Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-05-09-Speech-3-175"
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"en.20070509.17.3-175"2
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".
Madam President, Commissioner, Mr President-in-Office, ladies and gentlemen, I believe that the piece of legislation that we are debating today is very important, because the reason why this directive was created in the past was of course to open up the market for goods.
Opening up the market and producing nominal quantities have now been replaced by consumer protection. How we deal with this proposal is therefore extremely important and that is why the European Parliament has stated clearly that simply doing away with all of the regulations in this sector could lead to difficulties, particularly for people with disabilities, especially the partially sighted. If we look round large supermarkets, for example, we note that prices are not always displayed as clearly as they might be.
For Parliament, it is of great importance to appeal to the Member States and say that it is not enough to display prices in units of litres or kilograms in the large supermarkets, but that it would also be appropriate to introduce this pricing method in other outlets. They should identify ways of achieving this, as it is particularly important for vulnerable customers. It was very important for us to make this appeal and it is good that it has been heard.
The second point that is particularly close to our hearts as social democrats has just been mentioned by my fellow Member, Mr Harbour. It concerns loaves of bread in the United Kingdom. At no stage have either the Commission, the Council or the European Parliament wanted to call into question these packaging sizes, but the debate in the United Kingdom has taken on a life of its own. To make this clear to the people of the United Kingdom it was important to include a corresponding recital in this legislation, so that we really could ensure – and British Members, in particular from the Labour Party, have asked me to stress this once more – that bread in the United Kingdom will not be affected in any shape or form, but that it will continue to be able to be sold in the forms that the British public is used to.
A third issue in this context concerned the fact that we wanted to ensure that these nominal quantities would not be abolished automatically after a certain time, but that the European Commission would assess the consequences and the possibilities beforehand and would consider by means of an impact assessment whether this was appropriate, what consequences could arise as a result and how we might respond to any disruption of the market. The detergent market has provided us with an example of what happens when there are no nominal quantities, and in that case we could consider what action might be taken."@en1
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