'Europe must be responsible for its own security', Metsola tells EU leaders

At the informal European Council meeting on defence, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola (pictured) outlined her vision on how Europe can and must strengthen its own security and defence.

“More action, more financing and more cooperation,” must be the EU’s goals, she argued.

“First, we need to do more to protect Europe.”

“Russia can still produce more weapons in three months than we can in twelve. We need to do more, much more, to ramp up defence production and increase our defence industrial readiness. We can do all this in a way that respects the constitutional specificities of Member States. The best investment in European security is investing in the security of Ukraine.”

“Second, we need to do more to finance this protection.”

“Investing in security, is not just about protection - it is about boosting European competitiveness, driving growth, creating quality high-skilled jobs and powering everyday breakthroughs that improve how we live, work and connect.

“Public funding can take us far but we know it will not be enough. This makes mobilising private capital essential. When it comes to the EIB’s mandate, the European Parliament has long emphasised the need to maximise its capacity to leverage private funding for the security and defence sector.”

“The real incentive lies in addressing fragmentation within our markets. Different rules, standards, and systems are putting up barriers and risk holding us back. It makes no sense for Europe to have 178 different weapons systems, when the United States has 30.”

“Third, we need to co-ordinate better.”

“Fragmentation costs us billions: between 25 and 75 billion euro are lost due to duplication and inefficiencies. The answer to this is staring us right in the face. Now is the time to move forward with a single market for defence.”

“Defence - Trade - Political reality. The expectation on us is high. We must be ready to respond. Effectively, robustly - even drastically. Europe must be responsible for its own security. No one else will do this for us.”

Read the full speech

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