Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-02-11-Speech-4-071"
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Madam President, thank you for your words of welcome, and thank you to every one of you for your good wishes and your encouragement. As you have understood – and, I have said so before this Parliament – I begin this new task that President Barroso has entrusted to me with great determination and resolve. I shall even remain a little idealistic. I believe that creative ideals do exist, especially when it comes to the European project.
I believe that, in addition to listening to the opinion of the Member States, as I shall be doing, I shall continue to listen to what is said in the European Parliament, as I have done this morning, even though I have clearly understood that there are on the various sides of this House different opinions that are not always consistent, because I am aware of what Parliament’s majority line is. I shall listen to Parliament and to all interested parties as well as associations within the context of this consultation on better European coordination. In any case, that is what I shall be proposing to my fellow Commissioners in the coming days.
I have spoken of challenges and trials, Madam President, and I shall finish with them. Of course, among the issues faced by society is the question of addiction, which is extremely important and which has been highlighted in your report, and there is the question of minors. We must have strict limits, so that minors cannot gamble; all the Member States are working on this question, but in a disorganised manner. That is why, on this point, I believe that there must be European coordination.
To do good work, one must first properly understand, and that is also why I accept the request many of you have made for the Commission policy document to contain figures and reliable statistics, in addition to the figures quoted just now. I am therefore going to endeavour – and this is what Mrs Stihler and Mrs McGuinness have just requested in particular – to ensure that, in addition to clear policy directions, which means not only words but also proposed decisions, the Commission document above all contains as accurate a diagnosis as possible of all these issues.
May I say one last word, Madam President, on a subject that is also connected to this question of gaming, and that is the financing of sport. I say this, moreover, as a person who has devoted 10 years of his life to organising sporting activities. We are a few days away from the opening of the Vancouver Olympic Games, and I have the honour of being the joint chair of an Olympic Games organising committee. I therefore know that the organisation of great sporting events costs money and that, somewhere, financing networks are linked to gaming.
It is for this reason, moreover, that many Member States that finance sport through gaming wish also to safeguard national practices or legislation. The Commission is currently carrying out a study on the financing of sport in order to better understand all these concerns. There will also be a conference to be held next week in Brussels, and in the policy document that I shall present to you we shall also refer to these networks which finance events and sport through gaming.
Ladies and gentlemen, I have listened to you very carefully and I am very grateful to you for the diversity and quality of your speeches. I shall continue to listen to you. In addition to and together with Parliament, I shall be consulting all interested parties. Therefore, on the basis of this policy document, which, subject to the agreement of the College, will probably be a green paper, I shall make an appointment with you, no later than this autumn, so that we may achieve this goal of being more consistent and of establishing this marvellous form of coordination at European level.
The question that Mr Harbour put very clearly just now, and the questions from Mr Schwab, Mrs Gebhardt, Mrs Rühle and Mr de Jong, in particular, all amount to this: will the European Commission, at this time, show resolve and initiative, and will it do so, moreover, by using methods other than infringement procedures?
Ladies and gentlemen, make no mistake. Of course, I have been in office for 48 hours. So, please give my colleagues and me time to work and to present things to you in a serious manner. However, it is about a new approach that I really want to speak to you, and I do so for a reason that is very important to me. As several of you – including Mr Karas, and Mrs Gebhardt and Mrs Figueiredo a moment ago – have said, this does not concern a service like the others. It is for this reason that you are right to expect this new approach from the Commission, beginning with the consultation I have just proposed to you.
Currently, Member States are free to choose how they approach this question, as long as they comply with the Treaty. All Member States believe that gambling must be regulated with care, in view of the risk it poses to society, a risk that Mrs Schaldemose’s report – which I have read with great care and interest – describes in explicit detail.
The Council’s work has also brought to light the significantly different opinions, traditions and practices that exist. What I have noted is that since they chose in 2006 to withdraw gambling from the scope of the Services Directive, the Member States have not been consulted by the Commission on a European initiative. It is this, therefore, that is going to change. For my part, my teams and I will be following the efforts of the Council working group very closely. I also know that many Member States want to see the scope of the draft directive on consumer rights restricted. I confirm that the Commission does not rule out solutions other than infringement procedures.
To find the right way, I am going to publish a policy document. I myself used the words ‘green paper’, but for that I need to check the content and the scheduling of the Commission’s work programme and to discuss it with my colleagues. However, we shall be publishing a policy document in order to structure future discussions on this question. That question, ladies and gentlemen, is assuredly one of a new and meaningful kind of European coordination.
Of course there is an economic dimension, but I repeat that it is not the only one as far as I am concerned. There are other serious issues that pose just as great a challenge to the public interest. Mr Creutzmann, Mr Kirkhope, Mr Paška – I cannot name everyone who has spoken, but I have made a careful note of what the various coordinators of your groups have said on your behalf.
One of these questions, one of these challenges, is cross-border crime. Is it possible to fight this sort of crime without taking a European approach? I think that it is impossible. What is more, if we do not adopt a European approach to online gambling, we will not make progress in establishing an internal market for
commerce.
As far as online gaming is concerned, the very least we must do is to strengthen cooperation between national authorities regulating gaming in Europe. This is, moreover, certainly one of the issues being studied by the Council working group, which is why, on this issue as on others, the Commission will be working with the Member States."@en1
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