Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-03-11-Speech-2-287"
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"en.20030311.11.2-287"2
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"Mr President, Mr Karas deserves our admiration. My Spanish colleague Mr García-Margallo y Marfil talked in terms of Mr Karas’s winning a bullfight, and that makes me angry with him, as I do not like bullfights. Moreover, he was the first and only MEP to talk about the greying of the population. If he had told me that I am an old lady – perhaps on the model of the one whose visit proves so dangerous in Dürrenmatt’s famous play – I would not have minded one bit. What I am not at all keen on is being called grey.
What do old people want? Security, independence and autonomy. It is just that all this is very difficult to achieve in the framework of occupational retirement provision that is only offered on a time-limited basis. Even a one-off payment – however generous it might be – does not provide security. Lifelong payments do most justice to the wishes and also to the needs of old people, corresponding to what we understand to mean by social security. It is to Mr Karas’s credit that he has clarified this very important idea and embedded it in the report, and I should like to thank him for his efforts.
Throughout Europe, we are in the process of discussing and solving the problems of a society in which people at long last ought to be living longer. With a whole package of measures for older employees, the freshly elected Austrian Federal Government has devised a range of options for giving older people the opportunity of being able to work longer. I say ‘of being able to’, please note. A reduction in incidental labour costs for those aged over 58, a push for higher qualifications and the promotion of part-time work for older people are just a few of these measures.
Mrs Lulling will certainly agree with me when I say that this society and this Parliament need us. Anyone who, like myself, has six grandchildren can no longer just relinquish this society of ours to other people. We ourselves have to take care of it. We oldies are not of course in the end fighting for ourselves, since we obviously already have an income. Rather, we are fighting for the young men and women whom we wish to see have much longer lives. A child born today may live until the age of a hundred, and we wish him or her an extremely long and, as far as possible, secure life."@en1
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