Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-04-10-Speech-1-111"
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"en.20000410.7.1-111"2
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"Mr President, the way in which we feed ourselves is an expression of how we live. Some people criticise what I would call the modern western lifestyle, rightly or wrongly. The answer to this question is often determined by the choices we make. What matters to the European People’s Party is that the consumer has choices. This presupposes both the availability of information and the guarantee that what is on offer on the market does not present any health risks and that all products are manufactured in accordance with current rules and procedures.
As far as additives are concerned, the basic rules are enshrined in the 1989 Framework Directive. This directive stipulates that an additive shall only be admitted if there is sufficient technological need, if there is no risk to the health of the consumer and if the consumer is not misled in the process. In our view, the latter condition has not been met regarding the admission of sodium alginate in peeled and sliced carrots. If consumers buy fresh carrots, they must be able to assume that these are untreated and not processed and they do not expect them to be dipped in a preservative.
To assess whether the use of additives is necessary, the Framework Directive lists various accepted objectives. One of these is the supply of ingredients or components of foodstuffs to patients with dietary needs. The use of E 467 – I will not attempt to pronounce the full word – as proposed by the Commission, seems to meet this requirement.
Finally, the Framework Directive also stipulates that facilitating the manufacture and preparation of foodstuffs is an acceptable criterion of usefulness. In the light of this, our Group is not really opposed to permitting three additives in baking sprays, unlike the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Policy. All other amendments tabled by this committee receive our support, including the amendment tabled by the PSE Group.
I would like to add the following if you will allow me. Firstly: the rapporteur who, incidentally, has worked extremely hard – I have rarely seen a rapporteur put so much effort into one report and I would like to congratulate him on this – has every right to complain about the Commission providing Parliament with insufficient information in the COM document. Something was added at the end, but I do not think that this is the way forward and I would like to find out from the Commissioner whether he intends to do anything about this in the future.
Secondly, the effects on public health must obviously be assessed on a scientific basis. For this purpose, we call on the Scientific Committee for Food for scientific opinions. After the BSE crisis, the Scientific Committees were reformed at our request and, as we have said before, they have been reformed to our satisfaction. We now have to make a decision: either we accept the opinions of the Scientific Committees in principle, or we do not; but then these Scientific Committees will need to be reformed once again. We cannot do a bit of both. I fear that if we do not, out of principle almost, accept the conclusions reached by the Scientific Committees, this will cost us and the legislation we draft dearly in terms of credibility, and we will then end up replacing the expertise of the scientists in the Scientific Committees by our own convictions. This is something I find difficult to come to terms with.
Thirdly, I would like to know from the Commission if it intends to screen the permitted additives at set times and examine these according to state-of-the-art technology, as the rapporteur has asked in his explanatory note, and quite rightly so.
Fourthly, and on a final note, I would like to say a few words on the hierarchy of standards. We have asked for a hierarchy of standards in the IGC report and we have also mentioned this elsewhere. Could the Commissioner tell me whether he thinks that lists of additives should be drafted or completed within the European Parliament and the Council, preferably according to a codecision procedure, or is this a task which, in his opinion, should be carried out by an authorised executive body?"@en1
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