Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-09-20-Speech-3-089"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20000920.7.3-089"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
"I have to express amazement at the two speeches we have just heard, one from Mr Bushill-Matthews and the other from Mrs Villiers. They seem to be engaging in a self-fulfilling prophecy. They deplore the fact that the European Parliament is regarded as involving itself in trivia and generating red tape and yet they spend their time issuing press releases describing very important pieces of health and safety legislation as nothing but trivia and red tape.
It is hardly surprising that the British media project the sort of image that they describe. This is a very important piece of health and safety legislation, building upon the corpus of such legislation that we have adopted at European level over the last twenty years. It is not trivial for the families of the 500 000 people who fall from heights at work every year. 300 000 of those accidents are serious enough to cause the employees to be absent from work more than three days. 40 000 of those falls are very serious and 1 000 result in deaths. Try to explain to the families concerned that this is a trivial issue. It is not. It is a very important issue and survey after survey, including those in Eurobarometer, and surveys of SMEs including by the last British Government have shown that SMEs themselves recognise the importance of good health and safety legislation.
I deplore the fact that the consensus we have had in this important area of policy has been broken in this way by a small minority in the EPP. It really is absolutely deplorable and we should all – right across the political spectrum – make it clear that we will not tolerate that sort of behaviour from that minority.
It is described as bureaucratic. But read the directive itself, read the proposal. Is it onerous? Is it burdensome? Does it require detailed voluminous risk assessments before work is carried out a height? No, it does not, it is a very easily understood, readable, implementable directive and it should be described in that way. It should be described as making a valuable contribution to preventing injury and deaths within the European Union.
Please do not engage in this trivialisation and then come along here and hypocritically express surprise that this institution is being held in ridicule. You are the people who are causing that. Stop it now, please."@en1
|
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples