Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-04-23-Speech-4-009"
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"en.20090423.3.4-009"2
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Ladies and gentlemen, I feel very honoured to be able to join you here today and to participate in discussions on a number of important topics relating to public health which are on today’s agenda. These include the application of patients’ rights in cross-border healthcare, ensuring patient safety and joint EU action on rare diseases.
I would like to start by saying that all three issues are among the priorities of the Czech Presidency and they will also be on the agenda of the Council for Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Protection on 7 June 2009 in Luxembourg. We therefore warmly welcome the forthcoming debate.
The Czech Presidency is fully aware of the important role played by the European Parliament in the legislative process in the area of public health, and it understands that close cooperation between the Council and Parliament is essential. Your reports on these three topics have therefore come at the right time.
I would now like to say a few words from the perspective of the Council concerning the proposed directive of the European Parliament and the Council on applying patients’ rights in cross-border healthcare.
The Czech Presidency is fully aware of the need to provide legal certainty for patients receiving healthcare in another Member State, and it is building on the results of the French Presidency’s work in this area. Our objective is to seek the approval of this text, which will be clear and comprehensible to EU citizens, which will respect primary law including the subsidiarity principle and which will fulfil the declared objective of establishing legal certainty for EU citizens concerning the application of their rights when receiving cross-border healthcare. However, at the same time careful thought must be given to possible impacts of the proposal’s implementation on the stability of healthcare systems in EU Member States.
In view of the fundamental importance of the proposal very intensive discussions have taken place and are still continuing in the legal bodies of the Council. Therefore at present I am not able to tell you whether the Council will achieve political agreement at the end of the Czech Presidency, i.e. at the EPSCO Council in June. However, I can make a number of general conclusions at this point. The future directive should codify all of the case law of the European Court of Justice applying to the implementation of the principle of free movement of goods and services in the area of public health and it should also add a regulation on the coordination of social systems and provide Member States with the option of making healthcare provision in another Member State conditional on prior authorisation, or the option to apply a ‘gate-keeping’ system.
We find these principles in John Bowis’s report on the proposed directive which you will be debating. It is also possible to identify other topics that the European Parliament and the Council have in common: the importance of providing full and correct information to patients about options for receiving cross-border healthcare or the emphasis on ensuring high quality and safety in the provision of care.
The Czech Presidency appreciates the care taken by Parliament in drafting this report, the wording of which has emerged from numerous difficult but fruitful discussions in a number of relevant committees. I am aware that the wording of the report represents a compromise between the various political groups and that finding this compromise has not been at all easy. I would therefore like to thank everyone who took part in creating it and the rapporteur John Bowis, to whom we all wish a speedy recovery, of course. This represents a valuable contribution, enabling the legislative process for proposed directive to continue further. The Council will review the text of the report in detail, as well as all of the amendment proposals, and will carefully consider incorporating them into the common position of the Council in order to support a second-reading agreement.
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, as I mentioned earlier it is still too soon to say whether the June EPSCO Council will produce a political agreement on the proposed directive, as discussions based on the compromise proposal submitted by the Czech Presidency have not yet ended. In any case, the Council will discuss this topic further, taking into account the report approved by the European Parliament."@en1
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