Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR) and Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-Presidents of The Left group in the European Parliament hold a press conference on their group's priorities during the plenary session in Strasbourg. This transcription is a result of an automatic process. Please check against delivery.

Strasbourg

press conference

SCHIRDEWAN, Martin (The Left, DE)

AUBRY, Manon (The Left, FR)

The Left

Press conference by Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR) and Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), The Left group group Leaders - The Left Press Briefing

https://api.multimedia.europarl.europa.eu/documents/20125/71309521/1688982663058_I243886Chapters%5BSD-EN%5D.srt

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, Thank you, David. And thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for having turned up in such large numbers to our press conference. As usual, we're going to inform you about the issues for this session, and then we'll hold a discussion. There are two main issue. Firstly, the debate on the nature restoration law.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, And then I also wanted to say a couple of things on the NATO summit and the readiness that NATO and Turkey have shown to take in Sweden as a member. So firstly, on the nature restoration law. Now as you're aware, there was a demonstration this morning in front of the Parliament and various climate activists right from across Europe have been involved in that, including Greta Thunberg.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, And on the other side you had the Conservatives who mobilised with the support of farmers and we're seeing a moment of political confrontation in Europe. And I think unfortunately we're seeing the Conservatives working with the extreme right and they're working against the interests of farmers and they're very aware of what they're doing politically.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, They're instrumentalized this law and it's a bit of an unholy alliance, and I think it's fully unacceptable. What we're seeing the particularly what the EPP Group and Manfred Weber are doing here. 80% of European areas, we're talking about waters, the ground forests, are in a bad state and obviously it's important for us, given that, to do something in terms of legislation to change the situation.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, We need to protect European nature by taking regulatory steps in this field. But the Conservatives have launched a Trump style campaign, which is which works with the extreme right to send out fake news and prevent nature restoration.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, What they're doing, acts against biodiversity, acts against the interests of farmers. And I often talk about farmers and like everyone else in Europe, they have an interest in protecting nature. I mean, at the end of the day, it's the possibility for them to farm at all depends on nature and farmers are very aware of that, as is everyone else in Europe.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, So what the EPP is doing here is absolute nonsense. I mean, we're seeing forests disappearing and in my constituency, the trees are being destroyed by various bugs and beetles that are turning up because of the warming climate. And it's a very bad situation and I don't think anyone can farm in a healthy, sustainable manner given the situation.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, But them our main criticism of the draft law relates to the fact that the costs of the law are unfairly distributed, essentially end up with small and medium sized farmers, and we'll be tabling amendments to try and ensure that that's dealt with. I mean, we believe that those farmers need financial support.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, We think there needs to be a significant increase in the financing of measures in favour of biodiversity. And I think we also need to make sure that small and medium sized farmers are not left alone with the burden of protecting nature. So we need a nature protection fund which comprises new financing so that we can ensure that farming in Europe can be sustainable and diverse. So that's our goal and we'll be tabling amendments.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, Well, actually, we have tabled amendments along those lines and then obviously we're very critical of what the Conservatives are doing together with the extreme right. What they're doing is no good for farmers, it's no good for biodiversity and it's no good for nature in Europe. So that's the first issue.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, Now secondly, moving on to the NATO's summit in Lithuania. Now, to our surprise, Turkish President Erdogan has agreed to Sweden's membership of NATO's, but the price is a very high one. The US will be providing further weapons to Turkey. Sixteen fighter jets, which will be used to attack Kurds in Iraq and Syria in violation of international law. So they'll be used for the aggression against the Kurds. That's really unacceptable.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, And at the same time the European Union has been told that it has to make further dirty deals with Erdogan. I mean, this is an authoritarian country. It has no future in the European Union as it currently is. And we as the Left group in the European Parliament want to see good cooperation with the Turkish people and with a Turkey which doesn't follow the policies that Erdogan's authoritarian regime follows.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, The implementation of the Istanbul Convention, so protecting women in Turkey, in Turkish society, protecting minorities, strengthening democracy, etc., etc. that's the way to cooperate with Turkey. We don't see more dirty deals pursuant to which Erdogan gets favourable treatment in exchange for Sweden's entry tonight.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, And let's not forget that NATO is a military alliance. It's not an alliance that works for peace. And it should also be said that Sweden's accession to NATO isn't going to mean that we live in a more peaceful world. Quite the opposite. It's going to lead to more defence spending, more war. And I think we need to think about more peaceful mechanisms to solve conflicts, the diplomatic level rather than by military means. Thank you very much.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, Thank you. And good morning. It's our last week in Strasbourg. It's 37 degrees out there. We've got air conditioning here in this room. And I just hope that our EPP friends stop staying in the Parliament and I hope they go outside so they will feel that climate change is real.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, They'll see that there's activists out there and maybe Manfred Weber will be the first of them lot that stops lying and stops replacing in the ENVI committee members that don't want to go along with their points, and I would invite them to stop being climate sceptic and aligning with the far right on this.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, But just to come back to what Martin was saying, I think this is the hottest week on record now for the past 125,000 years. And we have people to the right and extreme right in this House who are saying, let's have a break from environmental rules.And, you know, it's the Renew Group and Emmanuel Macron who have the copyright on this. It doesn't even come from the right or the far right. But of course, they've co-opted that. And even the Renew group is involved now.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, In the Committee, there were 44 votes in favour, 44 against, and it faltered because there were four votes missing from the Renew group. And Stéphane Sejourné in plenary holds the keys here and they will need to see whether they want to sacrifice our future. When it comes to Mr. Weber, he wasn't in the hemicycle, he preferred speaking to journalists than be present during the discussion in the hemicycle.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, But I have to say that everyone on the right and the far right was absent. All the chairs were empty. They obviously didn't have the courage to face the music. This brings me to my second point, which is the independent ethics body and the work being done there. Now, I talk about this on a regular basis in our press conferences. It's just sort of leitmotif.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, Now, you know that this week, tomorrow, in fact, there will be a vote in plenary on a resolution following the Commission's proposal for the setting up of an independent ethics body. No, I'm not going to go over the fact that for the past four years the Commission has been making fun of us. They sort of been avoiding thing while rendering this ethics body null and void. It's an empty shell.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, Now, I was the Rapporteur for our group and during the negotiations we saw something which is symptomatic of what happens in this Parliament. Again, the right and the far right aligned, so that they could empty out the text of any meaning and the right that managed to water down the text. At the end of the day, of course doesn't want to co-sign and doesn't want to vote for it.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, Now, the text says that members need to be independent for this independent ethics body. It's in the title, but the Commission didn't foresee it, as a requirement. And of course, you need the powers for investigation and the powers to be hand up on penalties. Otherwise it's just an empty shell.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, Now, we will have key amendments in relation to the text and we will be calling on the Commission simply to revisit its proposal, which really isn't a credible basis, on a sound basis, to work with for any future work.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, Then, in closing, could I draw your attention to the discussion which is on the Parliament's agenda for this week? We're looking at what to put on the agenda for this plenary session. It's a debate from the Left. It's our last opportunity before the European elections of next year and the topic speaks for itself.

SOUNDBITE (English), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, We've simply called it tax the rich. And I think given the current climate, the world we live in, the title of our debates, which might sound a bit provocative, also has some real meaning to it at political level, we need to make sure that those who have become even richer from the economic crisis, the energy crisis and the health crisis, also pay their dues and contribute.

SOUNDBITE (English), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, European citizens have seen price hikes of 15%. There are millions of people on our continent who go without food at times, at the same time, there were 15% price hikes. The consumption of food stuffs went down by 10% as a result. We live on a continent where people decide not to have food at times.

SOUNDBITE (English), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, Now, given that overall context, we have the very wealthy, the very rich on our continent who just kept getting richer by, you know, millions and billions. And in fact, if I look at the richest French families, they got richer by 15%. But, this will be one of our main campaign issues. Tax the rich, tax super profits. And it's not a a micro tax to be applied on the energy sector. No, we really need to tax those who became rich.

SOUNDBITE (English), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, And if prices went up, it's not just because of the energy crisis. Even the European Central Bank says this is because of major companies who wanted to make money from the crisis and who, as a result, put up the process for food stuffs, their profits are stratospheric and for once we will agree with the European Central Bank. But, go further and say let's take some action.

SOUNDBITE (English), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, And that will be our main point tomorrow for the debate, tomorrow from 13 pm on the agenda, and the ethics body vote is taking place tomorrow in the same voting session as the Nature Restoration Law. Thank you.

Q&A, Question regarding the position of The Left on the amendments brought by Renew on the Council's text.

Q&A, Question about the compromises that needed to be made to the Ethics Body proposal as to get the EPP's support.

Q&A, A question asking an opinion about why the Nature Restoration Law has become a politicized topic, and another one about where the money for the fund supporting the nature restoration will come from.

Q&A, Question regarding the EU-CELAC summit and if the new Brazilian President is seen as an ally by The Left.

Q&A, Question about if the co-presidents considers that in their home countries there are far right groups ready to ally with an European political party.

SOUNDBITE (French), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, -

SOUNDBITE (English), Manon AUBRY (The Left, FR), Co-president of The Left, -

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, -

Q&A, A question about the Left's position on the production of ammunition and another question on the EU Ethics Body.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martin SCHIRDEWAN (The Left, DE), Co-president of The Left, - -