Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2015-11-25-Speech-3-811-000"
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"en.20151125.37.3-811-000"2
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"Mr President, I am pleased that we have chosen today to debate this issue because today, colleagues, we actually have something to celebrate in the midst of all the gloom in the news about us. We adopted the budget today, and when we adopted that budget we agreed one of the key demands of our resolution which we will adopt tomorrow, namely to increase the humanitarian aid budget for education in emergencies substantially – by EUR 26 million.
This is a figure that we proposed in the Committee on Development, and I want to congratulate Arne Lietz, our rapporteur. It is a big step towards the 4% target that we all want to see as part of the EU’s overall humanitarian aid budget, and I know that this is a cause close to the heart of nearly everybody in this room. Certainly, I know that for Commissioner Stylianides it is a big priority, as it is for for my own political group. I know that colleagues from the EPP, the Greens, the Liberals – all those I see here, and our colleagues in many Groups – have shared this view, and I thank you for your support.
It was when I went to Turkey with the Development Committee earlier this autumn that I got a real sense of why it matters that we put money into education, because I visited a refugee camp of 17 500 people. I also visited some of the many families in the community and I got a real sense of what it means to the families who come to have to leave their homes and everything else behind and to start again, and also of what it means to a country to have to receive hundreds of thousands of refugees and try and offer education. We saw some excellent projects run by UNICEF and other organisations. In the refugee camp in Kahramanmaraş we saw UNICEF organising schools, paying Syrian teachers a stipend to offer education to the children, and providing a school curriculum.
What was offered to those children was not just an education but a sense of normality, and the school was a happier place in that camp. We met children who were orphaned and had been through enormous trauma, but in the school they had a sense of normality: it was a place where they could be like other children. The Commission was providing kites and games and toys, as well as an education.
There is one issue, however, which I am concerned about, and that is what happens when children get to the age of 16, 17 or 18 and want to go on to higher education. I think that is where we need to do more – because we met young people in southern Turkey who had lost their sense of hope for the future. They had had plans to go to university, to study and to train, and yet, at 17 or 18, they did not see any outlet. Those are the young people who are getting on boats, risking their lives crossing the Mediterranean, and we have to find a solution for them. I think we could do this with our universities and colleges, by offering scholarships. I am sure there is something more we can do.
The message from our resolution was very clear. I know, Commissioner, that you are aware of the problem of the barrier between humanitarian aid and development funding. The Commission is trying to break that barrier down, and we welcome that. We have the new global goals now, on the basis of which we can work to consolidate education, particularly in countries which are precarious and fragile.
Our figures show that up to 1 billion children are living in conflict areas in the world today. We will also soon have the report that my colleague, Enrique Guerrero Salom, is preparing for the World Humanitarian Aid Summit, and at that summit, Commissioner and colleagues, we will have to argue to get other players to back our increase in funding for this type of education.
Thank you very much for your support. Let us hope we can build on what we have achieved today."@en1
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