The President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, said on Friday 2 September that it was time for “more Europe”.
“If we were waiting for the right moment to move towards ‘more Europe’, that moment has arrived, here and now. (...) Europe is a choice; a choice countries made because they understood that our best chance is if we are together”, stressed the Parliament President in a speech at the Estoril 2022 conferences in Lisbon. Despite the challenges, she said she was hopeful, adding that “because Europe exists, the world of tomorrow will be better than the world of today”.
However, Metsola warned that to survive, Europe needed to be fought for, “if we stop taking it for granted, if we understand and explain its benefits, if we listen, if we push back against those determined to undermine it, if we are able to reform, if we are able to reinvent our project”. According to her, that is why Parliament called for a Convention on the Future of Europe to discuss how to leave Europe fit for the next generation.
“The world needs Europe at its best. We need that hope. We need the values Europe stands for”, she explained. While citizens are “worried about the future”, Europe “must be able to provide answers”. “If citizens feel that democracy is not helping them to get out of their loneliness, isolation and frustrations, they will turn away”, Mrs Metsola warned. According to her, “theoretical Europe must be met with practical leadership, with commitment and courage. Europe must rise to meet that challenge. Whether it is tackling cost of living, electricity prices, climate change, defence, food security, the only way forward is if we are united”.
Citing the EU candidate countries or potential candidates, the President of Parliament also said that Europe had the power to transform, “but we have to find the political bravery to take that leap forward, to change the world”. “We can. We should. Because if we do not write the future, it will be written by those with a very different narrative and have a very different ending”, she warned. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)