are presented with the Just Transition Fund as a tool for social justice. But the reality is quite different. This fund, financed by the Europeans themselves, is drowned in administrative complexity. Result: local authorities, farmers and associations face a jungle of procedures. Help arrives too late or never arrives. It's even more serious. This fund is not intended to meet the urgent needs of Europeans. It serves above all to accompany an imposed ecological transition, which destroys our industries, which sacrifices our jobs and which plunges our territories into precariousness. Brussels always finds billions to finance pharaonic projects on the other side of the world, while our peasants, our fishermen, our workers struggle to survive. Our position is clear: Europeans' money must remain in Europe. It must serve our nations, our regions, our workers, our farmers, and not finance a punitive ecological transition or water external projects. It's a matter of justice. It's a matter of common sense. It is time to build a Europe at the service of its peoples and not a Europe at the service of the rest of the world.

Mr Pellerin-Carlin, we will never go into your environmental delusions, which kill our territories. The first environmentalists are the farmers, and we, unlike you, defend them, and, in the face of forest fires, winegrowers are the first defenders.

Mr. Allione, I do know your fight and your support for firefighters. You yourself have been a firefighter in your career, and this fight is strong and remarkable. But, you know as well as I do: you are here, in this Chamber, the representative of Emmanuel Macron. You know as well as I do that the park is aging and that there are thirty years of delay in France. Today, firefighters are on the front line and they need resources, they need a strong investment – something you have not been able to do for many years now. So when we come to having to take on these kinds of responsibilities, believe that with Marine Le Pen we will empower the firefighters.

Madam President, as every summer, southern Europe and southern France are on fire. And like every summer, the French state, however obsessed with the issue of global warming, is outdated. At home in Occitanie, in one week, 4,000 hectares went up in smoke in Aude, despite the heroic courage of our firefighters. In Marseille, it is the same tragedy. And what is the French government doing? He notes, he promises, but he does not act. Our air assets, once powerful, are now dramatically insufficient. Last year, we only had two Canadairs available in the middle of the season due to a lack of maintenance. Moreover, our fleet is ageing and Emmanuel Macron’s promise to renew it is already buried, with only two more planes – at best – by 2028. Worse still, France has refused EU funding for water bomber helicopters, which it now rents at a high price. Meanwhile, the journey in absurdity continues. The grubbing-up of vines, which are genuine natural firewalls, is subsidised to make way for flammable wastelands. Hydraulic developments are blocked in the name of a dogmatic ecologism while the territories are burning. So no, fire is not inevitable. It is a fault, a fault of the State.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, farmers in our mountains can no longer do this. Bears, wolves, vultures: predators are multiplying, and the European Union is turning a blind eye. It finances predation and lets pastoralism die. This afternoon, in the Pyrenees, two calves were eaten alive by vultures under the eyes of their breeder, and during this time bears proliferate (83 adults, 16 cubs this year), and wolves colonize southwest France. Result: hundreds of slaughtered animals, traumatised herders, children who are no longer allowed out alone. Some dare to talk about stabilizing attacks. The truth is that bluetongue has killed thousands of animals. There were fewer animals attacked: This is the explanation. We call on the Commission to revise the protection statutes for these predators, to allow supervised scaring, to fund rapid compensation, including psychological support, and to recognise pastoralism as a living European heritage. The Rassemblement National and Patriotes pour l’Europe will always fight for our farmers, our mountains and our rural identity. They are the real environmentalists!

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, once again the European Commission is waving promises to hide its failures and impose new standards on us. She tells us about the review of passenger rights, but, as always, she forgets the essential: protecting European citizens from the abuses of an excessively liberalised system. The Single European Sky has failed. The uncontrolled opening of the market has led to the abandonment of passengers, crammed like cattle in low-cost aircraft, treated without respect, without effective recourse in case of delay or cancellation. Meanwhile, the Commission continues to favour the interests of large companies to the detriment of national companies and users. Let's be clear: this reform actually hides a new stage of deregulation orchestrated under the guise of rationalisation. With the Patriots for Europe group and Jordan Bardella, we reject this Europe of technocratic contempt. We stand for a Europe of nations that protects. We demand real protection for travellers, an end to impunity for offending airlines and support for our national airlines. Travelling must no longer be synonymous with humiliation, but with freedom, respect and dignity.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the European Commission has been promising us a bright future for public transport for years. But for our fellow citizens, especially in France, the reality is abandonment. In metropolises, projects are chronically lagging behind. And in our campaigns, nothing. Ten million French people do not have access to public transport. The French in rural areas have no choice but to take their car, pay more while Brussels subsidizes above ground environmental fads. And let's talk about radical environmentalists. They are not mere activists trying to block projects like the A69 at my home in Occitania, they are extremists who sabotage railway tracks, attack construction sites with Molotov cocktails and endanger human lives. And here in this Chamber, we are silent by cowardice or by complicity. The truth is that the Commission is not defending the common good. It obeys a militant and radical minority. We, at the Rassemblement National, with Jordan Bardella within the Patriotes pour l'Europe group, want modern public transport, accessible everywhere for everyone, whether you are a worker, a student or a pensioner. Above all, we reject punitive ecology, disconnected liberal logics and extremist violence.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, it is not without emotion that I take the floor to evoke the memory of the Righteous, those men and women who, at the risk of their lives, saved countless innocent people from Nazi barbarism. During his recent visit to Israel, our group president, Jordan Bardella, was able to honour their memory, including at the Yad Vashem Memorial, and reaffirm the importance of preserving their memory as a pillar of our identity. It is more important than ever to honour the thousands of French and Europeans who saved Jews and resistance fighters from certain death that awaited them. If I had to mention a figure among the Righteous, beyond the commune of Moissac, in France, who is personally close to my heart, I would pay tribute to Rolande Birgy, nicknamed ‘Béret bleu’, a historical activist with the Front National in France. Finally, I deplore the fact that this Parliament is meeting in plenary in Strasbourg on 8 May 2025, disregarding the memory of those who gave their lives to make Europe and France free. For my part, I will not be sitting here on May 8. I will be at the foot of our memorials to the dead honouring the memory of those who fought for our freedom in the face of Nazi Germany. What they have done obliges us. Let's honor the righteous. Yes, in France, we do, on July 21st. But let’s stop ignoring and trampling on our own history.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, once again the Commission and the Council are rediscovering the importance of infrastructure, but always as a matter of urgency. For years, you sacrificed them in the name of free trade and ecological ideology. Result: a vulnerable, deindustrialised Europe, unable to secure its supply chains. While our roads are deteriorating and our lines are closing, you are financing billions of corridors above ground, dictated by Brussels and its technocrats. Let's take a concrete example: the Toulouse-Auch line in Occitania should be modernised as a matter of urgency, but Brussels is unaware of this, preferring to invest in transbaltic links that are disconnected from the realities on the ground. With the Patriots for Europe and Jordan Bardella, we demand action: priority to national strategic infrastructures, support for forgotten territories, relocation of the real economy. Europe must stop despising people and become again a tool at the service of nations. And since we are talking about democracy, I give all my support to Marine Le Pen, unfairly targeted in France.

Madam President, the European Commission is today presenting its first omnibus proposals to cut red tape and make life easier for businesses. However, French business leaders expect much more than just regulatory grooming. In France, our artisans, farmers and industrialists are overwhelmed by an avalanche of standards and bureaucratic constraints. In five years, 850 new European obligations have been imposed, representing nearly 5,000 additional pages of regulation. Result: endless delays in obtaining a simple building permit, absurd steps to access public aid and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) penalised in the face of large companies, which have an army of lawyers to navigate this administrative labyrinth. A striking example: our farmers crumble under the demands of the CAP, while their non-European competitors benefit from more flexible rules. Our industrial SMEs, especially in the automotive sector, see their competitiveness weakened by absurd over-transpositions. We propose an administrative revolution, through a regulatory pause, the abolition of national over-transpositions and a right of derogation for the Member States. It is time to free our businesses from this bureaucratic asphyxiation and to empower our economies to grow and innovate.

Mr President, COP16 was, without a doubt, the largest meeting of States to date on the subject of desertification. It was held in Riyadh, which allowed participants to see how this problem is disrupting regional powers that once relied on agriculture, such as Ethiopia or Egypt. This real scourge is now at our doorstep. It is already observed in Greece, Italy, but also in my region in the south of France, in Occitania, where the running water of the inhabitants is now rationed in summer, during heat waves, where farmers can not always water their crops and where forest fires are more and more frequent. Today, time is no longer for good intentions and false promises, but for change. Europeans affected by land take and drought deserve better than the sufficient ramblings of those standing in glass and concrete towers. To meet this challenge, we must focus on short supply chains, reduce the unbridled free trade that pollutes our air and oceans and turn to innovation and research, like the Gulf countries. Let us not remain spectators, let us be the actors of our salvation before it is too late.

Mr President, in Venezuela, the communist regime has once again been guilty of confiscating power at the expense of the people. A gagged opposition, thousands of people locked up in the same brutality that has torn Eastern Europe apart for almost a century. This situation requires a clear finding: There are those in Europe today who welcome dictatorships, who excuse political violence and who welcome pogroms. And there are, on the contrary, those who stand up to the new totalitarianisms, those who believe in the merits of democracy and the republic, those who defend referendums and citizen consultations rather than repression. It is we, the Patriots, who do not falter in spite of adversity. If our conviction leads us to support the Venezuelan opposition and our hearts make us pray for the victims of Marxism, our reason must lead us to condemn those in Europe who, by their cowardice or extremism, allow this type of regime to continue.

Mr President, having ravaged European agriculture with its Farm to Fork Strategy, which encourages unbridled free trade – with Mercosur in particular – the European Commission is now drawing up a strategy for tourism on the continent. Tourism, however, falls within the competence of States, whose sovereignty is once again violated. In this vision, it is not surprising that we find the same forgotten ones again and again. Metropolises, with their hubs and similar business districts, from Bombay to Manhattan, are naturally in the spotlight. So, not a word about rural territories, not a word about these natural places that combine tourism, environment and history. European tourists do not travel to find the same concrete blocks that cover the globe, but to reconnect with the roots of a thousand-year-old land. Similarly, foreign tourists are looking for more than just a brand: They want this Europe of nations rooted in its heritage, which we propose. The Europe of Puy du Fou, the Cathar fortresses, the Tabernas desert and the Carpathians, which remains the most visited continent in the world. This land has survived wars, diseases, foreign invasions, and, dear Commission, it will, I hope, survive your calamitous management.

Madam President, at the end of the G20 summit in Brazil, we can only deplore the cowardice of the various European representatives regarding the signing of a free trade agreement between the European Union and the Mercosur countries. Once again, rather than agreeing to look at the reality of the problems facing Europe, they agreed to put the dust under the carpet. On this subject as on so many others, what about the lamentable attitude of the European centrists who, not without cynicism, call today to oppose this agreement, which they have always supported? Like your mentor Emmanuel Macron, you were born before shame, especially when we know that you are already negotiating with Uruguay in order to anticipate a rejection of the agreement with Mercosur. We say it with gravity: If this trade agreement is ratified, then French and European agriculture will not survive the unfair competition represented by such an influx of chickens doped with antibiotics, maize treated with atrazine, beef from deforestation. The legitimate revolt of the agricultural world shows that no one is fooled anymore about the real intentions of the European Union with regard to agriculture. Faced with competition from South American products that do not respect the nature or ethics of workers, faced with the hypocrisy of so-called ecologists who think they can offset the carbon footprint of a container ship by buying a bicycle, we, elected representatives of the National Rally in France, will always be alongside French farmers.