Timothy Kirkhope, rapporteur. – Madam President, I think this has been a very important debate and I am very grateful to all of those who contributed. Indeed, throughout the whole process of this Directive and the work on it, I have always been – and I think everyone would agree – not always in agreement with everybody, but certainly very willing to listen to the various suggestions that have been made, even for those who are quite sceptical of the proposals, and I thank them for their contribution today.

I do just want to say that I hope that we will be able to get support tomorrow. I would urge people not to support the amendments that have been put down by Groups, because we are dealing with a package of measures here which I hope we can put through as they now are on the table. I think it is an important matter because my country, of course, is in the middle of a nationwide debate on why we should be members of the European Union. I make no apology to say that some of my constituents want more evidence of where there is added value. Frankly, this is timely. It may have taken five years, but our security and our cooperation in the fight against criminality is something that I strongly believe does add value to our membership. As has been said, it is not just a question of dealing with terrorists or threats of terrorism, important though that is; it is also dealing with all the other major criminal areas: people trafficking, child trafficking, trafficking in drugs, and all the other things that are so important that we should be working together to tackle them.

So I am asking everybody to vote for this tomorrow, of course, but I think it will also give a message to our citizens that we really do care about them. We care about their security, we care about their privacy and, by doing it in a balanced way, I think we will restore some of the trust, which sometimes our institutions seem to have lost. We are doing the right thing and I hope we are making the right decision.