Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-07-06-Speech-2-064"
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"en.20100706.5.2-064"2
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"Mr President, I am really glad to be back in the plenary today on the occasion of this debate. I am especially happy that we have achieved, as the rapporteur and the President said, good cooperation between the three institutions for a text that I hope you will approve later this week.
Many of these changes are the direct results of discussions that I have had with the European Parliament rapporteurs – both of them, and I would like to thank them both – and other key members of the political groups. This is indeed an achievement of Europe: the Council, Parliament and the Commission.
Another important point here, which the President referred to, is that the Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme will help to make our lives safer. Member States have confirmed the enormous value of this information derived from the TFTP which the US authorities share with us.
We also know that since the start of this year, leads on known suspects have gone cold because EU-stored TFTP data have not been transferred to the US for the last six months. This has been a serious situation and I am relieved that we are now closing this security gap.
The London bombings took place exactly five years ago. This sad anniversary makes us remember the victims and their families and we wish that this tragedy had never happened and that it will never happen again. We must do our best to prevent future attacks and this agreement is one important tool in the fight to prevent horrible attacks like this one.
For all these reasons, I would ask you to give your consent to the agreement on Thursday. I am confident that most of you will share the opinion of the rapporteur and acknowledge the many important improvements that have been made in this agreement.
This has only been possible because of the close cooperation we have had: all the institutions, the rapporteur, the political group, the committee, and outside representatives of the group. I would like to thank all of you wholeheartedly.
I am very satisfied that the agreement we signed on 28 June gives us a new base and a new start for EU-US cooperation. I am delighted that the structures and the procedures have worked well – not without difficulty, but they have worked well – and it has allowed us in record time to negotiate an agreement which ensures good high-level protection of personal data, whilst maintaining a counter-terrorist programme that helps to save lives in Europe and in the US and beyond.
The agreement for which I ask your consent this week is considerably different from the interim agreement that you rejected in February. Let me just mention a few points.
It empowers a European public authority, namely Europol, to verify that each and every request is tailored as narrowly as possible in order to minimise the amount of data requested.
It takes account of Parliament’s call for a twin-track approach, holding out the prospect of an EU mechanism in the medium term allowing for extraction of data on European soil and for a more targeted transfer of data.
The rapporteur laid out the provisions that we will take. Immediately after the vote, I will begin a study to consider the possible introduction of a European system. This system will be the basis for a full impact assessment taking into account the legal, technical, economic and other aspects of a future European TFTP mechanism.
The agreement also includes significant data protection when it comes to transparency, rights of access, rectification, erasure and redress. It allows the Commission to appoint a person who will monitor the day-to-day extraction of data from the TFTP database and who will be empowered to query and even block searches. This person will be on the premises where the US analysts are working and will have full access to the TFTP searches to ensure permanent monitoring. This is a major achievement.
Moreover, the agreement empowers the EU to undertake regular and detailed reviews of the TFTP. The first such review will take place six months after the entry into force of the agreement. The review team will include data protection experts and an expert with a judicial background and they will be able to do random checks."@en1
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