Guy Verhofstadt, on behalf of the ALDE Group. –Mr President, I say to Ms Trebesius: I am guilty. I am in favour of the United States of Europe. I think can only be to make from the European Union a good federal state, a perfect union; that should be a goal for everybody.

Chancellor, you have talked a lot about migration, and you have said your first priority is to be tougher on illegal migration. But I have to tell you one thing, being President of the European Council is a little bit different than being Chancellor of Austria. You have not only to please who you think are your voters in Austria. What you do as a Council President is something completely different. You have to build bridges, you have to make compromises, and you have to find difficult compromises. And from time to time, I have to tell you, it will not be pleasant. There will be unpopular compromises that you have to make on a lot of things.

There is Brexit, the multiannual financial framework; there is a lot you did not talk about. That is a little bit strange as reform of the eurozone is a priority in the coming months and there is naturally also migration, so I will not talk to you now about all these fights.

On Brexit we are waiting for the white paper of the British Government after the Chequers meeting. I hope that the match between England and Colombia will be less violent than the meeting in Chequers, but we will see this in the coming days. On Friday, there is the eurozone reform. The Council did nothing about that. They pushed all the problems until the end of the year. My question to you is: what are going to do? What initiative are you going to take on this?

And then there is the so-called migration crisis, and I say ‘so-called’ because I don’t think it is a real migration crisis which we are living through in Europe at the moment; it is a political crisis on the back of migrants. That is the reality. Look at the figures before spreading fear into the populations and public opinion. There were more than one million crossings in the Mediterranean in 2015. That fell to 360 000 – still too many – in 2016. In 2017, 170 000 and now in the first six months of the year, 45 000 crossings in the Mediterranean, which is 0.07% of entire migration flows worldwide: 68 million in all.

So what are we talking about? In my opinion we are not talking about a sudden influx of people crossing the Mediterranean. We are talking about a political decision, an opportunistic decision of one minister of the interior in Italy, Mr Salvini, who created this problem that we now have on our plate. That is happening, and Mr Salvini has a very simple opinion: he says, ‘not in Italy, put them in Germany, put them in Austria put them in Hungary maybe’. And Mr Orbán, who is a friend of Mr Salvini’s, says: ‘no, not in Hungary, we will put them in Italy or in Germany or why not in Austria’ and then your friend, Mr Seehofer, has another opinion and says ‘no, not in Germany, send them back to Italy or eventually to Hungary and maybe to your country, Austria’ and you are saying – and have already – you don’t want them in Austria. You want them to stay in Italy or in Germany or to send them to Hungary.

You see what the problem is, Ms Chancellor. The problem in Europe is that the only consensus that the Council and the prime ministers and you and your friends can agree today is: ‘not in my back yard’. That is the only consensus that you are capable of for the moment, and that is the scandal of Europe. Don’t talk about migrants.

We are talking about a political crisis on the back of migrants, and what I am asking you is not only to be tough on migration or illegal migration. You have to be tough on illegal migration but when an asylum seeker is coming from Syria when he enters the European Union, he is illegal before he asks for asylum. What I am asking you is to play the European card, as Austria has always done. And the European card is a real European border and coast guard.

Back the proposals of the Commission before the end of the year with the Council. Secondly, make an agreement on Dublin. The parliaments have a position. The Council has no position for the moment. Thirdly, create European reception centres where people can ask for asylum inside or outside Europe, I don’t care, what is important is that they are not falling into the hands of the smugglers and the criminal gangs. Finally, a legal system of economic migration, which we absolutely need. In conclusion, Chancellor, you can count on the support of all this Parliament. Not for big speeches against migration but for European solutions on migration.