John Attard-Montalto (PSE). – (MT) It is evident, Madam President, that the United States of America and Japan have overtaken Europe in three vital fields. These are growth, research and production.

We know that Europe is capable of developing a lot more than it is developing at the moment. We also know that the unemployment lines are too long. And we have adopted an attitude where we stretch out our fingers and point them towards recently industrialised countries. Today we talk of China, tomorrow India, and the day after tomorrow Brazil. However, this is not the truth; the truth is that Europe has not taken the initiative into its hands, nor has it understood the importance of renovation, research, technology and informatics.

In fact, we imposed upon ourselves a target of 3% of GDP. We are now saying that this is a difficult target to reach, and the countries – I shall conclude here – the countries which benefit from structural funds should dedicate part of this sum towards the achievement of this goal.