Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-10-24-Speech-1-133"
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"en.20051024.18.1-133"2
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".
Mr President, as rapporteur, I am pleased to be able to say that Parliament has, at second reading, reached agreement with the Council on the waste shipments regulation. Of the 90 amendments that were adopted in the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, the Council has accepted 50 in full; 17 amendments have been replaced by 12 compromise amendments and the other 23 amendments lapsed as a result of the overall compromise.
Finally, I should like to make an urgent appeal to the Commission not to resort to legal action again on account of the legal basis. I do not believe that a legal battle between the European institutions would benefit the environment; it would hamper the progress of the implementation of this regulation. I hope that the Commission also realises that the review of this directive serves a greater purpose and I am relying on the support of the Commissioner for the Environment, Mr Dimas, in this.
It is a result to be proud of, in my view, certainly if we bear in mind the fact that the Commission’s position on the legal basis means that unanimity is required in the Council. I would like to thank the Council, and the British Presidency in particular, for the constructive and pleasant working relationship. That certainly also applies to the shadow rapporteurs of the other groups. I am delighted that a compromise package has been achieved in such a short space of time which enjoys such broad support from the groups.
In the latter stages of the negotiations, we mainly talked about the two key components, namely the enforcement of the regulation and the dismantling of decommissioned ships, on which two topics I should like to expand.
With regard to enforcement, since 1993, there has been a regulation in place for the shipment of waste. It appears, though, that this regulation is not being observed properly, as many illegal waste shipments take place. You are probably familiar with the example of the British undertaking which, in March of this year, was caught illegally exporting no fewer than 60 sea containers full of rotting and foul-smelling household waste to China. The forged documents indicated that the shipment concerned waste paper recovery. Last week, the British Environmental Agency admitted that following the inspection of sea containers, 75% of the waste shipments appear to be illegal.
In June 2005, it even transpired in France that 100% of the inspected waste shipments were irregular. From this, we can conclude that, instead of the odd enforcement campaign, clear rules on waste transports are absolutely vital and that they need to be enforced in a structurally sound manner. The compromise package now stipulates that Member States are required to inspect the paperwork and the physical shipments. They must also work in tandem with each other in order to prevent and trace illegal waste shipments.
Moreover, the Council agreed that personnel from the Member States should be deployed permanently in order to ensure that this cooperation actually takes place. With this, arrangements are put in place in order to back up regular physical inspections of the actual shipments. I would like to ask the Commission to continue the enforcement campaigns in the framework of the IMPEL network and to embed them structurally in the organisation.
I would also like to say a few words about decommissioned ships. All groups have expressed their concern about the way in which these are dismantled. Since, in the next few years, an unusually high number of ships will be decommissioned as a result of single-hulled tankers being phased out, global measures to prevent dumping in places such as Asia are of paramount importance. Sadly, the strict measures taken unilaterally by the European Union to ensure the safe and environmentally-responsible dismantling of ships can be circumvented simply by, at the end of a ship’s life, changing the flag over to that of a country outside the European Union.
Consequently, the ILO and IMO must set to work in order to draft compulsory conditions that provide an effective solution to the problem of decommissioned ships. The Council has declared it will extend the capacity for dismantling ships in the European Union. Moreover, the Council has pledged its 100% commitment to concluding the previously mentioned global agreement on the dismantling of ships.
Although I have a great deal of sympathy for a number of amendments by the Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance, as rapporteur, I must advise against their adoption in the light of the agreement that has been reached with the Council."@en1
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