Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-01-13-Speech-2-307"
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"en.20040113.13.2-307"2
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"Madam President, like everyone else, I too can endorse the package that has been assembled as a compromise. I thank the rapporteur for the work he has done on this. The process for reaching a compromise has been very useful and speedy. However, like so many others, I endorse it with some reservations.
Over the last few years we have seen, at least in Western Europe, the levels of phosphate in drinking water fall by between 50% and 80%. It has dropped steadily since the 1980s. One of the biggest reasons for that has been the control of detergents. Now we are opting for even tougher laws, I hope. We are going to see them applied over a wider area, from Limerick – which Mrs Doyle knows very well – to new places such as Latvia, Nicosia and other parts of Central and Eastern Europe. We can expect that all the rivers that drain into the Baltic and the North Sea will become cleaner. There will be far fewer bubbles in the rivers of Europe than Europeans have in their baths.
These new measures, in terms of labelling of detergents and ensuring that they break down into safe components when they are discharged in the water, are not quite enough. This issue could quite simply be resolved and in many ways improved by the removal of phosphates from our laundry wash. This is something that we have not managed to do in this proposal. I believe that it is something that Parliament would like to see happen and something which we feel the Commission still has to address.
Something not mentioned by other colleagues is the continued use of animal tests to assess detergents. The practice cannot be accepted for much longer. The Commission must set out a clear timescale for the development of replacement tests. It is long overdue. The Commission appears to have missed its chance yet again. Nevertheless I, like everyone else, will support the compromise tomorrow."@en1
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