Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-09-06-Speech-1-034"
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"en.20100906.16.1-034"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, President of the Council, ladies and gentlemen, the adoption of the Free Trade Agreement with South Korea will open up opportunities for both European and Korean industry. However, in order to prevent any negative effects on European industry, it is essential to have an effective safeguard clause.
We believe that the report incorporates a whole series of improvements such as creating an on-line platform to speed up the processes; the possibility of the industry being able to initiate an investigation process; the Commission being obliged to produce reports; and improvements in the monitoring and surveillance of Korean imports. These are points on which we have already reached an agreement in principle with the Council.
I think this is a good result, but we still do not think it is enough. There are other, even more fundamental points that deserve the full attention of the negotiators and which all the political groups must defend here, as we did in the Committee on International Trade. I am essentially talking about four points.
Firstly, we need to mitigate the possible risk to the more vulnerable Member States by establishing a regional clause, region by region, to prevent some sensitive industries from being affected. We should not forget that the safeguard clause is essentially temporary and its objective is precisely to safeguard the most sensitive sectors of the economy so that they have sufficient time to adapt to the new situation.
Secondly, we need to clearly establish surveillance for the products affected by the duty drawback clause.
Thirdly, we need to defend Parliament’s role in the process of initiating investigations, and the final point is the decision-making process or comitology.
As well as mentioning the good will shown by the Belgian Presidency during the negotiations, finally, I want to mention the vital role that the Commission is playing and will continue to play in bringing the negotiations to a sound conclusion.
That is what my colleagues and I have been working on over the past few months in the Committee on International Trade, which is why it is important for Parliament as a whole to strongly support the whole package of amendments.
The report was adopted by 27 votes in favour and one abstention in June. Under this clause, it will be possible to apply safeguard measures if the reductions to the customs duties on products imported from South Korea threaten to cause serious damage to European industry.
As you know, under the new powers given to Parliament following the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon, the adoption of this regulation is following the ordinary legislative procedure. Unfortunately, it was not possible to hold a trialogue with a mandate from the Council before the summer recess.
The first official trialogue was held on 30 August, and both the shadow rapporteurs and I were able to hear the Council’s reaction to our amendments. That meeting enabled us to move forward on many points and define the final text of some paragraphs, and our feeling following the meeting is that we believe the Council genuinely wants to reach an agreement on the most controversial points and is working hard to do so. This is, of course, something that we view very positively.
However, at the same time, we do not think there has been time to sufficiently clarify the Council’s position on the points on which it has a different view to that adopted in the Committee on International Trade.
All the political groups therefore unanimously decided that the time had come for Parliament to take a position in plenary on the amendments adopted in the Committee on International Trade in July, which are vital in order for the safeguard clause to be applicable and effective.
At the same time, a unanimous decision was taken not to close the door on a possible agreement at first reading, which we firmly believe will be possible when the Council clarifies its position.
We will therefore vote tomorrow only on the amendments tabled by the Committee on International Trade and, in accordance with Rule 55, we will defer the vote on the legislative report to the second part-session in October, when we hope to reach a positive conclusion to the legislative procedure."@en1
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