Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-09-04-Speech-2-272"
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"en.20010904.11.2-272"2
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".
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the regulation creating a European Aviation Safety Agency was welcomed by all groups in committee. Basically, this regulation needs to take account of three points. First, and this has always been the most important point, once there is a liberalised air traffic market, which will give rise to new competitive pressures and the risk of using competition to cut costs, cost cuts must not be made at the expense of safety. That is why I say, loud and clear, that this regulation is a sign that we want to guarantee a uniformly high standard of safety in the EU Member States in future and ensure that it is identical in every state.
The second point is also, I think, an important aspect to bear in mind, despite the fact that it often receives short shift in policy. There are also economic policy aspects to this regulation because, in it, we are creating an authority or, more accurately, an agency which brings all the licences and permits needed for the air travel industry under one uniform licensing procedure. That means that, in future, individual Member States will not need to repeat the entire procedure and everything will be taken care of by this standard agency in the European Union.
A third point also needs highlighting. We are creating an agency which is a very similar institution to the agency which already exists in America. We all know that the FIA has quite a lot of clout – even worldwide – because it represents a nation which is a strong economic power. We Europeans are obviously limping along behind because individual nation states have less influence than a closed unit, i.e. an institution which represents all the Member States. That is why I think that this is a step in the right direction.
The Commission proposal before us was discussed at several meetings in committee and we endeavoured, I will not say to improve certain positions, because that always sounds as if we think those who prepared it did a bad job; we endeavoured to lighten the Commission decision, to make the agency more independent, because we felt that the prime concern of this sort of agency should be to improve air traffic safety, so we tried to ensure that it has plenty of room for manoeuvre.
Now we all know that, under the current Treaties, a fully independent agency is out of the question. But we do feel that the Commission should give the agency enough leeway to carry out some sort of legal supervision and perhaps some sort of technical supervision in certain secondary areas.
We were therefore right in saying that we want an independent agency and I think it was also important that we said that the administrative board must be given a stronger remit, on the one hand, and that the executive director must be given a position that allows him a degree of independence as the head of such an agency, on the other.
There is another important aspect which I should like to make a point of addressing here. We endeavoured in committee to draw clear dividing lines between the various areas of jurisdiction. As Parliament, we deliberately avoided accepting the Commission proposal of a seat on the administrative board. Instead we said, we want it to be perfectly clear that Parliament lays down the basic specifications, the Commission is the contact for the corresponding implementing provisions and the agency has to ensure that the technical details are properly regulated.
To summarise, because I am running out of time, I think that this regulation is the right move. We are making sure that the European level takes action in an area which is of interest to a great many people and which a great many people worry about. And I say to you quite unequivocally that airspace and safety should know no bounds and this agency is therefore well placed at European level. I therefore call on the House join with me in voting in favour of this report tomorrow."@en1
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