Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-01-14-Speech-2-189"
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"en.20030114.6.2-189"2
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".
Mr Cushnahan, I can only agree with you in that, amongst other things, I cannot accept that citizens have fewer rights in Europe than in the United States. This is what I said very clearly when I made the proposals in the
and
packages.
If the Council had agreed to the proposal for single-hull vessels transporting oil to leave Community waters, the
disaster would not have taken place, because it would have had to leave Community waters several months beforehand. I do fully agree that there are things we can learn from the United States. I do not understand why the United States can have a timetable according to which there will be no single-hull vessels transporting oil in its ports by 2010 and we cannot adopt a similar measure.
In the end, as the honourable Members know, a less ambitious timetable was approved. What I have proposed to this Parliament and to the Council of Ministers is that we return to the Commission’s initial proposal and speed up the departure of single-hull ships transporting oil. And furthermore, to take the maximum security measures, specifically, that the transport of heavy oil, of heavy fuel oil, of bituminous products and of tars, in other words, of the most polluting products, should be carried out by safer ships, meaning those with double hulls.
Copenhagen speaks of specific measures. The Commission is studying how to apply those specific measures following the
; they include the possibility of promoting the construction and maintenance of two or three large skimmers, large suction machines, so that, if an oil slick happens – unfortunately there is no such thing as zero risk, although it should be reduced to the minimum – there may be vessels of the greatest possible power, superior to the vessels currently in existence on European coasts, which furthermore can operate and act at sea at times of storms and difficulties.
We must coordinate the European response. The Agency, which would be responsible for these vessels and for the deployment at different strategic points on European coasts, must also implement a series of plans for responding to maritime accidents of this type. This will be one of your tasks: to create a pre-established method for cooperation between different Member States of the Union, which could work better, since it largely depends on bilateral agreements rather than on a perfectly coordinated European-type action.
With regard to responsibility, as the honourable Member knows, we are working on it and I hope that over the next few weeks we can present, within the Commission and rapidly approved, a proposal to provide a criminal definition of serious negligence in all the Member States of the Union in the event of this type of accident."@en1
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