Jana Toom
Member of the European Parliament · Renew · EE
“Madam President, Commissioner, colleagues, of course I was prepared. You know how it goes – you have 60 seconds and you write it and you measure it. It's exactly 60 seconds. But after listening to this debate, I don't want to read it out. I'm extremely worried, really.”
“We are making big promises and we are not delivering, and we don't have many attempts left, because the people of Europe are tired of that. So this time we really have to deliver, otherwise it will be a win for the far right, and this will be a great mistake.”
“Mr President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, I do not know, for some reason, the far right in this House are constantly crying, probably shouting. You probably think that if you shout, it makes you right. This is not the case. 17 years have passed since the Commission first proposed this directive.”
“A piece of legislation that combats discrimination in all corners of the EU is not a nice activity we can do if we are in the mood for it. It is an absolute necessity to deliver on our most fundamental shared values.”
“Madam President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, what stands out to me after almost one year in the Housing Committee is that no two housing situations I heard were the same. There are some common partners, of course, but it is clear that many of these issues come from national and regional challenges.”
“Yes, we need bold and urgent action to make housing more affordable, and we will definitely play our part, but the real drivers of the change are our countries and regions. So let's make sure that we offer all the tools and measures we can, so that national and regional authorities can work to fix their local issues. 2-0288-0000”
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“We are making big promises and we are not delivering, and we don't have many attempts left, because the people of Europe are tired of that. So this time we really have to deliver, otherwise it will be a win for the far right, and this will be a great mistake. (The speaker declined to take a blue-card question from Jadwiga Wiśniewska) 3-0413-0000”
“Madam President, Commissioner, colleagues, of course I was prepared. You know how it goes – you have 60 seconds and you write it and you measure it. It's exactly 60 seconds. But after listening to this debate, I don't want to read it out. I'm extremely worried, really. A majority of the Members in this House at the moment, in this room, are on the same page. But this is not the first time we're on the same page. I was elected in 2014, and if anybody had told me back then that we would come up with the first ever anti-poverty strategy, I would probably have jumped with joy. I'm not jumping now. Because, in between, we came up with the first-ever European Pillar of Social Rights – not implemented. First-ever Minimum Wage Directive – not implemented. First-ever Child Guarantee – lacking money.”
“A piece of legislation that combats discrimination in all corners of the EU is not a nice activity we can do if we are in the mood for it. It is an absolute necessity to deliver on our most fundamental shared values. We expect national governments to get this message and have serious discussions with a view to finally adopt the directive, and we expect the Commission and will support the Commission to help the discussions and, if necessary, look at the ways to bring qualified majority for adoption. 3-0221-0000”
“Mr President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, I do not know, for some reason, the far right in this House are constantly crying, probably shouting. You probably think that if you shout, it makes you right. This is not the case. 17 years have passed since the Commission first proposed this directive. Next year, in July, it will reach the majority voting age. And yet, some countries do not take this process seriously enough to look past their differences and find a common solution. These days we are hearing outside voices questioning the European Union, questioning our resolve. In these trying times, we need to take a look at ourselves and consider what we are working for and what we stand for. Freedom, equality and respect for the rights of minorities sit at the very core of the European project.”
“Yes, we need bold and urgent action to make housing more affordable, and we will definitely play our part, but the real drivers of the change are our countries and regions. So let's make sure that we offer all the tools and measures we can, so that national and regional authorities can work to fix their local issues. 2-0288-0000”
“Madam President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, what stands out to me after almost one year in the Housing Committee is that no two housing situations I heard were the same. There are some common partners, of course, but it is clear that many of these issues come from national and regional challenges. So, while I normally take the floor in this Chamber to criticise the Commission for not being ambitious enough, this time I have to support the Commission for taking a more careful and realistic approach. Colleagues, let's not kid ourselves: the Union does not have the power to fix many of the housing crisis crises in Member States, with one regulation and promising anyone anything more than we can deliver will only undermine our credibility.”
“The barriers of obtaining Estonian citizenship were and remain too high. These people are law-abiding taxpayers that have lived in Estonia for decades or since birth. It is their homeland. Teachers, doctors, engineers, old folks – even the security police doesn't see them as a security risk. It is a purely political decision in order to change the results of the local elections that will be held in autumn. Given the fragile security situation in Europe, such a step is stupid but also dangerous. (The President cut off the speaker) 1-0250-0000”
“Madam President, colleagues, I'm speaking today on behalf of my voters. Last Wednesday, the Estonian Parliament amended the Constitution and cancelled the rights of third-country citizens and stateless people to vote in local elections. This threat existed for 30 years. The blow was aimed mostly at citizens of Russia and Belarus with a permanent residence permit, using the war of Russia against Ukraine as a pretext. The population of Estonia is 1.3 million; the Members of Parliament decided that 140 000 people are a 'fifth column', without charge or trial, collectively. The punishment: no democratic representation at all. These people are not new migrants. They are Estonians in all but their passports. Most of them took Russian passports to legalise themselves after the collapse of the Soviet Union.”
“We have to stop this nonsense trend and remember that behind every job, there is a worker that relies on their job to provide for their family, or a worker that worked hard to get where they are. Let us not forget that many people take pride in their work and feel a sense of purpose for doing that job. We need to be bold in protecting our workers that are stuck in the crossfire. First of all, by focusing on real – not fake – social dialogue, so that workers are involved in all plans for change, and also by having a framework that ensures new jobs will be created, so that workers will have concrete, decent alternatives available. 3-0305-0000”
“Madam President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, there is no doubt that economic difficulties will affect many companies across the EU during these very turbulent times, and the structuring of other types of changes will be necessary so that companies can return to a more profitable situation. However, these changes will be difficult and they will hurt many workers. So it is extremely timely to talk about the need to protect jobs and workers' rights. What I am concerned about is the growing trend in some Member States about thinking of jobs as numbers on a table, or about workers as some faceless individuals that will go on with their lives unaffected by any jobs cuts.”
“This means that the Council gets handed the perfect weapon: if they ever think that we're asking for too much in the Parliament or in the Commission, they just need to drag their feet for long enough and then make the problem disappear. In the meantime, the message we are sending to Europeans is clear: these values you hoped for will remain unreachable. It is unacceptable that we allow a couple of holdout countries to prevent the adoption of European rules that deal with values central to the European project. We need to be looking immediately at another proposal for horizontal rules to combat discrimination. 1-0214-0000”
“Madam President, colleagues, the Treaty on European Union starts with the objective of creating an ever closer union, and continues in Article 2 with the shared values that this Union shall be based on, including freedom, equality, and respect for the rights of minorities. Many of the citizens that voted for their countries to enter the Union after the 1990s did so with the hope that their countries and societies will converge to these European values. What we are seeing in the Commission work programme is that the anti-discrimination directive – and many other measures for which we did not reach an agreement in five years – gets withdrawn.”