N1HRV — broadcast
20260917 130000 UTC
496 transcript segments
Google Cloud Speech-to-Text API (Chirp) + Gemini 2.5 Flash Non-Thinking
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[00:01:39] Božo Kovačević is waiting for us this time in
[00:01:41] London,
[00:02:00] The next item on the agenda
[00:02:03] is the Commission's statement on the protection of human health
[00:02:07] from toxic
[00:02:08] substances.
[00:02:12] This is the last debate this week
[00:02:16] in plenary, but it is very
[00:02:19] significant because it discusses toxic substances
[00:02:22] that are
[00:02:25] dangerous to the health of Europeans. Recently there
[00:02:28] have been. Many such examples across
[00:02:31] Europe, Italy, Germany,
[00:02:35] Romania and the city of Gospić in Croatia.
[00:02:39] Allow me to express full solidarity with
[00:02:42] the citizens of Europe and to express
[00:02:45] the desire to protect the health of all our
[00:03:01] Protecting health is something
[00:03:06] citizens, that is of fundamental value to us, protecting citizens and our
[00:03:09] economies. This is not something that is
[00:03:12] unilateral, it goes from every level of
[00:03:16] government in different
[00:03:19] sectors. I will start with one of the sectors
[00:03:23] that is very harmful and
[00:03:26] easy to avoid, that is...
[00:03:30] Tobacco. 700,000
[00:03:33] people
[00:03:34] died in
[00:03:37] 2012 due to tobacco, and
[00:03:40] in 2023,
[00:03:42] 520,000 people, which is significant
[00:03:46] progress. However, this still means that approximately
[00:03:49] half a million people in Europe still die
[00:03:53] every year due to
[00:03:56] tobacco use. The use of
[00:03:59] nicotine in various forms is spreading, especially among
[00:04:03] young people, half of
[00:04:05] whom are under 40 years old,
[00:04:09] a large number of them in the age
[00:04:12] group of 14 to 19 years old, who already
[00:04:15] regularly start smoking
[00:04:17] e-cigarettes. Electronic cigarettes
[00:04:21] exist with nicotine or without nicotine,
[00:04:25] but those without nicotine contain
[00:04:28] dangerous metals, such as lead or
[00:04:32] nickel. These substances
[00:04:36] have a harmful effect on
[00:04:39] the body
[00:04:40] and various
[00:04:43] parts of the body,
[00:04:46] especially the respiratory system. Therefore,
[00:04:49] we are trying to work
[00:04:52] on new regulations to
[00:04:55] provide protection from these harmful products.
[00:04:58] In that regulation, we will
[00:05:02] also deal with very
[00:05:05] attractive marketing, especially
[00:05:09] on the internet, where they try to attract interest for
[00:05:12] products, especially among younger consumers.
[00:05:16] Now the European Union is working on a large consultation
[00:05:19] process. Second, protecting
[00:05:23] citizens means focusing on
[00:05:27] those who treat citizens. From the beginning of
[00:05:31] 2025,
[00:05:33] we have reduced
[00:05:36] the possibility of using certain types of amalgams that
[00:05:40] use mercury in this way. We have reduced
[00:05:43] citizens' exposure to
[00:05:47] the goal was to protect citizens as
[00:05:51] well as workers and
[00:05:53] set limit values,
[00:05:57] maximum limit values for such
[00:05:59] substances.
[00:06:02] Also, the European Commission
[00:06:05] has, due to this
[00:06:08] situation, significantly revised
[00:06:11] many of its regulations ranging from
[00:06:15] industrial emissions to
[00:06:17] waste management. The European Commission also
[00:06:21] revises the REACH regulation, which
[00:06:24] revises limit values for many
[00:06:27] substances. Work is currently underway
[00:06:31] on restrictions related to Pefas
[00:06:35] in general. And now something else that
[00:06:38] concerns all Europeans, that
[00:06:42] is: the food we eat, which is on our
[00:06:45] table every day, food is indeed
[00:06:49] exposed to many harmful
[00:06:52] substances and pollutants, many
[00:06:55] residues, the maximum
[00:06:57] values for these substances are now
[00:07:01] in our regulations after eFS
[00:07:03] assessments, all this also
[00:07:07] requires good supervision. In
[00:07:10] past years.
[00:07:12] 18%
[00:07:15] of samples were either without residues or residues
[00:07:19] within the prescribed
[00:07:22] values. Most of the residues found
[00:07:26] were related to substances that are not
[00:07:29] allowed on the market. This
[00:07:32] also applies to all products that
[00:07:35] come from outside our borders, so if they
[00:07:39] contain products that are not allowed in Europe,
[00:07:42] they must not enter our markets.
[00:07:45] The European Commission will accompany the detection
[00:07:49] of such products with practical
[00:07:52] measures, increasing audits from 50
[00:07:55] percent in third countries and by 33%
[00:07:59] increasing border controls. We also have
[00:08:03] national experts who
[00:08:06] go to border
[00:08:10] crossings. They
[00:08:12] started such work at the beginning of this week.
[00:08:15] Also, a certain number of
[00:08:18] customs
[00:08:21] officers will undergo additional professional
[00:08:24] training, those who
[00:08:28] will thus acquire knowledge where they will be
[00:08:31] most useful. So,
[00:08:35] exposure to various
[00:08:38] harmful substances, from tobacco to
[00:08:42] chemicals to harmful substances in
[00:08:46] our plates, is something
[00:08:49] where our citizens expect
[00:09:05] is neither a left nor a right topic.
[00:09:08] Clean water, air and environment concern all of us.
[00:09:14] And that is why when problems arise, when failures occur, or when
[00:09:17] situations like the ones we unfortunately face in
[00:09:20] Croatia occur,
[00:09:23] serious politics solves the problem, it does not
[00:09:26] spread fear and panic. Serious
[00:09:30] politics brings citizens the results
[00:09:32] of remediation, it does not use citizens' fear for its
[00:09:36] plans. Illegal waste management
[00:09:40] represents a significant European challenge, which concerns
[00:09:44] every member state, because
[00:09:47] environmental crime is often cross-border
[00:09:50] in nature, as we know, and one of the most lucrative
[00:09:53] activities of organized crime.
[00:09:57] Illegal disposal, more than 35,000
[00:10:00] tons of hazardous waste in Varaždin, Gospić
[00:10:04] and Benkovac, which was discovered with the help
[00:10:07] of Europol, shows how much damage
[00:10:10] can be caused by such illegal
[00:10:12] activities,
[00:10:15] but that makes it even clearer that concern for
[00:10:18] health cannot be proven by the loudness
[00:10:22] of an ideological attack, but by independent analysis, public
[00:10:25] data, and remediation deadlines. This case
[00:10:29] is therefore not another opportunity for ideological rivalry,
[00:10:32] but a test of the strength of our rule of law.
[00:10:36] Citizens have the right to truth, to continuous health monitoring
[00:10:40] and to remediation with clear deadlines. Perpetrators, without
[00:10:44] any doubt, must be prosecuted and
[00:10:46] held accountable. In conclusion, colleagues,
[00:10:49] it is clear that we will not choose between
[00:10:53] ignoring the problem on one side and spreading panic on
[00:10:57] the other, but that we choose measurement,
[00:10:59] transparency, remediation and accountability, concrete measures that
[00:11:03] will be presented by colleagues from the delegation, we choose to
[00:11:06] protect our fellow citizens and not fill them with fear
[00:11:10] and then politically
[00:11:12] ride on that fear.
[00:11:26] First of all, I would like to say that asking questions is not spreading
[00:11:29] panic, but protecting citizens. How important
[00:11:33] today's discussion is, I will illustrate with the example of the city of Gospić in my
[00:11:37] Croatia. The city of Gospić today has about 35,000 tons
[00:11:41] of illegally deposited waste, more than
[00:11:44] three tons per every inhabitant. Such an
[00:11:47] ecological disaster does not happen overnight. It
[00:11:50] happens when the government turns a blind eye for years and when
[00:11:54] it caters to the interests
[00:11:57] of well-connected individuals instead of protecting
[00:12:01] citizens. It happens when corruption, favoritism and
[00:12:04] political silence become more important than the health
[00:12:08] of citizens. Some are now trying to shift the blame
[00:12:12] exclusively to cross-border waste traffic and international
[00:12:15] crime. Yes, this should undoubtedly
[00:12:18] be investigated, but rules exist and they
[00:12:22] are very clear. The question is why the government and state
[00:12:25] institutions did not implement them, how is it possible
[00:12:29] that thousands of trucks with hazardous waste from several
[00:12:32] countries crossed the border, that no one inspected them, how
[00:12:36] is it possible that they ended up buried in Gospić, how
[00:12:40] is it possible that even after several dozen inspections,
[00:12:43] the state failed to prevent the scale
[00:12:47] of illegal disposal, not only in Gospić, but in
[00:12:50] other locations. In the case of Gospić alone, the Treaty on the Functioning of the European
[00:12:54] Union was violated, at least five European directives and
[00:12:58] laws, and two conventions related to waste. And
[00:13:02] something else: the legal deadline for disposing of illegally imported
[00:13:05] waste is 30 days, and what do we have today in Gospić after
[00:13:09] 580 days since the arrest? This is just one example of
[00:13:13] many, as if the protection of human health from toxic
[00:13:16] hazardous substances were a question of political
[00:13:19] will. It is not, it is the obligation of the state and its
[00:13:22] institutions, and when the state fails, we must turn to
[00:13:26] European institutions, which is the last line of defense for the health of our
[00:13:31] on which we seriously
[00:13:51] of our citizens from toxic substances is something that is
[00:13:55] absolutely necessary, it is a challenge that requires
[00:13:59] a strictly rational approach. In this council,
[00:14:03] especially among the Left and
[00:14:05] the Greens, scientific rationality
[00:14:09] has long given way to
[00:14:11] ideology and moral panic. It's been
[00:14:15] clear for a long time: poison is something that
[00:14:19] depends on the dose. Today
[00:14:22] we are looking for
[00:14:26] a tiny molecule, because
[00:14:29] we can do that today in a very, very
[00:14:32] diluted way, but
[00:14:35] the extreme left environmentalists
[00:14:38] constantly
[00:14:40] mix something with
[00:14:44] health risk, which creates policies
[00:14:48] of fear that have catastrophic consequences. In
[00:14:51] toxicology, this is called harmful
[00:14:55] substitution. This has nothing to do with
[00:14:58] reality. You leftists and
[00:15:01] Macronists are looking for things
[00:15:04] that you simply defend but
[00:15:07] do not offer any good
[00:15:09] alternative, because, for example,
[00:15:13] you do not
[00:15:15] want to use some
[00:15:18] pesticides and simply because
[00:15:22] of that you harm
[00:15:25] the production of sugar beet.
[00:15:29] By doing so, you are asking for tractors to
[00:15:33] pass many times, spraying something
[00:15:36] else. This is not
[00:15:39] ecology, it is cynical
[00:15:42] commercialism, because you impose the
[00:15:45] strictest
[00:15:47] values
[00:15:49] in the world
[00:15:52] on our farmers and industrialists, and
[00:15:55] French farmers are truly impeccable.
[00:15:59] However, at the same time, you allow
[00:16:02] products to enter our markets
[00:16:05] that contain pesticides that are absolutely forbidden in the European
[00:16:09] Union. So where is the ecology when
[00:16:12] plant protection products from third countries are used
[00:16:15] on those products?
[00:16:19] Then those products, then those
[00:16:22] third then those pesticides are forbidden
[00:16:26] here. We in
[00:16:28] the National Rally
[00:16:32] party believe in much else
[00:16:35] than this kind of ecology. We want to
[00:16:39] protect our borders and finance
[00:16:42] research so that we can
[00:16:45] truly expand,
[00:16:49] protect our products, not so that all this
[00:16:52] leads to
[00:16:54] a punishable
[00:17:07] we have a truck that comes at night and
[00:17:10] instead of going to an authorized facility,
[00:17:14] it goes to an abandoned industrial
[00:17:17] site. The truck leaves and
[00:17:21] the problem disappears, but it doesn't disappear
[00:17:24] from the water, soil and lives of people living nearby,
[00:17:28] who eat crops from that land, who
[00:17:32] bathe in local waters. In Croatia, about
[00:17:35] 37 industrial,
[00:17:39] electronic and medical waste imported from
[00:17:42] other EU member states has been disposed of. Pefas, so-called
[00:17:46] eternal chemicals, were also found in that
[00:17:56] must go through the entire
[00:17:59] process, have financial guarantees and must
[00:18:02] go through control. A criminal can simply
[00:18:06] place waste and bury it in
[00:18:10] the ground. Waste regulations are precisely
[00:18:12] what cause the highest costs for small and medium-sized enterprises.
[00:18:16] It is obvious that honesty is being killed because
[00:18:20] of too many rules and because of inconsistent
[00:18:23] interpretation in member states. Unfortunately, the conclusion is
[00:18:27] sad: if legal activity
[00:18:30] becomes complicated and expensive, and
[00:18:33] illegal activity becomes profitable,
[00:18:36] then the system actually creates incentives to
[00:18:40] circumvent legal regulations. What we
[00:18:43] need is effective enforcement
[00:18:47] of legal regulations. I will tell you what our
[00:18:50] government has done to
[00:18:54] fight the mafia that threatened the environment,
[00:18:57] health and lives of my
[00:19:00] fellow citizens. Between 2018 and
[00:19:03] 2023, Poland introduced
[00:19:06] mandatory camera
[00:19:09] monitoring for waste
[00:19:12] landfills, financial guarantees.
[00:19:15] Storage time was also reduced from three to one
[00:19:19] year, and the possibility of revoking
[00:19:23] licenses and permits
[00:19:26] and closing facilities was introduced. These are
[00:19:28] concrete measures.
[00:19:33] Abuse must be nipped in the bud.
[00:19:37] And decisively and effectively. We cannot
[00:19:40] expect security from a system whose
[00:19:44] targets are mostly honest businesses.
[00:19:46] We need a system that will
[00:19:49] effectively prosecute those who
[00:19:52] illegally transport,
[00:19:55] conceal and dispose of waste.
[00:19:59] Let's get rid of excessive
[00:20:02] regulations that are useless. Let's reward
[00:20:06] the honest.
[00:20:21] initially supposed to have a different title.
[00:20:24] Explicitly mentioned were
[00:20:27] Pefas chemicals and contaminated
[00:20:31] groundwater in Croatia. However,
[00:20:34] then a curious purification of that
[00:20:37] title occurred, and now it just
[00:20:41] says "Protection of people from toxic substances". It's a shame that
[00:20:44] 37,000 tons of toxic waste
[00:20:47] in Gospić is not easy
[00:20:50] to clean up just like that. That's perhaps a little
[00:20:54] bigger challenge than purifying the debate title.
[00:20:58] Almost 35,000 tons of that waste is buried
[00:21:01] in the ground, and it's only a few kilometers away from
[00:21:05] Nikola Tesla's hometown. There is no need to explain that he was
[00:21:09] an individual who dedicated his life to the future, he thought
[00:21:12] about it long before everyone else,
[00:21:16] and it would be good if
[00:21:20] at least the short-term future were considered. However, this is not just
[00:21:23] a Croatian story, the waste came from other countries, Italy, Germany
[00:21:27] and my country, Slovenia.
[00:21:30] According to investigation data, over two years, about
[00:21:34] 15,000 tons of waste came to
[00:21:38] Gospić from Slovenia. The Slovenian Inspectorate claims
[00:21:41] that no permits were issued for the
[00:21:43] delivery of waste to facilities related
[00:21:47] to this case. If you try to
[00:21:50] find evidence why this is a European problem,
[00:21:53] there it is, waste obviously crosses European
[00:21:57] borders more easily than we can say for
[00:22:00] political responsibility.
[00:22:04] PFAS was found, these chemicals were
[00:22:07] found in the groundwater near the contaminated
[00:22:11] area. Local residents have been warning
[00:22:14] about problems for years, but now
[00:22:17] Croatian Prime Minister Plenković talks about panic
[00:22:20] and hysterics. People are worried that the waste
[00:22:24] will remain, chemicals have penetrated
[00:22:27] the groundwater, but the problem only appeared when someone
[00:22:31] asked who was responsible. And when
[00:22:34] you think things can't get more absurd, that's exactly
[00:22:38] what happens: to bury about
[00:22:40] 35,000 tons
[00:22:43] of waste, the Croatian subsidiary of a Slovenian
[00:22:46] company got the contract for it, and what was found?
[00:22:50] "in the business premises of that
[00:22:52] company, or rather, what was found near that Slovenian
[00:22:56] company, was precisely illegally buried waste. So we
[00:22:59] need European,
[00:23:03] European solutions, we need a quick possibility of remediation,
[00:23:07] effective implementation of the "polluter
[00:23:09] pays" principle, but above all, we need
[00:23:13] political responsibility. You can remove Croatia from
[00:23:16] the title of this debate, you can schedule a debate
[00:23:20] on Thursday afternoon at the end of the plenary session when
[00:23:23] most MEPs go home, but that won't solve the problem. Nikola Tesla
[00:23:27] left behind numerous inventions for future generations. What
[00:23:31] will you pass on to them, leave them, eternal
[00:23:34] chemicals? I think it would be better to leave them with greater
[00:23:37] responsibility.
[00:23:50] this house about the illegal import of 37,000 tons
[00:23:54] of toxic waste contaminated with PFAS from Italy,
[00:23:57] Slovenia and Germany to the city of Gospić in
[00:24:00] Croatia. This criminal ecocide
[00:24:04] directly endangered human health, what we are talking about today. In
[00:24:08] Croatia, the obligation
[00:24:11] to announce waste imports and the waste
[00:24:14] register have been abolished, and today our institutions
[00:24:17] do not know where almost a million tons
[00:24:21] of waste that enters our country every year is located.
[00:24:25] Commissioner, how was it possible at the national
[00:24:29] level to deregulate the control of waste imports, is
[00:24:33] that still in line with the waste shipment
[00:24:36] regulation? How is that possible?
[00:24:39] Additionally, it is necessary to adopt clear rules according
[00:24:42] to which a country that does not have the capacity for waste
[00:24:45] treatment cannot then import waste, because otherwise it
[00:24:49] ends up in the water. Finally, given that
[00:24:53] the national government has been failing for months to solve this ecocide in
[00:24:57] the Schengen area, I call on the Commission to monitor
[00:25:00] this case. Gospić and Croatia will not be the dump
[00:25:03] of the European Union, and they can't
[00:25:28] that people in Croatia
[00:25:31] are furious, that they are furious at politicians
[00:25:34] and decision-makers who put them
[00:25:38] in danger. However, the problem
[00:25:41] is much worse.
[00:25:44] We are talking about a thousand different
[00:25:48] toxic substances that pollute our
[00:25:51] environment, our children's toys, and even
[00:25:54] the food we consume.
[00:25:58] I would like to warn those who say that we
[00:26:01] want to reduce this. We don't have too many
[00:26:05] legal regulations, we have too little
[00:26:08] regulation. We allow too many chemicals
[00:26:11] to be in circulation. I participated in
[00:26:15] the omnibus negotiations in this
[00:26:19] area, and
[00:26:22] one of the consequences of this is that people will now be exposed to dangerous
[00:26:26] chemicals in the coming years. This is
[00:26:29] insane. The Commission has also delayed
[00:26:33] the reform of the chemical system, which it has promised us
[00:26:36] for years. It still hasn't
[00:26:40] come time to protect people from dangerous
[00:26:44] chemicals. That seems to be their perspective.
[00:26:47] So what are the consequences of all this?
[00:26:51] We are talking about
[00:26:53] PFAS chemicals and other substances. They would
[00:26:57] rather deregulate all of this than
[00:27:00] regulate it. And what will happen
[00:27:04] when we are poisoned, how will
[00:27:08] that, when we are contaminated, and how will that
[00:27:11] affect various diseases,
[00:27:14] the occurrence of cancer, cardiovascular diseases, fertility? But
[00:27:18] most people prefer not to
[00:27:21] discuss it.
[00:27:25] So we need to gradually stop
[00:27:28] producing PFAS chemicals, but instead
[00:27:32] their production is increasing, which will
[00:27:35] mean greater damage to the environment and to our
[00:27:39] health. This means that future generations will have to
[00:27:42] pay even
[00:27:45] more money, just to
[00:27:48] clean up PFAS by 2050.
[00:27:51] The cost of that would be around 440
[00:27:55] billion euros. When we talk about toxic substances, we must be
[00:27:58] aware of the fact that if we close our eyes to that fact, it will not
[00:28:01] disappear. Absence or failure
[00:28:04] to act is not something we will be able to do for free
[00:28:07] forever. Sometime in the future
[00:28:11] we will have to pay to settle
[00:28:14] the bills. This policy can only be described as
[00:28:17] irresponsible and
[00:28:19] immoral.
[00:29:02] I.
[00:29:02] Thank you for giving me the floor, what happened in Gospić should
[00:29:15] make us realize that there is a problem
[00:29:27] when it comes to this entire sector of
[00:29:30] waste management. An illegal
[00:29:34] waste disposal site was found
[00:29:38] near Gospić, documents were falsified
[00:29:41] to circumvent the regulations in force in
[00:29:44] Croatia, allegedly
[00:29:47] it was supposed to be
[00:29:50] plastic waste, however that was not
[00:29:54] the case. A number of companies from
[00:29:58] Italy transported waste to
[00:30:01] Croatia. There was also imported
[00:30:04] hazardous waste from
[00:30:08] Slovenia and Germany, including medical waste.
[00:30:11] The perpetrators allegedly earned more than 4 million
[00:30:14] euros, however the procedure is still ongoing,
[00:30:17] all this leaves one speechless,
[00:30:21] but fortunately cooperation between Croatian
[00:30:24] European authorities is working,
[00:30:27] so that certain profits
[00:30:29] have been confiscated.
[00:30:32] So this
[00:30:38] is indeed an example of
[00:30:42] how the fact that we do not have
[00:30:45] control at the borders can be dangerous and that is why we need
[00:30:49] very very harsh sanctions for those who are
[00:30:53] responsible, the competent authorities also need to be
[00:30:56] reviewed given that...