Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-03-09-Speech-2-359"
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"en.20040309.13.2-359"2
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"Commissioner, Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, what we are dealing with here is the fourth daughter directive to the Air Quality Framework Directive, which already has three adopted daughters, the first on sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, particulate matter and lead, the second on benzene and carbon monoxide and the third on ozone. In the first two cases, limit values were sought and were duly enshrined in the directives. The so-called mother directive, in other words the overarching framework legislation, also calls for limit values in respect of arsenic, cadmium, nickel, mercury and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. This is the basic requirement. In the case of ozone, the framework directive only provides for a target value, and the third daughter directive set the target accordingly.
In the present discussion on this fourth daughter directive, there are three positions: the Commission has adopted the position that monitoring is enough and sets a proposed target value for benzopyrenes. This, in my view, is contrary to the framework directive, and I know of earlier Commission drafts in which limit values were set. The Commission, then, has already deliberated on this point. The Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Policy voted by a very narrow majority of 26 to 24 for limit values. These limits did not come from me, because I was pretty poor at chemistry in my schooldays, but from experts from the Commission, international experts and a committee of people with a sound scientific grounding. In short, these limit values are feasible from the Commission’s point of view, which, in this case, we have endorsed.
There are very many indications from industry too that these target and limit values can be achieved. We also voted in the Committee on the Environment for the omission of the original requirement for a time limit for industrial areas where these values are difficult to achieve. In other words, we were very responsive to the needs of industry, telling them that, where damage had been done to their environment in the past, where there was a history of pollution, they were not actually expected to achieve the targets within a very short period. In addition, the Committee on the Environment commissioned a study from the Institute for European Environmental Policy. The study likewise confirms the feasibility of limit values.
The third position is that of the Council, with which we have already conducted preliminary negotiations and maintained contacts and dialogue. In the view of the Council, or a potential majority of the Council, target values are also conceivable. This point will undoubtedly be the focus of future discussions too.
We certainly must be clearly aware of the significance of these heavy metals. They are genotoxic human carcinogens, which, even in minimal doses, effect a change in DNA – in people’s genetic make-up. There is definitely a need to appreciate fully what is at stake here.
The line of argument adopted in the Commission document, namely that it is all a matter of cost-benefit analysis, of weighing the cost of filters or technical measures against potential savings from a reduction in the number of people dying from cancer, is, to my mind, extremely cynical. The second step, namely an assessment of the secondary benefits in terms of a lower incidence of disease, has not been taken at all, because such benefits are difficult to quantify. Such a cynical line of argument will not wash with the bulk of the European population.
We have postponed tomorrow’s vote with the intention of trying to reach an agreement with the Council before the end of the present legislative term. I am pleased that the Commissioner shares my view that we can perhaps use these remaining weeks to reach a compromise that will ultimately enable us to look one another straight in the eye."@en1
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