Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-11-18-Speech-2-280"
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"en.20031118.10.2-280"2
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, 15% of heavy goods vehicles on European roads are transporting waste. The reason for this is the existence of differing market conditions. Not all Member States have bans or taxes on the dumping of waste. As a result, a great deal of waste is being transferred to other countries. This runs counter to the principles of proximity and self-sufficiency that apply to waste disposal under the Waste Framework Directive.
Shipments of waste can only be refused if the waste cannot be recovered in the importing country. A lengthy debate has arisen on the subject of when something can be considered to be recovery. The problem in this whole debate is that waste recovery is not necessarily more sound in environmental terms. Clear criteria for recovery must therefore be developed. The European Commission acknowledges this problem by remarking, among other things, that there are few Community environmental requirements for waste recovery operations. There is no prospect of a solution to this problem, however, unless the Commission makes proposals as part of the Thematic Strategy on Recycling. It is currently the Court of Justice that determines what constitutes waste recovery, and this is unacceptable. In addition, the amendment of the Waste Framework Directive has been far too long in coming.
We are not behaving responsibly towards the waste sector if we await the whole, protracted, process of amending the Waste Framework Directive. Clarity is needed in the shorter term. Since the problems arise primarily in connection with the shipment of waste, it is an obvious course of action to spell out these additional conditions in this Regulation. The Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Policy is of the opinion that, until the European Commission formulates these conditions, the Member States should have the option of imposing their own conditions on waste recovery.
In addition, it is my view that it must be possible to refuse shipments of waste if a minimum percentage of recovery and a minimum calorific value are not observed. A misunderstanding persists as to these grounds for refusal. If there is the possibility of refusing a shipment of waste on environmental grounds, this does not imply that refusal is compulsory. Some position papers incorrectly state that shipments of waste are banned. Articles 12 and 13 of this Regulation are not talking about a ban, but about the fact that shipments of waste may be undertaken by mutual agreement.
The reuse of silver, even if it is less than one tenth of a per cent, shall thus remain possible. Exports of waste should only be permitted if they lead to recovery or final disposal in the short term; and not, therefore, exports of waste that are destined for what is termed ‘interim recovery’ or ‘interim disposal’, as far as the Committee on the Environment is concerned. In practice, a great deal goes wrong during the mixing, sorting and storing involved. It can no longer be ascertained where the waste has gone and what has happened to it. Waste that is well sorted and quantifiable, and is really recovered or disposed of in an environmentally sound way, can indeed be exported, therefore. In line with this, the Committee on the Environment proposes a ban on the export of unsorted household waste. After all, we do not transport our sewage to other countries.
My final point concerns the implementation of this Regulation. We must not give in to those Member States that are failing to invest sufficiently in this. For this reason, I do not support Amendments 95 and 98 by the Group of the European People’s Party (Christian Democrats) and European Democrats, which introduce implied permission for the country of import. Prior mutual written agreement is necessary for the purposes of transparency. There are Member States that do not have their house in order at the moment. They themselves admit that they cannot control shipments of waste. In this regard, the Member States concerned must bring about change instead of complaining about the administrative burden.
In summary, price competition on the European waste market is acceptable, but eco-competition is not. What the Committee on the Environment does not want is exports of waste that lead to an environmentally less sound alternative. After all, this Regulation is not intended to facilitate trade in waste, but to enable environmentally sound waste management."@en1
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