Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2016-04-13-Speech-3-022-000"
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"en.20160413.5.3-022-000"2
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"Mr President, last September Frans Timmermans stood before the plenary to talk about the immigration and refugee crisis and dramatically announced that winter was coming. Well, as the days get longer and the blossom and leaves appear on the trees, we can now see that summer is coming. The International Organisation for Migration has estimated that eight times more people crossed the seas to come to EU countries in the first three months of 2016 compared to the first three months of 2015. All indications are that the numbers arriving this summer will surpass previous years, many fleeing the horrors of terrorism and barbarism that still exist, but others understandably pursuing a better life in our countries.
None of us wants to see another summer like the last, wondering if the public support for the Schengen area or the public’s confidence in our institutions or the public sympathy can last another summer like the last. And whilst the challenge may not change, what does need to change is our attitude and our response.
This summer is a chance to show that we have learned the lessons of failure from 2015. And while Mr. Tusk admits that not all agreements are perfect, I have to say that much has come out of the Council and the Commission to tackle the crisis which my political group has called for and supports: measures to better guard the external border; enhancing the Schengen Information System; building a more efficient returns and readmission programme, and taking on the human traffickers. However, other decisions have been made which may make some of us feel better but may store up more problems for the future. And while I have huge admiration for the way that the Turkish nation has received, administered and housed over 2.7 million refugees, as Mr Tusk admitted, many of us still have serious concerns about the EU-Turkey deal on a practical level, on a legal level and (some) on an ethical level. Time will tell if those concerns are allayed.
But even as the German Chancellor and the European Commission hailed the deal with Turkey, questions are being asked in other countries. We live in an age of instant messaging and social media, and we have to realise that as one entry point becomes less accessible, messages will be sent back telling others to try alternative routes via Italy, Spain or Malta, to name a just few.
Moving on to last week’s communication from the Commission on the review of the Dublin system, we saw a mixed bag: two very different options for reform. One option that reinvents the wheel and centralises asylum applications and distribution. The other, which seeks to make the wheel that we have turn better, offers some improvements to help states on the front line. Or to put it another way, now we face a clear decision between choosing an option shrouded in idealism but which has little chance of success, and one based on realism and making the situation better.
I suspect the general public would prefer that we choose pragmatism over idealism. So, rather than an idealistic grand plan or what Mr Tusk calls a ‘golden key’, let us make the rules that we have work properly. Let us enhance and improve the laws and agencies already in place, not scrap and replace them through desperation. Let us put our efforts and our money into controlling our borders; returning those who are not fleeing persecution or war or disaster – of course understandably coming for a better economic life – but allowing them to apply through existing legal migration channels; providing dignified detention conditions; speeding up asylum procedures and getting meaningful and voluntary commitment from Member States about helping refugees closer to their homes, or directly resettling the most vulnerable from conflict regions.
But let us show anyone looking to come to EU countries that we have asylum systems which are firm but fair, based on compassion and pragmatism. So my message to this House, to the Commission and to Member States over the next few weeks is a simple one: summer is coming. We do not have time to reinvent the wheel, but we do have time to fix it."@en1
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