Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-01-17-Speech-3-167"
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"en.20070117.9.3-167"2
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"Mr President, I should like to start by thanking the Members of this House who have contributed from afar or from close by to the result we are discussing today. As you know, we will take this matter further, and will probably set the conciliation procedure in motion, which will involve quite a bit of work.
Turning to the Sterckx report, I should like to repeat what I said at first reading, namely that we managed to reach a consensus across the party-political divides about the key issues concerning passenger rights. It may be possible to bridge the chasm that separates us from the Council, which wishes to restrict these rights to international passenger travel by putting in place transitional measures for situations where public service contracts already provide for these passenger rights.
At the same time, we must make sure that these exceptions are very clearly defined and thus prevent this regulation from becoming an empty shell.
Opinions are clearly divided over the Jarzembowski report, not only between the groups, but also within them, since the situation within the railway market and the potential implications of liberalising the national railway market make for very different opinions from one country to the next. I deeply regret – and this is my personal view – the fact that most of my fellow Members, not least in the Committee on Transport and Tourism, have voted in favour of liberalising national passenger transport. This is something that has not actually been requested by the sector, something the implications of which have not been properly looked into and something that the Commission, the Council, the trade unions, the consumer organisations, and the Association of European railway companies do not want to see approved today.
I have to tell Mr Sterckx that this is especially the case because we have failed to dispel, in a legally reliable manner, the fear that liberalisation will eat away at the public services in our Member States or render them unaffordable, for the simple reason that new competitors will obviously only be interested in the few profitable lines within the railway market, which will result in a considerable economic loss for the public service provider who will need to attract new sources of income in order to maintain the minor non-profitable lines, or else will be forced to cut these down.
It would have been preferable, as the Commissioner already said, to look at the issue of liberalisation in combination with the Meijer report, so that clear and uniform procedures could be put in place which would allow Member States or regions to offer sections of the network to one particular company in the framework of public service provision contracts.
To vote on liberalisation at this stage, without putting arrangements in place in this area first, is to put the cart before the horse, and this will not work. Moreover, as I have already said several times, I do not think that the liberalisation of the market is in itself a panacea to get more people to use rail. In Belgium, for example, the number of train travellers has rocketed in recent years – last year by 6.6% – not because of liberalisation, but as a result of investment in new and comfortable rolling stock and of the adoption of an attractive pricing policy."@en1
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