Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, together with María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), Shadow Rapporteur, Pascal CANFIN (Renew, FR), Chair of the ENVI Committee, and Nils TORVALDS (Renew, FI), coordinator ENVI Committee, hold a press conference on Renew's efforts regarding the vote on the Nature Restoration Law, during the plenary session in Strasbourg. This transcription is a result of an automatic process. Please check against delivery.

Strasbourg

press conference

TORVALDS, Nils (Renew, FI)

CANFIN, Pascal (Renew, FR)

RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS, María Soraya (Renew, ES)

SÉJOURNÉ, Stéphane (Renew, FR)

Renew Europe

Press conference by Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), Renew Europe Group Leader, with María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), Pascal CANFIN (Renew, FR), Chair ENVI Committee, and Nils TORVALDS (Renew, FI) - Renew Europe Press Briefing

SOUNDBITE (French), St&eacute;phane S&Eacute;JOURN&Eacute; (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, Thank you very much. So, we've decided to hold this press conference all together so that we can respond to any specific questions you may have on this very topical issue, on the Nature Restoration Law. Let me just make a few comments to kick off.

SOUNDBITE (French), Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, Now as a group, last week, thanks to our Rapporteur, the Chair of the Committee and our group co-ordinator, we took an initiative which we feel provides a way out for the Parliament as a whole and provides the conditions for unanimity around this file to avoid it being rejected.

SOUNDBITE (French), Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, There is a major possibility for this file to be existed, particularly given the original Commission proposal. So we've taken this initiative. I am going to let the rapporteur talk about the content of our proposal, but the fact is that there are still doubts over whether this file goes through, whether the motion for rejection is adopted or not. The vote will be at midday, of course.

SOUNDBITE (French), Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, So, the group is working internally to build our position. But I think it's also useful externally what we're doing because ensuring cohesion within the Renew group also means that possibly we can find a majority on the file. It should be noted, though, that given recent statements by the EPP, for example, there's not a great deal of desire to find a majority in spite of some movement and efforts to find a European level compromise.

SOUNDBITE (French), Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, The fact is that the images that we've seen this morning, farmers groups and demonstrators squaring up to each other is, as it were. I mean, these are things that as the Renew group, we wanted to avoid. But we're seeing that we have, on the one hand, people who are very sensitive to climate issues and want to push things forward.

SOUNDBITE (French), Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, But we also want to ensure that while their views are taken account of, we can we also take account of people who are more pragmatic on these issues. So that's the context of the situation. We await mid-day, of course, but I'm going to give the floor to Soraya, who can give you talk a bit more about the political context.

SOUNDBITE (French), Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, And then Pascale and Niels will also answer your questions and tell you a little bit more about the current text and how things are looking for the vote. So, Soraya, please.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), Good morning and thank you, Stephane. Well, as you're aware, the renewed compromise has been very clear right through the negotiation process on this file. We have been working hard to build compromises among all the political groups. The EPP was involved in all of that as well. At the end of the day, withdrew for reasons which don't have anything to do with the substance of this law.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), We've seen in the debate that the EPP, together with the far right, have essentially taken the nature restoration law hostage for reasons which have nothing to do with the content of the file. I think it's pretty symptomatic that subsequent to all the statements that we've heard from Mr. Weber during recent weeks, a lot of which has been fake news, I think clearly.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), Well, subsequent to all of that, he wasn't even present in the debate today. And I think that really shows that there's no content to what they're saying is just political slogans. We had this situation of blockage and so as Stephane was saying, Renew decided to work to try and unblock the situation.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), Now we have a hopefully today we'll get a mandate from the Parliament to be able to launch trialogue negotiations and what we're trying to do is take the Council's general approach, because a majority of Member States is in favour of moving forward.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), And together with that general approach, we've tabled amendments on behalf of our political group which dealt with some of the main concerns that had emerged from our political group focusing on more flexibility from four Member States.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), Some amendments related to financing and others which dealt with particular concerns related to compensation schemes being set up, whether for agricultural funds or forestry projects. So we're going to continue working along these lines this morning.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), It seems clear that large industry and energy companies, the European Federation of Renewable Energies, have come out in favour of the law because they know that we can only have economic growth in Europe if we maintain our ecosystems and natural resources in good health.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), I think there's a majority also of farmers and people who live in rural areas who have been providing ecosystem services for years in their communities and they haven't been remunerated or recognised and they need this law in order to for that to happen. The majority of our mayors in Europe, federal state presidents, autonomous communities in my country have adopted this law.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), They've adopted a report from the Committee of the Regions with two rapporteurs, one from the Socialist Group and one from the EPP. And they do that because they know that they need to act at the local level and they're aware that the health of their citizens is at stake. So there isn't a problem in terms of substance here.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), María Soraya RODRÍGUEZ RAMOS (Renew, ES), The problem is this the fact that this has been taken hostage by the EPP and the far right. Now, we in the Renew group think we're part of the solution and right until the vote, we'll be working hard to ensure the widest possible consensus in our political group and the largest possible number of votes in favour of this law from other groups as well. Thank you very much.

SOUNDBITE (English), Pascal CANFIN (Renew, FR), Chair of the ENVI Committee, As Soraya just said, that more than half of the EPP governments voted in favour of that law in the Council and that's why we tabled a general approach to give us more chance to make possible for some EPP delegations where their government voted in favour and the Council to support the text in plenary.

SOUNDBITE (English), Pascal CANFIN (Renew, FR), Chair of the ENVI Committee, And we are ready to work again to secure a majority because the last thing we want is to have a win of the fake news and win of far right populism, because that's exactly what threaten us today. We are in the grey zone. I don't know at that stage if the vote would take place right now, I don't know what the result will be. I don't know. So that's why we still have a couple of hours to work on to secure a majority.

SOUNDBITE (English), Nils TORVALDS (Renew, FI), coordinator ENVI Committee, Thank you. It's nice to be on this side of the microphone for once. I think what we are facing is the agony of the kingmaker, because the official count of votes for the plenary on this issue is that we might lose it if we are not united in Renew. So therefore, what was already said by the Stephan and Pascal and actually also by our shadow, who has she has been doing great work is that we need to find a solution and time is running out.

SOUNDBITE (English), Nils TORVALDS (Renew, FI), coordinator ENVI Committee, So what we are trying to achieve is a compromise where we can have all of us all on board. The background issue there is that the proposal from the Commission from the very beginning was a one size fits all. And you have, if you speak about the problems with biodiversity, if you speak about anything that ties with nature to do, you have very different circumstances in different Member States.

SOUNDBITE (English), Nils TORVALDS (Renew, FI), coordinator ENVI Committee, So Finland doesn't equal a state, Sweden doesn't equal Greece. Nobody equals the Netherlands because there are too many Dutch people. That's their problem. So what we are trying now to is to just to find a solution where we have everybody on board and amendments, where the biggest shortcomings of the proposal are, they are sort of remedied.

SOUNDBITE (English), Nils TORVALDS (Renew, FI), coordinator ENVI Committee, That is not an easy task. As I said, being kingmaker and coming from a Republican Finland being kingmaker is not sort of my greatest joy. It's slightly easier if you come from Spain and if you have a variant from France. Imagine if you come from France with a very imperial president, then you might be understanding the things.

SOUNDBITE (English), Nils TORVALDS (Renew, FI), coordinator ENVI Committee, But this is sort of the challenges we have here and but we are still talking terms. I gave actually Pascal the voting card back to him so we might be able to work together.

Q&A, Question about the mandatory objectives in the law which made EPP to oppose the dossier.

SOUNDBITE (French), Stéphane SÉJOURNÉ (Renew, FR), President of the Renew Europe Group of the European Parliament, -

Q&A, A question regarding the percentange of Renew MEPs who will intend to vote for the Nature Restoration law. And another question about the political ideological spectrum in the EP and if it is shifting to the right.

SOUNDBITE (English), Nils TORVALDS (Renew, FI), coordinator ENVI Committee, -

Q&A, A question about how many more Renew MEPs have to be convinced to vote in favour of the Nature Restoration Law. And another question about possible amendments which could be brought as to give Member States more flexibility. -