Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-09-25-Speech-1-064"
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"en.20060925.13.1-064"2
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to begin by thanking the shadow rapporteurs from the European People’s Party and Socialist Groups, Mrs Weisgerber and Mrs Corbey, for their cooperation, but I also want to thank the Commission and both the Austrian and Finnish Presidencies of the Council for their openness and willingness to engage in dialogue. That there is not always complete agreement about everything, whether within this House or between one institution and another, should become the norm in European democracy, for what really matters is that we, although we approach it from different angles and with different priorities, should have one single end in mind, that being that air quality in Europe should be improved.
Let me now turn to PM2.5, the smallest particles, which are, according to all the experts, the source of the greatest hazards to health. However, the data obtained in Europe on PM2.5 are as yet uncertain, and most Member States have had insufficient experience with measurements of it.
We therefore propose a two-stage regulation for PM2.5, with, in the first instance, a target value from 2010 onwards, and, with effect from 2005, a limit value around 20 micrograms; this too, is more ambitious than what the Council and the Commission are proposing.
A majority in this House agrees that the 25 microgram annual average value as proposed by the Commission is lacking in ambition and that we should therefore reduce it. In its proposal, the Commission opted for an overall reduction of 20% for PM2.5 without undertaking any further impact assessment relating to the practical actions and costs resulting from it for each individual Member State. Like my fellow members of the committee, I am persuaded that a graduated model, with Member States being treated differently and greater account taken of previous achievements, is in any case preferable to aiming for a reduction across the board.
Let me just say something about Article 20. I could understand the Commission’s and outside bodies' criticisms of the 5+5 rule – which aims to institute a time delay in order to enable the limit values to be reached. We have put together a new package called ‘4+2’, which represents a move towards the position taken by the Commission, which, as we know, is proposing a five-year period. I would like to reiterate air quality in Europe will be achieved only in the long term and only by means of actions targeting the problem at source, that is, the causes of pollution. I look to the Commission in expectation of the proposals that it has announced for reducing pollution at its source.
That many respiratory diseases and the consequences resulting from them are attributable to high levels of air pollution, particularly in densely-populated areas and conurbations in the EU, is not disputed. Polluted air takes no account of borders, and so improving the quality of our ambient air remains a major challenge. The problem of air pollution can only be solved in the long term and in a European framework, particularly by stepping up cross-border measures. In order for the ambitious goals to be achieved, further instruments will be needed in the Community in future: clean air in the Member States can only be achieved if the directives which are in force are transposed consistently and if new EU legislative proposals concentrate on restricting emissions at the point where polluters cause them.
While there is justifiable concern about the state of ambient air in Europe, I would like to take this opportunity to emphasise that air quality in Europe has, over the past decades, been improved as a result of stringent legal regulation and technical advances.
Prior to the July vote in the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, and looking forward to the vote we are about to take in this plenary, all three of the main groups in this House negotiated a package of compromise amendments, which can be summed up as aiming for, on the one hand, ambitious limit and target values, with, on the other, greater flexibility and consideration of the difficulties that individual Member States face with the transposition of the current directive. Let me briefly sketch out the essential points.
I will start with PM10. There is a large degree of consensus in this House about the lack of ambition inherent in allowing the 40 microgram annual average value for PM10 to remain unchanged after 2010. This value is already adhered to in most European cities. The Commission had already announced a more stringent annual average value for PM10 with effect from 2010, but, as this present proposal makes no reference to it, the three big groups propose that the threshold value for PM10 be reduced to 33 micrograms with effect from 2010.
I have to say, Commissioner, that I find it remarkable, in view of the criticism that these compromises attract, that you continually neglect to make this very point. Where the PM10 annual limit values are concerned, there is a marked downward turn. I would like to point out that this is not an example of the dilution of limit values that has attracted such strong criticism from the environmental organisations.
The daily limit value for PM10, according to which 50 micrograms may be exceeded on at most 35 days in the year, has come in for forthright criticism from many Members, but the fact is that there is no correlation between the current daily and annual threshold values, and, moreover, the figure of 35 days is arbitrary. Nobody in this House would doubt the importance of carrying out daily measurements and informing at-risk groups of increased concentrations of pollutants. On the other hand, no credible scientist has as yet claimed that the daily limit value is more relevant to health policy than the annual one. The problems cities have with compliance with the daily limit value are no secret, and we abandon municipalities to a sort of organised helplessness. It has now been demonstrated that compliance with daily limit values is completely unrelated to any clean air measures, but rather largely dependent on chance meteorological phenomena.
The Committee on the Environment and the three main groups in this House endorse the compromise proposal according to which the cities and municipalities affected would, in tandem with a reduction in the annual limit value of approximately 20%, be allowed – albeit only subject to certain conditions – rather more flexibility and permitted to comply with a limit value on a maximum of 55 rather than 35 days.
There may be those who will have their doubts about the correlation between the daily and annual limit values proposed by this House, but nobody can claim with any seriousness that we are thereby being any less ambitious than the Commission and the Council."@en1
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