Roberta METSOLA, EP President, gives a speech at the special plenary organised at the European Economic and Social Committee about the topic: "EU's responses to (geo-) political challenges in 2023 – the perspective of the European Parliament". The transciption is a result of an automatic process. Please check against delivery.

statement

METSOLA, Roberta (EPP, MT, EP President)

European Economic and Social Committee

president's agenda

Statement by Roberta METSOLA, EP President at the European Economic and Social Committee plenary on "EU's responses to (geo-) political challenges in 2023 – the perspective of the European Parliament"

SOUNDBITE (English), Christa SCHWENG, President of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), I would now like to welcome President of the European Parliament, Roberta MMetsola it's really a pleasure having you with us. And I'm particularly happy that you found the time and dedicated. I know that you have a busy schedule. We are talking on how to tackle successfully the current geopolitical challenges. This topic of today's debates. Europe is indeed facing a multitude of challenges that threaten our continent's prosperity and stability. From the ongoing war in Ukraine to the resulting inflation, energy and food crisis.

SOUNDBITE (English), Christa SCHWENG, President of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), These challenges follow the consequences of the pandemic, putting at risk all our efforts to recover. Because of high bills and inflation many businesses struggle to survive, and there are people having to choose between eat or heat. The competitiveness of the European Union is under pressure. We have a new external context in this sense, the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act, to which the EU needs to response.

SOUNDBITE (English), Christa SCHWENG, President of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), We also have increasing internal challenges related to the lack of skills we are faced with in Europe. During the European Year of Skills we must take the opportunity to focus on tackling lack of skills and skills mismatches that harm innovation and thus the future prosperity of Europe. The EESC has developed a series of proposal to address these challenges head on. By focusing on economic growth, on strategic autonomy, on the digital and green transition, Sustainability and solidarity.

SOUNDBITE (English), Christa SCHWENG, President of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), We believe that we can build a more prosperous, competitive, inclusive and sustainable European Union that is really future proof. I will mention only a few examples of important ideas. First, revising the EU's economic governance framework is crucial in supporting the EU's growth agenda. Europe must find ways to increase its strategic autonomy and to decarbonise its economy while keeping energy prices under control. Additionally, the EESC has called for the full implementation of the National Recovery and Resilience Plans.

SOUNDBITE (English), Christa SCHWENG, President of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), And supported the inclusion of free power EU chapters in them as a way to speed up the EU's strategic autonomy, the energy transition. The green and digital transitions are no more necessary than ever, but we must ensure that the private sector is well equipped for the new reality and that nobody is left behind. Last but definitely not least, I am convinced that organised civil society has a critical role to play in improving EU policies and their effectiveness when they are implemented. Citizens wants to have a bigger say in the European Union. The Conference on the Future of Europe has shown this.

SOUNDBITE (English), Christa SCHWENG, President of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), The EESC fully supports this and is cloud to put its six years of experience in liaising between the European institutions and the organisations of civil society across the European Union at the disposal of EU institutions. We can also build further on the long history of cooperation between the EESC and European parliaments. We are convinced to strengthen our institution ties by establishing a list of common priorities for reinforced cooperation as foreseen in our cooperation agreements.

SOUNDBITE (English), Christa SCHWENG, President of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), This will ensure that we work more efficiently together towards the same goals. We also propose to work together and have joint activities in view of the 2024 European elections. With a view to achieve the highest possible turnout rates at the 2024 elections and thus strengthening Europe's democratic basis. This is a make or break moment, and only through coordinated efforts can we successfully tackle the challenges facing Europe and build a more prosperous, inclusive and sustainable future. President Metsola, the floor is yours.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, Thank you very much. Dear President, dear Christa. Distinguished members, I will start by catching on to the last thing you said in your introduction that this is a make or break moment. We had to answer this question I would say since the very beginning of our legislative mandate in 2019. We had to answer to those challenges during the pandemic. We had to answer to those moments at the beginning of the Russian invasion into Ukraine, 11 months ago. And we need to continue to answer that at the beginning of the year 2023.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, As we work not only on reform, immediate, medium term, longer term, but also on the fact that we need to convince every day that Europe matters, that voting in European elections matters and choosing your representatives and what is the emergence of that matters. In Ukraine the brutal fighting and killing still goes on since Russia launched its illegal invasion of sovereign Ukraine. Last week, we learnt with sadness of the death in a helicopter crash of Ukraine's interior minister, his first deputy and the ministry secretary, along with 13 other victims.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, As European nations prepare to send more tanks to Ukraine to help it liberate more territory from Russia these days in the Donbass, bone chilling explosions are constant and relentless. And relentlessly Ukraine is fighting for democracy, freedom and justice and fighting for us too. European Union members have rallied together like never before to provide Ukraine with financial aid, humanitarian aid, macro financial assistance and military assistance. We have adopted nine hard hitting packages of targeted sanctions against Putin and those responsible for these horrors.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, We have granted Moldova and Ukraine EU candidate status. And we at the European Parliament are supporting calls for the establishment of an Ad Hoc international tribunal to hold State sponsors of terrorism accountable for war crimes and for the crime of aggression. Also, to give the people of Ukraine hope the European Parliament launched a 'The Generators of Hope' campaign. With this campaign, we have secured hundreds of generators from various sizes and power from across European citizens and regions in all European countries.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, Because 11 months later, Europeans still want to help every day for what the Ukrainian brothers and sisters are going through. The war has also brought on an energy crisis, which in turn not only puts enormous pressure on households, but also is a driver of inflation. And here European Union members came up with a common EU response, which we can never leave out of our discourse when we look at the work that we do every day, not only what we decide, how we communicate it and how we message with it in order to deliver the tangible results to our citizens.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, This includes gas storage rate regulation, the reduction of gas and electricity consumption, and the announcement of joint purchases of gas. All of which helped to calm the markets and to bring energy prices down. Energy prices and inflation would have been at far worse levels if EU Member States and institutions hadn't sat together more frequently in 2022 than ever before in EU history to hammer out our divergences, our realities, and find solutions.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, The Eurobarometer indicates that the vast majority of European citizens are supportive of our actions, even though we are not yet out of the woods. I strongly believe in time we will come out stronger. But this will require a lot of effort from governments, from businesses, from stakeholders, from industry, and from European institutions and bodies too. Right now, our number one priority is Europe's competitiveness. We must ensure the Green Deal and the digital transition continue in earnest. We must return to growth and lower our dependencies.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, The next generation EU and the Recovery and Resilience Facility will help both households and industries recover from what is essentially drastic economic turmoil. What we can also say is that there is still money left in the next generation EU, existing funds which are available. We need to say this and we need to see how they can and where they can be used. The Parliament has done its part. We were swift in adopting a position on Repower EU, which allows Member States to tap in deeper into next generation EU funds. As long as these funds are invested in renewable energy, that will in-turn ease the energy transition while at the same time pushing growth.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, The truth is that Europe has leverage in abundance, but we have to get smarter at using it. Together, EU Member States form the world's largest single market. The foundations of our economy are strong, but what we need now is to use our macroeconomic power as an asset. European Economic and Social Committee stakeholders are at the forefront of implementing national recovery and resilient plans. The success and effectiveness of our recovery plan depends on them, on us, on you.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, This is why the European Parliament has repeatedly outlined to the Commission and the Council the importance of putting local and regional recovery and resilience stakeholders at the centre of our efforts. Because democratic accountability and legitimacy is of prime importance. It is in the way we take decisions into how we communicate, as I said earlier. But how we transform discourse, whether in local, regional, national, European elections, into saying what has concretely been achieved tangibly at a European level that matters concretely to everybody.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, If we look back, the war has changed everything. Even the way that European institutions and bodies operate with one another. So going forward, I think it is imperative if that Europeans and whichever fora we work in stick together. And that all our governing bodies at all levels work together in a healthy, cooperative spirit, social and territorial dialogue with social partners and civil society has always been a cornerstone of how our union operates.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, Because European institutions, when we look at how, for example, I will speak specifically about the European Parliament and the European Economic and Social Committee, how our relationship since 1957 has evolved dramatically. It has evolved and also in our conversations between myself and your president, is how our constructive and consultative partnership is outlined, not only in precision in the treaties. But also in terms of your legislative recommendations on the green and digital transitions, which were particularly appreciated by members of the European Parliament.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, When it came to fixing together the final outcome of the trialogues at the end of last year. And will continue to dominate our work and the bill in the beginning of this year's mandate during the the current Swedish Presidency and the incoming Swedish and Belgian presidencies. If I looked forward now over the coming years, the European Parliament must continue to take on board the EESCs authoritative and legitimate input. Particularly as it can help Parliament optimise its own legislative mandate.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, We are all the wiser for the insightful contributions that we receive, and you can count on my support and my position in ensuring that this continues in the way that we work with different committees, in the way that we work internally on different legislative proposals. I would also like to say that with the improved access waiver working for a long time between the European Parliament and in the Stefan Zweig building and your building.

SOUNDBITE (English), Roberta METSOLA, President of the European Parliament, For which I thank our building management teams, this is actually something that we can really concretely say that we are connected. We just have to do more in order to work together on concrete proposals. I am ready to answer all questions. Happy to discuss. Please hold us to account and let us continue the consultation together. I very much look forward to our discussion. Thank you very much.