Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-07-02-Speech-3-252"
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"en.20030702.7.3-252"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, Mr Schmitt is indeed right to say that today marks the first anniversary of the calamity at Überlingen, when two aircraft collided, resulting in many deaths. The public see the Single Sky project as the European response to the situation in the skies above Europe, which is, to say the least, unsatisfactory.
So how do matters stand? We have three times as many control centres as an area of comparable size in the USA, with a patchwork carpet – a product of the Sixties – in the skies above us. If you fly from Brussels to Rome, you have to pass through nine different control sectors; during a flight from Brussels to Geneva, the radio frequency has to be changed five times. With the number of journeys by air continuing to mount over the coming years, the whole thing is more and more a safety hazard, and, at the same time, highly inefficient; one in every four flights is delayed, and 350 000 flying hours are wasted every year. All that costs the airlines some two thousand million euros per annum.
The Commission, with its regulatory package, and Parliament, at first reading stage, faced up to this challenge, but the Member States’ Common Position does not do it justice in terms of what is expected and required. Why is this so?
The first reason for this is that, at the heart of the single sky, there are the functional airspace blocks. How are these to become reality? What is the added value of a regulation if its implementation is to continue to be dependent on the whims of the Member States? They can already set up airspace blocks on a bilateral basis. We take the view that nothing will change here unless we get a normative proposal from Eurocontrol and the Commission.
My second point is that, in the Common Position, we have made hardly any real progress away from the status quo in terms of civil/military cooperation either. I know this is a highly sensitive issue, but we cannot wait a few decades more for people to be able to fly within Europe by a direct route from A to B.
Thirdly, it is a cause of anguish that there has been no European response to the desperate lack of air traffic controllers. This must be included in the regulatory package and – not least for safety reasons – should be tackled as soon as possible.
My group endorses the reintroduction of the amendments adopted by Parliament at first reading stage. No doubt we will have to have frank discussions with the Council in the Conciliation Committee.
Thanks are due not least to the rapporteurs for their good and cooperative approach to our work together."@en1
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