Debate on European Fund for Strategic Investments during&nbsp;EP plenary session in Brussels. Extacts from statements&nbsp;by&nbsp;MEPs.

Brussels

statement

debate

plenary session

WEBER, Manfred (EPP, DE)

KATAINEN, Jyrki (FI, EC)

VAN BREMPT, Kathleen (S&D, BE)

BULLMANN, Udo (S&D, DE)

DURAND, Pascal (S&D, FR)

AYALA SENDER, Inés (S&D, ES)

THEURER, Michael (ALDE, DE)

GEORGIEVA, Kristalina (BG)

FERNANDES, José Manuel (EPP, PT)

European Fund for Strategic Investments (T)

European Fund for Strategic Investments: extracts from the debate

External shot of the European Parliament in Brussels.  

SOUNDBITE (Portuguese), Jos&#233; Manuel FERNANDES (EPP, PT), Rapporteur, "I'm here to support viable projects that the current programmes and financial markets don't support right now."

SOUNDBITE (Portuguese), Jos&#233; Manuel FERNANDES (EPP, PT), Rapporteur, "240 billion for investments, 75 billion for companies, especially for SMEs, to help growth, to help the competitiveness of our economy."

SOUNDBITE (Portuguese), Jos&#233; Manuel FERNANDES (EPP, PT), Rapporteur, "Politicians are not themselves the ones that create jobs. But they must do everything they can in order to create conditions that help create jobs."

SOUNDBITE (German), Udo BULLMANN (S&amp;D, DE), Rapporteur, "It's no wonder that we are excited, this is big, this is important. Europe actually has a massive investment gap, an investment gap of 200 BN or 300 BN, per year. These are the lower figures that the European Commission gives us".

SOUNDBITE (German), Udo BULLMANN (S&amp;D, DE), Rapporteur, "We welcome this proposal, not because we think it is enough, but because we say it's a step in the right direction, if we manage it well".

SOUNDBITE (English), Jyrki KATAINEN, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Jobs, Growth, Investment and Competitiveness, "Europe is not primarily lacking of liquidity, there is plenty of money, plenty of liquidity in the private sector. But there are also plenty of reasons why this liquidity is not used for productive investment in the real economy. One of the reasons is lack of risk financing and that is exactly what the EFSI is providing now."

SOUNDBITE (English), Kristalina GEORGIEVA, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Budget and Human Resources , "So, it wasn't because we had different objectives, no, we had the same objective: to make the best use of our people's sacrifice. But this objective had to be achieved making very tough tradeoffs between well performing programmes - Horizon 2020, Connecting Europe Facility - and the margin we need so we can face the challenges of today and tomorrow. We made this choice toghether".

SOUNDBITE (German), Michael THEURER (ALDE, DE), "That's why we are happy that we could reach improvements at the negotiations. On top, we have worked very hard at the budgetary control committee to make sure that there would be a democratic control of the expenditures, of bills, of sustainability. And it's a great success that we achieved to include the European Court of Auditors and the right for them to look into the books".    

SOUNDBITE (Dutch), Kathleen VAN BREMPT (S&amp;D, BE), "We, in the European Union, have switched from only focusing in cuts, to focusing on investment."

SOUNDBITE (French), Pascal DURAND (Greens/EFA, FR), "The Juncker Plan is not an investment Plan. It's a communication plan."

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), In&#233;s AYALA SENDER (S&amp;D, ES), "The EFSI offers us, from my point of view, two main virtues for our narrative in front of the citizens. Firstly it has restored the lyrics of the European anthem - the 'Ode to Joy' - after this last 7 years of austerity, suffering and setback for Europe."

SOUNDBITE (German), Manfred WEBER (EPP, DE), EPP group leader, "The fact that we met our time plan is a great success for us all, as an institution. We have shown that we can deliver to our citizens."