Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-06-12-Speech-2-081"
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"en.20010612.5.2-081"2
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"Mr President, I should like to begin by thanking Mr Davies for the splendid and very expert job he has done on the report. Together with Mrs Myller’s report on national emissions ceilings, which is before the Conciliation Committee at the moment, this report will make an important contribution to securing better air quality, especially in the big cities of Europe. It will be an important contribution to preventing and reducing ozone’s harmful effects on the environment and public health. I should like to point out the most important features of Mr Davies's report. First and foremost, it is important that we stick to the WHO's health targets in this area and that those exceedances of these targets that are to be accepted for a number of years are limited as far as possible, in this case to 20 days per year. By means of the report, we shall thus also reject the Council’s wish to be given the option of longer exceedance periods.
Secondly, I would draw your attention to the long-term targets for the concentration of ozone in the air. We now have a deadline for when the long-term targets are to be achieved, namely before 2020, except in cases where it is physically impossible to achieve the targets. It will be an important task for both the Commission and Parliament to ensure that the compromise made here concerning what is physically impossible does not in reality become a pretext for doing nothing and to ensure that there is not too much elasticity in the compromise. I would also point out how important it is for information to be given both to the general population and, in particular, to the especially vulnerable population groups too, namely children and the elderly. The report requires that information be provided and that action plans be devised so that rapid intervention is possible if the concentration of ozone is too high.
Allow me, finally, also to indicate two other areas included by Mr Davies. The first is the relationship with the applicant countries. I think it is right that we should try to involve the applicant countries as early as possible in this process, as recommended also by those of us in the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Policy. Ozone pollution is, of course, clearly transboundary in character, a fact which justifies our including as many neighbouring countries as we possibly can from the beginning. Finally, the reporting, which Mr Davies also emphasised in his speech here today, is important if we are to have comparisons not only of initiatives taken in the Member States but also of exceedances which, as a matter of actual fact, occur in the Member States. I believe that, with the adoption of this report, we shall be taking a considerable step forward and acquiring a sound basis for the further negotiations with the Commission and the Council in the Conciliation Committee."@en1
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