Two big ones!
Although there were several issues I had to deal with as part of my
committee responsibilities, I reckon there were two major items on the
November plenary session agenda which are of general interest.
Energy efficient television?
But first a flavour of Industry, Research and Energy Committee
responsibilities. We had a special meeting to discuss the second reading
of the Report on the proposal for a directive on end use energy
efficiency and energy services. I met representatives from BT concerned
about the anticipated effect of new Television without Frontiers
proposals on internet broadband carriers and service providers.
Austrian date
I spent quite a long dinner with the next Presidency of the Council, the
Austrian Minister for Research and Education, about the 7th Framework
Programme of European Research proposals, the likely level of finance
for them and how long we will take to complete the first reading. And I
met representatives of EURIMA, the insulation manufacturers association
about, guess what, how important insulation will be for energy
conservation and efficiency in the battle against climate change.
Silly writing
REACH stands for the Registration, Evaluation and Authorisation of
CHemicals and, yes, I know it looks silly writing CHemical that way but
it is to make the acronym clear. This huge piece of legislation has been
with us for over two years. It represents the last Commission’s attempt
to bring together and replace much existing legislation into one
coherent new Regulation.
Polarize debate
Its aims are the protection of human health and the environment through
better, earlier identification of risky or hazardous chemical substances
so as to manage and reduce the risk. At the same time some of us have
been concerned about the potential impact of this measure on business
and employment within Europe. The debates within committee have tended
to focus on the concerns of the two sides of this issue.
Amendment over-REACH
A measure of the size of the Commission proposal and what we thought of
it lies in the number of amendments put down at
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committee stage (over 1300 in my committee alone)
and in the plenary (1033 which included a number of amendments adopted
by my committee as a compromise between the different groups as well as
a series of last minute attempts to make compromise amendments). Such
numbers indicate the original proposal was badly drafted and needed much
alteration as well as showing the pressures from the various NGOs
(non-governmental organisation) and industry lobbies, not to forget the
animal welfare people.
Simplified vote
We voted on blocks of amendments under the various headings of Scope;
Substances in articles; Registration; OSOR or one substance one
registration; Evaluation; Authorisation: Agency Model (the regulation
envisages establishing a Chemicals Agency to receive the registration
data, make evaluation and give authorisations); Animal Testing; SMEs
(small and medium-sized enterprises and the regulation impact on them);
Duty of Care; Risk Communication; Access to Information; Third Party
Representative; and whatever came under Remaining Provisions.
Left carries the day
Prior to the vote, I had a clear impression that the position
established in the compromise amendments adopted by my committee, but
mostly rejected by the Environment Committee, stood a good chance in the
final vote. However, the various groups of the left (including the Lib
Dems) combined on another set of compromise amendments which were more
radical and carried the day except in the case of registration. So I
voted against at the end because our reasoned compromises did not even
have a chance to be voted on and because the left had won most of the
votes.
Simple majority won’t be enough
This does not mean I oppose the principle behind the proposal but it was
important to show the Council the level of support for the various
amendments passed and the sum of them in the final outcome. That is
because if the Council does not accept any or many of them in its Common
Position then the Parliament has to muster a qualified majority to
re-instate amendments adopted at first reading in the second reading. A
qualified majority is half the membership of the Parliament plus one or
367 as things stand at present. And very few of the |
amendments we voted against were adopted with a vote as high as that so
their chances of re-instatement by the left at second reading are poor
unless the Council were to surprise us all by taking in the lot to the
Common Position.
It’s Auditor’s Report time again
The other major item was the presentation by the Court of Auditors of
its Annual Reports on the budget for 2004. This comes in November every
year and is routinely greeted by certain sections of the press as
another good opportunity to attack the bureaucracy, waste, negligence,
incompetence and fraud that everybody believes is widespread in the
Commission and the EU at large.
DWP in the dock too
All this because the Court will not sign the Certificate of Assurance
because there are sufficient examples of the above conditions to give
reason to qualify the accounts. It is for similar reasons the National
Audit Office refuses to sign off the accounts of the Department of Work
and Pensions, responsible for pensions and social security payments,
because of approximately £3 bn per annum identified fraud and money
which cannot be accounted for. Curiously, very few people get worked up
about this UK situation compared to the numbers who wax indignant about
EU fraud.
UK far from blameless
A point not widely taken on board is that the major part of expenditure
under the EU budget is actually administered by the Member States and
that is where the Court of Auditors has the most difficulty in
accurately tracking the money. Does that mean that we in the UK suffer
our share of bureaucracy, waste, negligence, incompetence and fraud? Of
course it does, both with individuals being caught trying to cheat the
system and with bureaucratic errors. But, possibly to those most
exercised about EU fraud, it seems OK if it’s UK!
See the detail on my website
A copy of the Annex 1 has been put up on my website. (pdf format,
3.5 megabytes).
http://www.gileschichestermep.org.uk/
2801_ANNEXE_I.pdf
I hope you find it interesting especially the tables on pages 9-15.
Please note EU budget expenditure is about £73 b; UK budget expenditure
is about £519 bn.
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