Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-03-31-Speech-3-246"
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"en.20040331.9.3-246"2
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".
Madam President, I wish to begin by making it clear that I have inherited my knowledge on this subject from my colleague, Mr Fischler, who, unfortunately, cannot be here today. However, I will gladly take on board what has been said and try to address as far as possible the arguments put forward in this debate.
Firstly, I shall try to clarify the Commission's position concerning the amendments that have been tabled. First of all on Amendment No 1: the financial compensation of the agreement is one single compensation, which corresponds to access to the waters, as well as compensation for the impact caused by the activity of European Union vessels in third-country waters. The fact that the third country in the framework of a fisheries sector dialogue accepts to commit a part of the financial compensation to activities in support of a reform of its own fisheries policy, does not constitute an argument for a differentiation in two different financial envelopes. The approach of differentiating financial compensation would result in the refusal of the third country to commit itself to reform its fisheries policy. Therefore the Commission cannot accept Amendment No 1.
On Amendment No 2, which, to a certain extent – if I have understood you correctly – is connected with Amendment No 5, considering the fact that the Commission is responsible for the sound financial management of the Community funds, Amendment No 2 cannot be accepted. Indeed, the budgetary authority must give the Commission the means and the legal basis to ensure the sound financial management of this agreement. Despite some transfers made in 2003 by the quota-holding Member States, experience shows that these have not been sufficient to ensure the optimum utilisation of the fishing possibilities and thus sound financial management. With respect to the argument put forward, how can we guarantee that the principle of relative stability and Article 20(5) of the basic regulation are adhered to? I would like to underline that the temporary transfer of fishing possibilities from one Member State to another by the Commission is
contrary to the principle of relative stability, because, in accordance with Article 20(1) of Council Regulation (EC) No 2371/2002 on the allocation of fishing possibilities among Member States, such a transfer will not have an effect on the allocation of fishing possibilities between the Member States in Greenland waters in the future.
The allocation continues – and will continue – to be ruled, on the basis of the distribution keys, as before. The Member States that benefit from a temporary transfer cannot exploit the catches made for the changing of the basis of the allocation for the future. The determination of the fishing possibilities is made on the basis of scientific reports. One innovation of this agreement is precisely that all quotas are now subject to an annual revision, if scientific advice so requests.
Also, I cannot accept the idea that with this mechanism we are creating a precedent. The transfer clause exists and is implemented in all other third-country agreements with financial compensation, without any problem. The only agreement that does not have this kind of article is precisely the Greenland agreement. That is the situation we want to change now.
I want to say that in 2003 the commercial value of the catches, including the real catches of the transfers made to Norway, Iceland and the Faroes amounted to EUR 50 million. Compared to the current financial compensation of EUR 42.82 million, this is not satisfactory. In an agreement with financial compensation, it is unacceptable that the Commission does not have the means to ensure that Community funds are not wasted. Having said that, the Commission welcomes the last amendment – Amendment No 5. We are responsible for ensuring the sound financial management of Community funds. Amendment No 5 shows the willingness of the budgetary authority to provide the Commission with the legal basis to ensure such a ground management without prejudice to relative stability, as I have said before.
On Amendment No 3, we agree with the spirit thereof, but we believe that the Commission already complies with the transmission of this kind of information in line with both the current interinstitutional arrangements and, in particular, with the framework agreement between the Commission and the European Parliament. Therefore, Amendment No 3 is not necessary.
Finally, we cannot accept Amendment No 4. I recall in this respect the established principle regarding the nature of a protocol to a fisheries agreement. In light of the fact that this is an annex to the framework agreement, its periodic renewal does not require a new mandate."@en1
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