Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-02-15-Speech-2-321"
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"en.20000215.13.2-321"2
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"Mr President, we are unable to vote for this report. The European Union should actually place social issues at the heart of the building of Europe. Social rights should determine economic choices, and not the other way around.
This is why, when it comes to social protection, we are opposed to schemes copied from the Luxembourg process which run counter to this rationale: broad economic guidelines, then convergence criteria and, finally, social issues, dealt with as the last resort. The European Union should proclaim one general principle, to wit, that the social rights acquired in Member States may not be restricted. Any Community intervention should aim to complement and to harmonise existing guarantees according to the highest common denominator.
In order to strengthen the funding of social security systems, we need a policy of general wage increase, the establishment of a minimum legal wage in each Member State. In order to fight poverty, entitlement to an income and to employment are inalienable rights. Finally, in order to avoid health being treated in any way as a commodity, the European Union should declare itself clearly opposed to pension funds and to a situation where private insurance companies have access to the health system.
I sincerely hope, in conclusion, that social Europe cannot be satisfied with mere words and pious hopes. For millions of people the situation is too tragic for that."@en1
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