Adina Vălean
Member of the European Parliament · PPE · RO
“Mr President, Madam Commissioner, colleagues, well, we are serious about competitiveness. Building state-of-the-art digital infrastructure is a necessity but is not enough. Europe does not need fibre, 5G, cloud capacity only to tick targets on a scoreboard.”
“Unlocking our own market potential is possible, as well as helping market forces work across borders or giving predictability to investment. Europe does not need isolation or overregulation to be sovereign. Europe needs a digital infrastructure that is built, scaled and put to good use. 2-0033-0000”
“Madam President, Madam Commissioner, dear colleagues, I really appreciate the fact that finally the Commission put forward this Digital Networks Act.”
“This is wrong, as usual, because the companies and the industry is the one who invested until now, not the Member States, who would never have enough money for that. So, we have to address the industry and give the right incentives for them to develop the infrastructure, but for this, we have to look at what they need.”
“Mr President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, I welcome the Commission's digital package. Simplification done well should lead to efficiency and competitiveness. We must admit that our traditional precautionary approach has sometimes been disproportionate.”
“The unpopular truth is that the loading speed of social media videos – or of the offers on platforms or entertainment in general – matter very little. Productivity matters more.”
The complete record
Every one of 9 lines we hold for Adina Vălean, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account.
“Unlocking our own market potential is possible, as well as helping market forces work across borders or giving predictability to investment. Europe does not need isolation or overregulation to be sovereign. Europe needs a digital infrastructure that is built, scaled and put to good use. 2-0033-0000”
“Mr President, Madam Commissioner, colleagues, well, we are serious about competitiveness. Building state-of-the-art digital infrastructure is a necessity but is not enough. Europe does not need fibre, 5G, cloud capacity only to tick targets on a scoreboard. We need them to be used at full capacity for our businesses, researchers, hospitals, industry and public services. Too often when the Commission is bold, the Council becomes mellow. Too often when we promise simplification, we multiply reporting. And too often when we say we deliver for consumers, we reduce the debate to low prices for entertainment. But serving citizens means building a vital digital economy that produces value, multiplies jobs and keeps innovation in Europe. Decoupling from the rest of the world is not possible.”
“Because in any other structure – in electricity, in energy, everywhere, in transport – when someone is using an infrastructure, it has to pay accordingly, and this is not solved yet by the Commission through its policies. 3-0301-0000”
“This is wrong, as usual, because the companies and the industry is the one who invested until now, not the Member States, who would never have enough money for that. So, we have to address the industry and give the right incentives for them to develop the infrastructure, but for this, we have to look at what they need. And here I think it fails a little because, one, it needs to address the competition issue – and I know that the Commission is working in silos, but they promised they stopped to do that – so even though it's not digital, it's competition, but you have to address this if you want to develop infrastructure. This is absolutely one thing. And the other one is the monetisation of the use of networks.”
“Madam President, Madam Commissioner, dear colleagues, I really appreciate the fact that finally the Commission put forward this Digital Networks Act. It was long awaited and it brings some really well-expected and well-defined improvements regarding harmonisation for the single market, regarding the spectrum policy, cybersecurity, resilience, so on and so forth. So, I really appreciate it and I'm looking forward for the debate and try to improve all of these topics. There remains a couple of things I want to address right now. One is the vision, as always, that the Commission puts a target on the Member States to develop the infrastructure because it says the Member States need to develop national plans for infrastructure.”
“The unpopular truth is that the loading speed of social media videos – or of the offers on platforms or entertainment in general – matter very little. Productivity matters more. So the next steps are crucial, and the Commission must take a bold approach to address the issues that industry once solved: the implementation of the measures proposed in the Draghi report, consolidation versus competition model in the telecoms market, reform of spectrum policy, just to name a few priorities. We should learn from past mistakes in which we hesitated to go through with bold policies, and we end up with 4G+ instead of 5G standalone, and that says it all. 2-0488-0000”
“Mr President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, I welcome the Commission's digital package. Simplification done well should lead to efficiency and competitiveness. We must admit that our traditional precautionary approach has sometimes been disproportionate. We regulated some times before we innovated, and I am not sure this is a record to take pride in. Digitalisation drives economic success and economic success finances new technologies. Our precautions must become constructive and create a clear link between digitalisation and productivity. The real question is not how much infrastructure we build, but how we use it. We need automated factories, smart energy grids, computing power for research.”
“We have in front of us a good, balanced text that is focused on efficiency, grounded in reality and aimed at delivering real value for Europeans. I encourage you to support it. 1-0172-0000”
“Mr President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, I see there is a lot of interest in this subject. I am happy to see that and a lot of very good ideas around. I think it is important because we have the responsibility to get the public procurement rules right. Nowadays, public money is a scarce commodity. We finance the green transition, we strive to grow sectors in Europe to break free from geopolitical dependencies, we want to rearm Europe. The competition for public funds will be fierce. So we need clarity on criteria to improve transparency and build trust. We also need flexibility. Prices rise, labour shifts – procurement rules must reflect reality: not with blank cheques, but with common sense. We should be able to adapt and evolve.”