Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-01-17-Speech-2-067"
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"en.20060117.6.2-067"2
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".
Mr President, I express my appreciation to the rapporteur, Mr El Khadraoui, for his extremely thorough work. The Committee on Transport and Tourism accepted his report as an appropriate compromise. Therefore, on behalf of myself and the Group of the European People’s Party (Christian Democrats) and European Democrats, I would like to express the opinion that the report basically corresponds with the position of Parliament.
In laying down the general principles, we have correctly emphasised that when, in accordance with the ruling of the Court, an issue falls within the competence of the Community, any type of discrimination between partners within the Community must be pragmatically excluded, on the one hand, and ‘open sky’ agreements should be concluded, to the extent that it is possible, on the other hand. Existing bilateral agreements can now be harmonised using this dual approach.
At the same time, it still remains to be decided how we are going to divide between Member States the number of flights that will now be negotiated with foreign partners, in cases when the number of flights is limited. The Commission will soon have to submit a concrete paper on this sensitive issue to Parliament.
In addition to this, I believe that another important principle is found in the approach of the Commission and Parliament, which emphasises the necessity of increased technical harmonisation with external partners. This is how we can primarily help maintain flight safety, the cornerstone of our foreign policy, and this is how we can indirectly facilitate the implementation of environmental and competition priorities.
However, I do not agree with ideas of extending European or mainly Member State social rights to agreements concluded with third countries, and to aircraft flying under the flags of other nations. Let them comply with the provisions of the internationally applicable labour law and safety and competition standards. Anything more than this even within the European Union would only increase the unnecessary publicity campaign against new Member States, under the pretext of the non-existent social dumping.
I also reject the taxation of air transport for reasons of environmental protection, since on the one hand there is no compulsory international regulation in this respect, and on the other hand, this competitive sector must finance itself, including airports, from its own revenues. The best environmental protection is to ensure the development of technical safety, not to impose new tax burdens. We have only accepted the inclusion of air transport in the Emission Trading Scheme as part of the compromise, but direct taxation is out of the question.
As a Member coming from a new Member State, it is particularly important to me that neighbouring regions, the Balkans and large market partners such as China, the USA and Russia enjoy priority. Finally, I would like to say that in order to ensure transparency of negotiations, Parliament should be continuously involved in the negotiation rounds."@en1
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