Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-10-21-Speech-2-215"
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"en.20031021.6.2-215"2
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".
In reply to the supplementary question, perhaps I may once again explain that the Commission is in active negotiations with the Government of the United States. I was in Washington early last week, and during my stay I had discussions with Mr Tom Ridge who is the Secretary for the Homeland Security Department, in other words the man in charge of seeing to it that the United States is a secure and safe country.
The legislation of the United States requires all passengers going to the United States to have their personal data sent on before their arrival. Quite apart from what the Commission thinks, airlines and, where necessary, computerised reservation systems, supply that data. That is not strictly in compliance with European law and, therefore, the situation is not good.
European law is laid down in the Data Protection Directive which, incidentally, has not yet been transposed into the national legislations of a number of Member States. Anyway, it is a directive and should be policed by Member States, not by the Commission.
Once again, this is not a good situation. We need to decide whether there is adequate protection of the data in the United States, that is the so-called 'adequacy finding'.
As I told the relevant parliamentary committee in the first half of September, I cannot as yet conclude that there is adequacy on the other side of the ocean. Therefore the legally precarious situation continues to exist. Once again that is not good. The honourable Member said that there was a secret arrangement. There is nothing secret about anything at all. The situation is of doubtful legality, but the Commission is in discussions with the American Government to try and rectify. On my last visit to Washington I managed to achieve some limited progress towards an agreed solution, but we are still very far apart.
I said to Parliament that I set a deadline of Christmas to resolve this situation. What will happen I do not know. Hopefully, we shall reach an adequacy finding later on during the near because our negotiations continue. If that is not the case, I shall tell Parliament that there is no adequacy and, therefore, propose that we engage in a bilateral negotiation with the United States. That would, of necessity, amount to a derogation from the data protection directive.
There is also another legal instrument in the form of the computerised reservation system regulation. That is a regulation and, therefore, the policing of that regulation is in the hands of the Commission. My colleague Mrs De Palacio is more specifically responsible for that. Articles 6 and 11 of the regulation say that the Commission may be required to stop data flow if that data flow is not compatible with the regulation.
But may I draw the attention of honourable Members to the fact that stopping the data flow, as I said earlier, may have dire consequences for the airlines involved. It may mean that all passengers have to queue up for three or four hours in Washington, New York or wherever in order to give the data required by the Americans, or that airlines are fined so many dollars per passenger or their landing rights actually suspended. These are no mean consequences, and I would remind the honourable Member of the possible consequences that stopping of the data flow would have.
Having said that I understand Parliament's concerns. They are my concerns because I am interested in upholding the law. We are working to that end. I was in Washington last week. We shall continue and I shall report to Parliament as soon as I have something more substantial than at this moment on how far our American partners are prepared to go."@en1
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