Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-02-15-Speech-2-126"
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"en.20000215.6.2-126"2
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"I should first like to thank the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development and its rapporteur, the committee chairman, Mr Graefe zu Baringdorf, for examining the Commission's proposal.
Reference was also made to the question of whether this proposal could give rise to the risk of the establishment of monopolies. Mr Kindermann and Mrs Auroi made reference to this. There are just a few points I should like to make on that issue.
First of all, this matter has been in the pipeline since 1993, so it has not really been sprung on any other commodity producers. Indeed any such applicants can still apply in respect of their particular product. I should also stress that the Commission has never approved any application for an authorisation for GMOs to be included in additives.
Mrs Roth-Behrendt made reference to the question of the appropriate legal base, whether it should be Article 37 or Article 152. I again refer to what I said earlier in relation to this and assure her and the House that it would be entirely inappropriate for the Commission to seek to justify any measure based on Article 37 merely by excluding from the provision any reference to public health. This is an issue that has been looked at on at least two separate occasions by the European Court of Justice, which has laid down the legal criteria for situations such as this where the appropriate legal base has to be properly taken into account when putting forward legislation. The jurisprudence of the Court appears to be quite clear in relation to this. As an overall comment to the suggested amendments here, particularly in relation to the legal base issue, it would be inappropriate, in my opinion, to change the legal base to Article 152 in these circumstances, as it would be very likely to fall foul of the objective criteria that have been laid down by the Court.
A number of you made reference – Mr Nicholson in particular – to the issue surrounding labelling. Directive 70/524 foresees the issue of labelling in the genetic modification of additives. It is already included now: "indication of the particular characteristics due to the manufacturing products". So this issue will be addressed. That formula enabled us to oblige applicants to put on the label the fact that genetic modification techniques have been used in the product, the subject matter of the application.
The Commission proposal is, as some of you have said, rather technical. Nonetheless it has a relatively simple objective: to harmonise procedures governing the authorisation of feed additives. At present there is a difference in treatment between authorisations, depending on whether applications were submitted before or after 1 January 1988. The purpose of the Commission's proposal is to harmonise procedures to ensure that no such difference exists. The scope of the proposed amendment is therefore very limited.
Five amendments have been presented by Parliament. I regret that the Commission is not in a position to accept these amendments, despite the fact that I am fully aware of the views and commitment of Parliament, the Agricultural Committee and, in particular, the rapporteur, Mr Graefe zu Baringdorf, on these issues.
I shall deal with each of the individual amendments separately. The first amendment proposes to change the legal base of the proposal by replacing Article 37 with Article 152. I would simply point out that the Commission proposal makes no reference to health or consumer protection. The proposed amendment is technical and cannot be interpreted as having as its primary objective the protection of public health. I note that Parliament's Committee on Legal Affairs and the Internal Market also accepts that Article 37 is the appropriate legal base. I remind Parliament that in Article 152 the primary objective is the protection of health. I commend to you the arguments set out in the letter from the Legal Affairs Committee which sets out the position, in my view, with precision, clarity and commendable brevity.
Amendments Nos 2 and 3 go much further than the Commission proposal since they aim to introduce additional provisions on genetically modified additives. I am the first to accept that GMOs are a very important issue. I also accept and acknowledge that a number of initiatives to update EU legislation in the field of GMOs are necessary. However, this technical amendment is not the correct instrument to introduce such initiatives. The Commission is of the view that it is premature to amend the rules currently laid down by Directive 70/524 on genetically modified additives at this stage. Instead it is appropriate to await developments in relation to the common position on the amendment to Directive 90/220, which is currently in second reading in Parliament. The Commission envisages going much further than is currently proposed by Parliament in its amendments.
I can also assure Parliament that I will ensure that the pertinent provisions of Directive 90/220 are included in the proposal for a recasting of Directive 70/524 that the Commission has proposed in the White Paper on food safety to present to Parliament before July 2001. I can also assure Parliament that all observations made here today will be fully taken into account.
Amendments Nos 4 and 5 are also unacceptable because they give undue preference to copy products by granting them authorisation to be placed into circulation even before an application for authorisation has been submitted. The Commission insists on first evaluating such applications as to their safety and efficacy before giving authorisations. I can only ask you again to bear in mind the technical nature of the Commission proposal and to wait for the substantive proposal for a new directive on additives in feedingstuffs to address wider issues.
I should just like to deal with some of the specific issues that were raised during the debate. First of all, regarding the observations made by Mr Graefe zu Baringdorf, I wish to assure him that we will change the procedure for authorisation of GMO additives in the Additives Directive 70/524, and not in the Novel Feed Directive. This is a directive that deals more specifically with raw materials rather than with additives.
The text taken by Parliament is from the Directive which was adopted in 1998. But the vertical legislation in Directive 90/220 on how to carry out the environmental risk assessment of GMOs has changed since then and is still changing. It is before Parliament for second reading. It is my belief that we should await the final outcome of Directive 90/220 and in particular, Article 11."@en1
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