Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-04-04-Speech-2-075"
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"en.20060404.7.2-075"2
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"Mr President, I too should like to thank the Commissioner and our rapporteur for their work on this issue.
As many have said, equality of treatment is a key principle for European citizens, which should apply to employment conditions and access to services within our Member States across the Union. However, in a debate where we are talking about third-country nationals, it is crucial that we are also very clear – as the rapporteur has been – that we are not talking about rolling back the hard-won rights of those individuals, but extending the rights to which our new Member States are entitled.
We have heard a number of arguments over the past few months in favour of maintaining transitional periods. Many of us here do not find them convincing. We believe that what we are seeing is – as has already been mentioned – evidence of irregular employment and false claims about self-employment. I am willing to bet that in all our countries we have a number of Member States’ citizens in unclear situations.
When the UK introduced its worker registration scheme for nationals of the A8 countries, it found that 40% of the Polish people who registered were already in the UK. I believe that is evidence that people want to work legally. We need to encourage them to do that. We need better information in advance, more effort on inspection and supporting whistle-blowers, and greater clarity about people’s rights, so we do not see the exploitation that Mr Cottigny has referred to, which threatens to undercut working conditions and exploits individuals. It is much easier to demand equality of treatment when you have clear rights.
The UK – as has been said – has opened access, with certain shifts on social security. We have had a range of workers, of all skill levels. We found no discernible statistical evidence of an increase in social benefit claims. The economic impact is seen to be modest, and the numbers started slowing towards the end of last year."@en1
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