mr president you are very kind
thank you for those words
it is good to be back for what is my last week in this parliament or any parliament
after twenty-five years of elected politics that is an adequate sufficiency i think
i just want on this last occasion to say that many of us in this house have invested a lot of ourselves in the reach process guido sacconi and many colleagues have laid the foundations for a safer better chemicals framework
my message to the next parliament is be vigilant keep an eye on the process
similarly as satu hassi has said we have a long history on asbestos and we have a very strong feeling that we need to watch out for that
when i was lying on my hospital bed having my heart bypass and feeling sorry for myself i was watching on the television the earthquake in italy and that put my problems into perspective
but it also of course reminded me in this context that when you have a disaster like that asbestos can be released into the atmosphere
asbestos is very often safe while it is covered
as soon as it breaks out that is when the dangers occur and so one of the messages has to be that we need to look at the at-risk areas of our european union to see where we should be highlighting the risk and monitoring it for the future
having said that i would just say thank you to my colleagues for their friendship their support and their messages in recent weeks
i shall treasure my ten years in this parliament and i shall watch with interest as the next parliament takes on the projects that perhaps we have been able to start
