MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION on EU coordinated action to combat the COVID­­‑19 pandemic and its consequences

B9‑0143/2020

European Parliament resolution on EU coordinated action to combat the COVID‑­19 pandemic and its consequences

(2020/2616(RSP))

The European Parliament,

– having regard to Rule 132(2) of its Rules of Procedure,

A. whereas the spread of the virus is affecting the life of each and every European and is testing us as a Union;

B. whereas healthcare is, above all, a national competence, whereby the EU can help coordinate Member States’ actions but cannot act of its own volition;

C. whereas with our economy having been put on hold, the effects of the ensuing disruption on European citizens, businesses, workers and the self‑employed will be both dramatic and immeasurable;

D. whereas solidarity is not an option but an obligation under the Treaties;

E. whereas this is a moment of truth for the European Union that will determine its future;

1. Expresses its deepest sorrow at the loss of lives and the human tragedy that the pandemic has brought to Europeans and their families and to citizens all over the globe and extends its condolences to all those who have lost loved ones; expresses its sincere compassion for those who are sick and wishes them a speedy recovery;

2. Applauds all those who are working at the front line to fight the pandemic, such as doctors and nurses; expresses its sincere gratitude to all the anonymous heroes who fulfil essential duties, such as those working in the fields of food retail and delivery, education, agriculture, transport and waste collection in order to maintain public life and services and to guarantee access to essential goods; urges the Member States to ensure safe working conditions for all workers at the front line of this epidemic, in particular front­­‑line medical staff, by implementing appropriate and coordinated national measures, including the provision of sufficient personal protective equipment (PPE); calls on the European Commission to supervise the implementation of these measures;

3. Expresses its solidarity with those Member States that have been hit the hardest by the virus and with all other countries that are facing the effects of the pandemic; expresses its most sincere solidarity with those who have lost their jobs and whose professional lives have been disrupted by the pandemic; emphasises that the EU will not leave any country on its own;

4. Is concerned about the EU’s initial inability to act collectively; demands that all future actions taken by Member States be guided by the Union’s founding principle of solidarity and loyal cooperation; believes that the COVID‑­19 crisis has accentuated the importance of joint European action; stresses that the European Union and its Member States have the common resources to fight the pandemic and its consequences, but only when they stand side by side; recognises that Member States, having acted unilaterally at the beginning of the crisis, now understand that cooperation, confidence and solidarity are the only way to overcome this crisis;

5. Calls on the European Commission and the Member States to act together to ensure that the Union emerges stronger from this crisis; stresses that Parliament will cooperate with the other EU institutions to save lives, protect jobs and businesses, and drive economic recovery and that it will stand ready to hold them accountable for their actions;

European solidarity and action in the health sector

6. Welcomes the European solidarity in action shown by Member States in their treating patients from other Member States, supplying health care equipment, including via joint procurement initiatives and stockpiling, and in repatriating citizens; stresses that borders must remain open within the EU for the circulation of PPE, food, medicine, medical devices, blood­‑derived products and organs; underlines the need to facilitate the mobilisation of health professionals and calls for the deployment of the European Medical Corps to deliver medical assistance; further emphasises the need to facilitate the transportation of patients from saturated hospitals in one Member State to another where capacity is still available;

7. Calls for substantially strengthening the budget and staff of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) and the competences of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) to enable them to coordinate medical responses in times of crisis;

8. Calls for the creation of a European health response mechanism to better prepare and respond in a common and coordinated way to any type of health or sanitary crisis that emerges at EU level in order to protect the health of our citizens;

9. Calls on the Commission to strengthen all components of crisis management and disaster response, and to further strengthen instruments such as RescEU to ensure a truly common, coordinated and effective response at EU level; believes that European disaster risk management, preparedness and prevention should be enhanced in addition to common equipment, materials and medicines stocks, in order to allow for their quick mobilisation to protect the lives and livelihoods of EU citizens;

10. Calls on Member States to channel all available research and innovation funds towards research initiatives that aim to understand the disease, speed up diagnosis testing and vaccine development; believes that Europe’s researchers, innovative SMEs and industry should get every support they need to find a cure;

11. Stresses the immediate need to do more for SMEs, help them maintain jobs and manage their liquidity; urges European prudential and supervisory authorities, as well as Member States, to explore all options to relieve the burden on SMEs; calls for a European horizontal strategy for SME recovery to support them by reducing red tape, costs for access to finance, and by fostering investments in strategic value chains in line with the Green Deal;

12. Believes the EU must seize the opportunity and regain technological control in strategic areas such as the active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) essential for the manufacture of medicine, and thus reduce its dependence on third countries without undermining the rewards that open economies derive from international trade;

13. Believes that the Commission should explore and consider the possibility of removing any barriers with third countries on goods essential to tackle this crisis – such as medical equipment, hand sanitiser, hand soap, face masks and medication – in order to make them more available throughout the EU;

14. Underlines that the pandemic knows no borders or ideologies and that it requires the cooperation and solidarity of the entire international community and a strengthening of the World Health Organization; considers it essential for the EU to ask China to shed full light on this pandemic, the timing of its emergence and its real human toll; emphasises the importance of cooperation and support for the Western Balkan countries, for our closest neighbours in the Eastern and Southern neighbourhoods and partners, and for developing countries, in particular Africa;

European solutions to overcoming the economic and social consequences

15. Calls on the European Commission to propose a massive recovery and reconstruction package for investment to support the European economy after the crisis, beyond what the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Central Bank (ECB) are already doing, as part of the new multiannual financial framework (MFF); believes that such a package should be in place while the economic disruption caused by this crisis lasts; considers that the necessary investment would be financed by an increased MFF, the existing EU funds and financial instruments, and recovery bonds guaranteed by the EU budget; is of the opinion that this package should not involve the mutualisation of existing debt and should be oriented to future investment;

16. Stresses that this recovery and reconstruction package should kick-start the economy, improve its resilience and create jobs, while at the same time assist in the ecological transition and economic development, including the strategic autonomy, of our continent, and assist in implementing our industrial strategy and the digital transformation of our societies; recalls the paramount importance of the Green Deal in this regard and the need to align our answers with the objective of climate neutrality;

17. Insists therefore on the adoption of an ambitious MFF that has an increased budget in line with the Union’s objectives, the projected impact of the crisis on EU economies and citizens’ expectations on European added value, has more flexibility and simplicity in how we use the funds to respond to crises, and is equipped with countercyclical features; calls, furthermore, for a revision of the Commission’s proposal on the reform of the own resources system in order to gain sufficient fiscal room for manoeuvre and ensure better predictability, capacity to act and less exposure to national hazards;

18. Underlines the urgency of helping Member States that are facing extraordinary additional expenditure in order to avoid a new sovereign debt crisis; highlights the role that the EIB, the ESM and a temporary facility based on Article 122 of the TFEU, similar to the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism (EFSM), should play to help to protect jobs, businesses and healthcare systems and relaunch the European economy; emphasises, however, that the capacity should go beyond the current ceiling of the EU’s MFF;

19. Calls on the finance ministers of the euro area to activate the EUR 410 billion of the ESM; recalls that this crisis is not the responsibility of any particular Member State and that the main objective should be to fight the consequences of the outbreak;

20. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to prioritise aid and crisis-mitigation measures for the most vulnerable citizens, the elderly, people with disabilities, ethnic minorities and people from remote and isolated regions, including the Overseas Countries and Territories, by means of a dedicated exceptional support fund focused on the healthcare system and sectors hit by the COVID-19 outbreak, as well as people below the threshold of social exclusion, who all run the greatest risk of infection with COVID-19 and also suffer the most from its economic effects; urges the EU and Member States to incorporate a gender analysis across all response efforts in order to avoid exacerbating gender inequalities and to provide women in danger with emergency support;

21. Believes that Member States must take measures to ensure that workers in Europe, including the self-employed and those working cross-border, are shielded from income loss and that the most affected sectors and companies, in particular SMEs, have the necessary support and financial liquidity; welcomes in this respect the Commission’s new Support to mitigate Unemployment Risks in an Emergency (SURE) proposal;

22. Considers that it is of utmost importance to keep the internal EU borders open for goods; recalls that the single market is the source of our collective prosperity and well‑being and that it is a key element of the immediate and continuous response to the COVID-19 outbreak; strongly supports the Commission’s call on the Member States to allow frontier workers to continue crossing borders, in particular in sectors for which continued free movement in the EU is deemed essential; calls, in that respect, for the establishment of ‘green lane’ border crossings for land (road and rail), maritime, inland waterways and air transport;

23. Underlines that this crisis has shown that the agri-food sector, including fisheries and aquaculture, is essential and strategic, as it ensures that safe and affordable food is delivered to citizens through a strong and profitable production in all regions of the EU; calls on the Commission and on the Member States, therefore, to put in place all necessary measures to ensure the adequate functioning of the agri-food supply chain, especially in terms of facilitating seasonal and cross-border working and access to key inputs; calls on the Commission to also activate the full range of supports and exceptional market measures available under Regulation (EU) No 1379/2013 of 11 December 2013 on the common organisation of the markets in fishery and aquaculture products (CMO)[1];

European values and rule of law are never optional

24. Stresses that even under the state of emergency imposed in reaction to the coronavirus pandemic, Member States are still bound to respect EU values and the European human rights framework, and must ensure that citizens continue to enjoy the same rights and protection; expresses particular concern over the steps taken by the Polish government in this regard; strongly condemns the decision of the Hungarian government to prolong the state of emergency indefinitely and suspend its national parliament;

25. Stresses that exceptional measures should be proportionate, subject to regular scrutiny by the national parliaments and limited in time, and that such measures should also respect the checks and balances of a democracy, including the independence of justice and the freedom of the media; stresses that border controls and restrictions on movement must remain proportionate and exceptional and that all freedom of movement inside the Schengen area should be re-established as soon as it is deemed feasible;

26. Calls for full respect of the Geneva Convention and European asylum law; points out that provisions have to be made for the reception of new asylum seekers in appropriate sanitary conditions, with particular attention paid to migrants arriving on the Greek islands;

27. Takes note of the Commission’s plan to call on telecoms providers to hand over anonymised and aggregated data in order to limit the spread of the coronavirus, of national tracking programmes already in force, and of the introduction of apps allowing authorities to monitor movements, contacts and health data; calls on the Commission and Member States to publish the details of these schemes and allow for public scrutiny and full oversight by data protection authorities; notes that the mobile location data of citizens can be processed only when made fully and irreversibly anonymous, or with the individuals’ freely given consent; expects national and European authorities to fully comply with data protection and privacy legislation, and data protection authorities to enforce it;

28. Stresses that disinformation about COVID­‑19 at this time is a major public health problem; urges the EU to establish a European information channel, in all the official languages, to ensure that all citizens have access to accurate and verified information; believes that the ECDC should be in charge of coordinating and aligning Member States’ data to improve quality and comparability;

29. Stresses that the EU must become more resilient against crises in general, to stay free of undue political and economic influence, such as from China and Russia, and must be ready to strategically communicate, fight external disinformation, fake news and cyberattacks, and adapt continuously to the changing geopolitical landscape;

A post-crisis European Union that is stronger and delivers more effective action to its citizens

30. Expresses its firm intention to do whatever it takes for the Union and its citizens to come out of the crisis and calls on all EU institutions and Member States to make immediate use of all relevant Treaty provisions and to act accordingly in the spirit of solidarity; recalls that this crisis is no one’s doing and that it should not be everyone’s undoing;

31. Believes that the pandemic has shown the limits of the Union’s capacity to act decisively and has exposed the lack of the Commission’s executive and budgetary powers; believes that the Union must undergo a profound and adequate reform in response; considers it necessary amid the urgency to activate the general passerelle clause to ease the decision-making process in all matters which could help to cope with the challenges of the current health crisis;

32. Urges Member States to put aside their differences and to act in the general interest and in the spirit of solidarity; calls on them to make an immediate use of the dedicated Treaty provisions to act accordingly;

33. Stresses that the Union must be prepared to start an in-depth reflection on how to become more effective and democratic and that the current crisis only heightens the urgency thereof; believes that the planned Conference on the Future of Europe is the appropriate forum to do this; is therefore of the opinion that the Conference needs to be convened as soon as possible and that it has to come forward with clear proposals, including by engaging directly with citizens, to bring about a profound reform of the European Union, making it more effective, solidary, democratic, sovereign and resilient;

34. Calls on the European Commission to take its Treaty-based responsibility to heart and take bold initiatives;

35. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the President of the Commission, the President of the European Council and the Presidency­‑­in‑­Office of the Council.