Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-05-14-Speech-3-258"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20030514.10.3-258"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:translated text |
"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I really do not want to start without thanking our rapporteur, Mr Kreissl-Dörfler, for the truly outstanding work he has done with this report, but, today, I want also to thank Mrs Redondo, who chaired the committee on foot and mouth disease and who managed it with a great deal of circumspection.
Fundamentally, I believe, both the Commission proposal for a directive and this report are to be welcomed. It is fortunate that the proposal submitted by the Commission takes on board most of the demands made by Parliament’s committee on foot and mouth disease, which, on 17 December 2002, adopted a resolution calling for the revision of the European Union’s existing policy on the control and prevention of foot and mouth disease. As the contributions to today’s debate make clear, the next epidemic is already rampant in Europe, and I believe that it really is five minutes to midnight when it comes to our changing the European Union’s policy, for we have to avoid in future any epidemic spreading and becoming the tragedy that we saw in Great Britain in 2001. We are not talking here only in terms of the grave financial losses sustained by farmers, especially in the upstream and downstream sectors, or about the damage to rural areas and the profound public disquiet; this is, rather, an image issue for European farmers such as ourselves and for the agricultural policy as a whole.
One important point that has been taken on board is the retention of the ban on prophylactic vaccination, which strikes me as pointless until such time as there is a vaccine that covers all seven serotypes and the 80 subtypes within them. There is a need for research into this to be extended and improved. A further, and decisive, point is that the importance of emergency vaccination is recognised, so that it is no longer seen as a last resort.
In conclusion, it has to be said that the disease, which spread to such an immense extent in Great Britain that we all still shudder to recall it, could have been prevented. All that was needed was for appropriate control measures to be taken and for the existing vaccination requirements to be adhered to in the Member State in question. The one thing that has become perfectly clear is that the Member States really do have to discharge the responsibilities placed on them by the Treaties. I trust that we have learned our lessons from the past in order to be able, next time, to act with more responsibility and coordination. Never again must there be a catastrophe – for a catastrophe is what it was – of these dimensions."@en1
|
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples