Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-04-24-Speech-2-248"
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"en.20070424.46.2-248"2
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".
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, I am delighted to be back in Strasbourg today to discuss with you the parliamentary business of the next few days.
Following tomorrow's adoption of the relevant report, the Council would like to arrive at a political decision in June. Our work on the draft directive on port-State control has progressed well. In December of last year, under the Finnish Presidency, the Council was able to establish its general line of approach, and now the German Presidency, anticipating the adoption of your report, which is highly consistent in many points with the outcome of the Council's deliberations, intends to bring about a political agreement at the June meeting of the Council of Transport Ministers. This agreement should also take account of the outcome of the next meeting of the Port State Control Committee established by the Paris Memorandum of Understanding; the committee is due to meet in Bonn the week after next.
The negotiations on the proposal for a directive on the liability of carriers of passengers by sea and inland waterway are turning out to be rather more difficult. The discussion of this proposal was launched under the Finnish Presidency. The German Presidency has not only continued the deliberations, it has also significantly intensified them. The Council's discussions have shown that there is agreement in principle on the proposal for a regulation. The inclusion of inland waterway transport, however, is rejected.
There are also a few points that still need to be discussed. These relate not only to matters of detail, such as the conditions in which an advance payment is to be made, but also to certain fundamental issues. To what extent should domestic traffic (cabotage) be covered by the regulation? That must be clarified. Last October, the Legal Committee of the IMO adopted the text of a reservation to the 2002 Protocol to the Athens Convention. What are the implications of this reservation for European legislation? That is another unresolved issue. What is the relationship between the proposed regulation and the provisions of the Convention on Limitation of Liability for Maritime Claims and its 1996 Protocol, the ratification of which is envisaged, as you know, in the proposal Parliament is examining for a directive on the civil liability of shipowners? Agreement in the Council depends on the clarification of these details and these fundamental issues.
The proposal for a directive on the investigation of accidents in maritime transport operations has been introduced during our presidency. The discussions so far have shown how much importance the Member States attach to improving the guidelines for the technical investigation of accidents at sea and have demonstrated the desire of the Member States to lay down the relevant Community rules without delay on the basis of the appropriate IMO code and the results of its current revision. In the light of the present deliberations of the Council bodies and the parliamentary report on which you will likewise be voting today, it will be possible to reach a political agreement on this draft directive too at the meeting of the Transport Council in June.
The proposal for a directive on the responsibility of flag States was presented by the Commission to the Council as a working document in November 2006. It emerged clearly then that most of the Member States did not support the proposal. The matter will be assessed by the Council in the light of the opinion delivered by the European Parliament in March 2007, with due regard to the subsidiarity principle.
This means that five legislative proposals on maritime safety have been placed on the agenda of the Council bodies and will be examined by them. The German Presidency is well aware that the European Parliament wants more progress. For this reason, following the meeting of the Council of Transport Ministers on 7 and 8 June, we intend to take the time to open discussions on the proposal for a directive on classification societies. A parliamentary opinion on this proposal is, of course, on the agenda for the present part-session too.
If substantive progress is to be achieved, all interested parties will have to cooperate. Accordingly, I should like to thank you, ladies and gentlemen of the European Parliament, and especially the rapporteurs, for helping to ensure that rapid progress could be made and objectives achieved during this presidency. We shall include the opinion of the European Parliament, in so far as this has not already been done, in the preparations for the meeting of the Council of Transport Ministers and then try to achieve further progress on this proposal too.
Thank you for your attention. I now look forward to the lively discussion to which I have, of course, become accustomed in this House.
Before addressing the individual issues, I should like to make four preliminary remarks. The first is that improving maritime safety is a common concern of the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission. We have made considerable progress in this direction. I refer, for example, to the improvement in the safety of RoRo vessels in 2002, the early introduction of double hulls in 2003 and the imminent voluntary renunciation by the EU Member States of recourse to internationally authorised exemptions for single-hulled ships. This is all good news.
Secondly, I believe it is also important to refer to employees' working conditions. We have already made significant progress in the implementation of the ILO Maritime Labour Convention of 2006. This is another area where there is broad consensus within the European Parliament and with the representative bodies of management and labour.
My third point refers to protection of the climate. Key tasks await us here, and some of these relate to shipping operations. I hope we shall manage to make good progress on this issue too.
My fourth remark concerns our desire to enhance shipping and ports and the associated activities within the maritime economy. To this end, we adopted an opinion of the Council of Transport Ministers on the Lisbon Strategy on 28 February. Our aim is to make maritime companies more competitive, thereby promoting the European Union as a business location for such operators. This will be a major topic at our conference on the future maritime policy of the EU, to be held in Bremen from 2 to 4 May, and I hope that good proposals will be developed here too, for I know that the European Parliament shares our interest in a European vision for the oceans and seas.
Let me now turn to the seven proposals for the improvement of maritime safety, our topic for today. Shipping is a crucial mode of transport in the global economy. If the sustainability of maritime operations is to be guaranteed, their safety and environmental compatibility must be continually upgraded.
Tomorrow's vote in the European Parliament will enable the Council to make further progress in the decision-making process. The German Presidency of the Council attaches the utmost importance to the present proposals for improvements in ship safety. We have not only continued the discussions that were launched during the Austrian and Finnish Presidencies but have also intensified and indeed accelerated them. In so doing, we are pursuing realistic objectives and focusing on the feasible.
Thanks to the concentration of these efforts into a small number of legislative proposals and the support of the European Council and the European Parliament, we shall be able to take several political decisions for the June meeting of the Council. I shall gladly take this opportunity to report to you on the state of play with regard to the initiatives on maritime safety during the German Presidency of the Council. The proposal for a directive on the Community vessel-traffic monitoring and information system was one of the first proposals to be examined by the Council.
In June 2006, under the Austrian Presidency, agreement was reached on a general line of approach. Since then the competent Council body has examined the amendments adopted by the Committee on Transport and Tourism of the European Parliament and has identified some points – such as the characteristics of the competent authorities and the procedures for providing refuge for vessels in distress – that need further consultation. There is no doubt, however, that both legislative institutions seek to improve the safety of maritime transport and to prevent environmental disasters."@en1
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