Verbatim report of proceedings

Thursday, 15 September 2022 - Strasbourg

Implementation of the Updated New Industrial Strategy for Europe: aligning spending to policy (continuation of debate)

  Tom Berendsen, rapporteur. – Madam President, my thanks to colleagues for the debate and I also want to thank the shadow rapporteurs of the other Groups for the intense discussions we had. But in the end, we found each other. We have a broad majority for the call for a clean, competitive and resilient European industry, and that we need to be more strategic. And there are some clear messages in our reports to the Commission.

There cannot be a Green Deal without industry policy. If we want to deliver on the growth strategy that the Green Deal promised, we need industry policy, and the clear message we have for the Commission is, come forward with the transition pathways of the industrial ecosystems. Give us the pathways that show what is needed in the sectors for the energy transition, for remaining competitive, for what kind of breakthrough technologies are needed, how the regulatory burden on the ecosystems is.

And we really call on the Commission to come to Parliament with these pathways and then have also an annual debate on where we are on these pathways so that we can monitor where we are with the sectors, because industry policy, in the end, is also about adapting measures that seem to work or seem not to work and making sure that we act swiftly, that our European industry will become more resilient, it will become more competitive on the pathway we have.

So for us, as Parliament, this report is not necessarily an end of the process after reacting to your various industry strategies. We need to stop updating the industry strategy all the time. We need to have an annual debate on the pathways of our ecosystems. For us, this is not the end of the process, it’s the start of cooperation between us and you to make sure that our industry will thrive, that we achieve the goals we set in the Green Deal but that we do that with a competitive and clean and resilient industry.

So thank you very much, I’m looking forward to the cooperation.