7 Amendments of Alexandra GEESE related to 2021/2180(INI)
Amendment 6 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1 a (new)
Paragraph 1 a (new)
1 a. Reiterates its call on the Commission to take immediate action under the Rule of Law Conditionality Regulation to make full use of its existing investigation tools without further delay in order to address rule of law deficiencies in Member States that could affect or seriously risk affecting the sound financial management of the EU budget in a sufficiently direct way; calls on the Commission to apply the Common Provisions Regulation and Financial Regulation more stringently in order to tackle the discriminatory use of EU funds, in particular those of politically motivated nature;
Amendment 9 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1 b (new)
Paragraph 1 b (new)
1 b. Welcomes that the report assesses the state of the rule of law in every Member State; notes, however, that it fails to make a clear distinction between Member States with isolated shortcomings and those with systemic rule of law deficiencies; calls on the Commission to make this distinction in future reports;
Amendment 13 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
2. Recalling its resolution of 8 July 2021 on the creation of guidelines for the application of the general regime of conditionality for the protection of the Union budget2 , insists that the Commission include in its annual Rule of Law Report a section dedicated to cases where breaches of the rule of law in a Member State could affect or seriously risk affecting the sound financial management of the Union budget or the protection of the financial interests of the Union in a sufficiently direct way; furthermore insists that findings published in the annual Rule of Law Report should not be subject to further informal exchanges with the concerned Member State for sending a notification under Article 6(1) of the Rule of Law Conditionality Regulation; _________________ 2 Texts adopted, P9_TA(2021)0348.
Amendment 17 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Recalls that the Rule of Law Conditionality Regulation applies both to individual breaches of the principles of the rule of law and to ‘systemic’ breaches that are widespread or are a result of recurrent practices or omissions by public authorities, or general measures adopted by such authorities; regrets that the structure of the 2021 Rule of Law Report does not always lend itself to the effective identification of such systemic breaches and calls on the Commission for improvements in this respecto draft the report for 2022 to ensure that the scrutiny of such systemic breaches is fully reflected in the annual Rule of Law Report.
Amendment 23 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3 a (new)
Paragraph 3 a (new)
3 a. Calls on the Commission to focus in the annual Rule of Law Report also on the country specific recommendations under the European Semester relevant for the annual Rule of Law report, in particular those linked to the independence of the judiciary and the public prosecutor as well as those linked to fighting corruption and ensuring transparency and integrity, where relevant;
Amendment 24 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3 b (new)
Paragraph 3 b (new)
3 b. Underlines the primordial role of civil society actors in the early identification of elements for the drafting of the annual Rule of Law Report and strongly insists that a proper consultation with reasonable timelines (in particular excluding the winter holiday period from the 2 months usually foreseen) is set by the Commission; further asks the Commission to reconsider the format of a one-size-fits-all questionnaire for providing input and that the consultation is followed up by a proper dialogue with the participating CSOs and that their input is fully reflected in the annual Rule of Law Report; encourages the Commission to seek further input from civil society on how to optimise the consultation process for future reports;
Amendment 25 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3 c (new)
Paragraph 3 c (new)
3 c. Is concerned by the spill over effects of the erosion of media freedom especially as regards the protection of the Union’s financial interests; urges the Commission to provide an assessment of the efficiency and effectiveness of the national frameworks for the protection of media freedom and media pluralism with a particular focus on the role media plays in fighting corruption; stresses the importance of assessing and monitoring the situation of the media in the Member States, in particular by examining measures taken by any government to silence critical media and/or to undermine freedom and pluralism, in order to prevent the risk of further concentration of information in the hands of a few, which could hamper the spread of free and independent information with a focus on both the public service and private media sector at national level and its de jure and de facto degree of independence from national authorities, political parties or any other interference, including the lack of an assessment of potential conflicts of interest and of media concentration and transparency of media ownership; highlights the need to ensure the financial independence of and conditions for sustainable activity by private media operators in order to avoid the political capture of the media;