Philippe LAMBERTS (Greens/EFA, BE), Co-Chair Greens/EFA, expresses himself following the Special European Council on Article 50.

Brussels

article 50 of the Lisbon treaty (T)

LAMBERTS, Philippe (Greens/EFA, BE)

European Council meeting 29 April 2017 (T)

Greens/EFA

meeting of the European Council

Special European Council meeting (Article 50):  statement by Philippe LAMBERTS (Greens/EFA, BE), Co-Chair Greens/EFA

SOUNDBITE (English), Philippe LAMBERTS (Greens/EFA, BE), We need to show unity around negotiating stands that need that neither seek revenge, not to be naive towards the United Kingdom and I find this in the table of the Council, it is quite obvious that the 27 are united but also the institutions are united. And that's maybe a first, that the Parliament's position that was adopted in the April plenary has been taking into account in writing, the conclusions of the today's Council. And so, I see the Council and the Parliament are rather united in the views that they are conveying to the Commission, to drafts and the directives of the negotiations. So, indeed it is a show of unity of the EU 27 and let's hope it will stay that way.

SOUNDBITE (English), Philippe LAMBERTS (Greens/EFA, BE), Well, of course there are reasons to be scared but again that has little to do with Brexit itself. It's quite obvious that we see rising inequalities in Europe that we see rising exclusion and therefore we should all be concerned. But this is not a result of Brexit, this is the result of political choices that are made by the mainstream political parties in Europe. The current majorities are pretty much in line with the neoliberal version of globalisation and that produces rising inequalities, rising concentration of wealth; that's the logical consequence. And, well, we need to move away from that if we want to avoid insurgencies like the one that Marine Le Pen embodied in France and we'll see in a week&rsquo;s time whether she get elected or not. I hope not of course but then again if the only answer to the voters who vote Marine Le Pen is more of the same, more of these neoliberal policies, then I am afraid that the tide will still rise in favour of Madame Le Pen.

SOUNDBITE (English), Philippe LAMBERTS (Greens/EFA, BE), Well I am not sure that there is very much political willingness to go after the anti-liberties laws that the Hungarian government is adopting, we saw Orban in the Plenary this week; he wanted to come across as a reasonable, seasoned, down to earth leader but actually he's been twisting the facts quite a lot in order to deflect and to deny the criticism that we have about a number of laws on migrants, on universities, on NGOs and all the rest in Hungary. It's not by chance that hundreds of thousands of Hungarians are demonstrating in the streets right now because they do not want their democracy to be taken away from them. And I am afraid that there is no at the moment, I am glad that the Commission is asking questions to Hungary but it is quite obvious that Orban enjoys quite a lot of immunity of his political family, which is the EPP.

SOUNDBITE (English), Philippe LAMBERTS (Greens/EFA, BE), And therefore, as long as he feels protected within his political family, which is the dominant one in Europe, I am not sure that he is going to change anything.