Debate contributions by Estrella GALÁN

Mr President, when we talk about consumer protection we see how the Commission follows the erratic policy of saying one thing and doing the opposite. It says it protects consumers, but in reality, it bends to the blackmail of companies that violate their rights. A clear example is the collection of hand luggage by large airlines that are profiting under the pretext of the free market. In Spain, the Ministry of Consumer Affairs has sanctioned these abusive practices. And you, do you know what you have done?: open a file to Spain and side with the interests of the powerful, as on other occasions. I'll be very clear: We are not going to be arrested by those of us who believe that no company, however large, can be above the law. Here's another example: access to housing has become the biggest problem for working people in Europe, mainly because of the predatory model of vulture funds and large speculative companies. Well, the Spanish Ministry of Consumer Affairs – the one you want to issue – has put a historic fine on Airbnb to stop those who break the law and violate the right to housing. I wonder on this occasion which side you are going to take, whether on the side of the profit of the multinationals or on the side of the people.

Mr. President, the cases of sexual harassment that we are seeing show that patriarchy continues to permeate everything and is present on the left and on the right, because machismo is a scourge. Harassment is a matter of power - you know it - and combating it requires real feminist policies: ending the pay gap, inequality and ensuring the presence of women in equal power spaces. And this is not achieved by hiding cases under the carpet until they burst, nor with cosmetic solutions. But, of course – certainly not – not with hypocritical speeches by those who have, among their ranks, the same cases of harassment, without having protocols to confront them. Because, deep down, what worries them is not the victims, but the opportunity to use them as political weapons. If it were not so serious, it would seem like a joke that the Popular Party now goes as a defender of women while cutting programs against gender violence in autonomous communities such as Madrid and agrees with the denialists of gender violence. So, of those who hold patriarchy, lessons, just ones.

Mr. President, ore, progress, wok, lobby gay, climate fanatics, gender ideology... With what contempt are these words vomited! The far right wants to impose its language of hatred. The fight against discrimination and the defense of human rights are devalued by calling them goodism, making the ostentation of evil a propaganda tool. Hatred is never innocent and always ends up translating into violence. One in five people in the European Union suffers insults, aggression, discrimination... just because they are who they are or love who they love. Far-right violence has become France's second most troubling threat and the deadliest danger to people in the United States. In Spain, in my country, a far-right terrorist cell has recently been dismantled, and we saw it also this summer, when ultra- and far-right neo-Nazi groups encouraged the organization of hunts against migrants. There is every reason to make urgent progress on the horizontal anti-discrimination directive, which has been paralysed for 17 years, and for hate speech to finally be considered a crime. We are safe in it, and so is our life. Commissioner: We have to stop this war against hatred, against the different. Hatred can ravage our model of civilization. It has already happened in interwar Europe and they intend to do it again, because – by reversing Robe Iniesta (Extremoduro) – although some people were only taught hatred and greed, we will not stop trying to widen their souls.

Mr President, what a piece of paper Mrs von der Leyen has: Neither the political groups that put it where it is can support a budget that prioritizes military spending over social spending, which is what is necessary. The reality does not fit in their figures. The reality is that inequality is growing in the European Union, that there is a housing crisis across Europe and that people cannot make ends meet. And his proposal not only fails to respond, but also breaks down social cohesion, which is one of the pillars of the European Union. Social spending translates into an indeterminate 14% in which, because it fits, it even fits military training. And they do the same with the European Social Fund, diluted among other items and without any specific objective. Spanish and European organisations working with the most vulnerable groups are highly concerned. Listen to them, because they are working side by side with the people who suffer. The European Social Fund is one of the best tools we have and have had. If Mrs von der Leyen is so concerned about the safety of Europeans, this should be her highest priority.

Madam President, Commissioner, today we should be taking a step towards a compulsory solidarity mechanism. However, what he is presenting to us here today is not solidarity, it is abandonment. Obviously, Spain, Italy, Greece, Cyprus, the southern border of Europe, we are the ones who have the most migratory pressure; that's obvious. What seems to us to be a joke is that, of the 27, you have determined that only nine countries are going to contribute or are in a position to contribute and to show solidarity - nine out of 27, Commissioner. And that if this can be called contributing, because it is choosing between welcoming or paying for not doing so. That is, it is an a la carte solidarity. It is unacceptable to call solidarity a mechanism that leaves out central countries of the European Union. We need to ensure that we are not left alone to the countries of the South or to the people who need a dignified reception. Your proposal, unfortunately, is not a solidarity mechanism, but an amendment to solidarity, because the data clearly show that Europe is not currently facing a migration crisis, it is facing a crisis of values that threatens the European project, and with this proposal you are just finishing it off.

Thank you for your question. Anxiety is what women live when we undergo a test and no one gives us a result. Anxiety is what we live when we go to a health service and there is a waiting list so huge that we are not able to know if we are going to get out alive or not of a screening process. Therefore, the political opinion that awakens in me a situation like the one we have experienced in Andalusia is that responsibilities must be purged.

Madam President, more than 2 000 women have their lives hanging in the balance as a result of the mismanagement of the Andalusian Government. 2,000 women who needed follow-up and never got a call. Some of them, unfortunately, are gone. That wasn't a mistake, it was political negligence. The system failed because there is a strategy to make it fail. Weakening the public to end up privatizing everything. It is not an isolated case, it is a model that we see repeated in the Valencian Community, in Murcia and in each territory where money is put ahead of life. Cancer does not discriminate between rich and poor people, but the possibility of overcoming it with a timely diagnosis, of course. It depends on quality public and universal services. We need to strengthen our public health with resources, with health professionals who have good working conditions, and decent, and, above all, with policies that prioritize health over economic benefits. Cuts cost lives, gentlemen, and dismantling health care costs lives.

Mr President, twelve months have passed since the damage that took more than two hundred and thirty-five people ahead. Twelve months in which we have seen in the streets the dignity of the Valencian people in the face of the indignity of a Valencian Government that continues to lie without assuming responsibilities. This tragedy showed that denying the climate emergency kills. What happened in the Valencian Country was not bad luck or an error of coordination, it was an indecent abandonment of functions and was a consequence of cutting in public services, in prevention and also, or therefore, in human lives. And in the meantime, Mr. Mazón continues to rely on the deniers who eliminated the emergency unit to continue governing there. And why? Why does he do it? Because Mazón chooses power in the face of truth. And the People's Party consents to it. We demand political responsibility, truth and reparation so that this tragedy is not repeated and that water does not take what politics failed to protect. Victims are still waiting for answers and deserve justice.

Mr President, Commissioner, Minister, few things show the wrong direction of this European Union better than this budget. The European Union was born as a project of peace between peoples, on the rubble of war and fascism. It was born to guarantee rights, equality, dignity for all. Today that project is being betrayed: instead of investing in peace, war is financed; instead of protecting people, resources are diverted from social funds to weapons; Instead of saving lives, millions of euros are spent on erecting higher walls and letting people die at sea. This budget is not a coincidence, it is an embarrassing political decision. We are not just talking about figures, but about a Europe that has lost its way with leaders who have chosen war over life and justice. Citizens need to invest in housing, education, health, social justice ... but this budget abandons Europeans and Europeans.

Mr President, in one week Israel has broken the ceasefire more than fifty times, blocked the entry of humanitarian aid, continued to kill and murder and is consolidating occupation and colonisation. What is the European Union waiting for to react, to do something? This is not a peace plan and you know it. Nor, it's not even a cease-fire. This is a perfect strategy to continue the second phase of the genocide. And you keep looking to the side. Excuses are no longer worth it. With bombs there is no peace. Without justice there is no peace either. We want all those responsible tried and convicted. Commissioner, where are the measures that Mrs von der Leyen presented in this Parliament on 17 September? Where are the sanctions? Where are the suspensions? Where are the consequences? We've been waiting for more than a month and nothing. Zero is the absolute that you have presented. People don't believe in you anymore. The streets are still demanding...

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, more than 3 600 people have died in Spain this summer because of the heat, 84% more than last summer. They are not statistics, they are lives: Most of them are very vulnerable people, working people, the elderly and even children. And no, it's not just a Southern European thing. Every year, Europe breaks temperature records and heat waves. And yet we continue to hear denialist speeches. They call us climate fanatics, as if climate change is an ideological issue, when it is a killing reality. Therefore, we must act and we must act now: We need to adapt our cities, our homes, our schools and our workplaces. In Spain, pioneering legislation has been put in place to protect working people, with measures as basic as stopping activity during hot peak hours or when there are weather alerts. Because protecting people is not so difficult, it is just a matter of political will, and this Parliament has to take the step if it does not want to end up suffocated by the denialism of the far right.

Madam President, Madam President von der Leyen, Europe is in the ICU, and you have proved it; And it is for its policies, which favor the powerful and sink and humiliate the most vulnerable. You spoke today about Europe's independence, and we saw it humiliating itself on Mr Trump's private golf course, where - without a democratic mandate - it left us sold out. We have seen it with his plans to destroy the European Social Fund, which was fundamental to improving people's lives, and yet he wants to empty it to finance the war. We have already told you many times: The security of citizens does not fit in a missile, it fits in social rights. We see it also with their migration necropolicies, with the creation of Guantánamos outside the European Union with our taxes, persecuting those who flee to put their lives safe. And, above all, we see it with Gaza, a genocide that you have not even been able to recognize as such. He's put it on the table...

Madam President, in my country we have a coalition government committed to improving people's lives. However, the same problem always appears: that of housing. I am going to give you a very clear example so that you can put yourself in a situation: Since 2018, the minimum wage has increased in Spain by 61%, but families are still unable to make ends meet. And you know what the reason is? Well, it's simple: in recent years the average rent has risen by 78%, much more than wages are rising. Housing has become a rent vacuum, it is the black hole where families' money goes and that increases inequality and prevents people from living with dignity. We are not talking about empty statistics, we are talking about our daughters, our sons and our neighbors expelled from our neighborhoods by vulture funds. That the price of housing is skyrocketing is not the result of chance, it is the result of the policies that have given our cities and our neighborhoods to these speculators who have turned a right into an inaccessible luxury. The solution is simple: intervening in the housing market. And this Parliament must decide whether it is on the side of the people or the elite who have made our precariousness a business.

Mr President, Europe continues to increase its defence spending when millions of people remain without access to the most basic: jobs and decent housing, quality health and education or protection against poverty. As European authorities worry about future threats we don't see, we see genocide committed in Palestine without Europe lifting a finger. We can't help but remind him: Stop being complicit with Israel and suspend the Association Agreement now. The reform of the European Social Fund is an attack on working people across Europe. Because, once again, when it comes to choosing between people's well-being or enriching the gun industry, they choose to encourage guns. The European Social Fund should foster cohesion, support those who need it most and reduce inequalities, because our security is not what fits in a missile. Redirecting this Fund to defense is a direct blow to the most vulnerable and a contempt for social justice. The European Social Fund is for improving people's lives, not for military purposes. Europe's true strength is not measured by the largest armies, but by a citizenry that has real opportunities, that can study, that has decent work and that can live in fit housing. Europe will be strong when it socially protects its people, not when it increases its arsenal and weapons.

Mr President, Commissioner, we arrived at this plenary session with a shrunken heart, one million hectares razed by fire throughout Europe and in Spain in particular, as it has been the country most affected. The lands of Galicia, Castilla y León, Extremadura, have experienced the worst moments of the last history. Behind this disaster there are people who have lost everything and exhausted professionals, in precarious conditions, risking their lives to protect us. From here I want to give a hug and all our recognition to all the firefighters and firefighters and also to the affected families. I want to take this opportunity to ask the deputies of the Popular Party, how long will they remain tied to the denialism of the extreme right? They have the greatest territorial power in our country. And with this they can protect people and, instead of offering security, they are divesting from protection, they are competing with VOX in discrediting the scientific consensus. How many more natural disasters do we need to take climate change seriously? Negligence costs lives: We have already seen it in Valencia and now we are seeing it – we have seen it – on average in Spain. Stop cutting and privatizing basic and fundamental public services. Dignify the professionals who risk their lives putting out fires and, in addition, ensure our safety, before what we have left of the country burns.

Madam President, what a pity that Mrs von der Leyen could not have one more minute to listen to us. The European Union has urgently provided hundreds of billions of euros for rearmament, which is exclusively in the economic interests of the United States. The greatest urgency that the European Union should have at the moment is to end the genocide of the Palestinian people - which you have not even mentioned, Mr Costa - but for that there are no resources, there is no time and, of course, there is no political will. And they still dare to say that they are indications when we attend live the extermination of an entire people. Instead of defending human rights and citizens' rights, they strive to strengthen NATO by acting as Trump's vassals. Europe does not need to spend more on defence, what it needs is sovereignty, social justice and peace. Mr Costa, there are two urgent things that the European Union should do now: immediately break with the Association Agreement with Israel and send resources to help the Palestinian people, the people in Gaza who are being exterminated. I'm not asking you: People are shouting it in the streets all over Europe. Listen to them, please, and act now.

Madam President, Commissioner, one more month we come to the plenary session of this Parliament with the certainty that most of the decisions we are going to take here represent a setback of rights. European Union countries are being allowed to implement a hate agenda with total impunity: They enable LGTBI-free zones, attack women and our free right to abortion, deny climate change that is costing thousands of lives, restrict the rights of workers and send migrants to "Guantánamos" in third countries that say they are safe and, of course, they are not, because human rights are violated there. The citizens chose us precisely to improve people's lives, but in this Parliament the unacceptable has been normalised and we are going in the opposite direction. We are witnessing what Hannah Arendt defined as the banality of evil. Because when Europe's legs shake to say no to the far right, to people...