Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2012-04-19-Speech-4-011-000"
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"en.20120419.4.4-011-000"2
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"Mr President, the Commission recommends that Parliament give its consent to the new agreement for three reasons. Firstly, because – as the Minister said – the law enforcement authorities need PNR to address the security threats that the US is facing. Secondly, because this agreement is a major improvement to the existing agreement that is now running and which you asked me to renegotiate. Thirdly, because it is difficult to see any alternatives which would better serve the interests of EU passengers and air carriers.
In the context of the joint review and evaluation mechanism set out in Article 23 of the agreement, and without prejudice to other matters that might be raised in this mechanism, the Commission will seek detailed information and pay particular attention to the respect of the provisions of Article 4 of the agreement. More specifically, the Commission will review respect of the uses of PNR under Article 41 of the agreement and request information on any cases in which PNR has been used, either for the protection of vital interests of any individual or, where ordered by a court, under Article 4 (2) of the agreement.
The Commission commits to keeping Parliament fully informed of these and other aspects and to presenting a full report to Parliament and to the Council, as foreseen by Article 23 (3), without delay at the end of the first joint review and of other subsequent reviews. If, following the joint review, Parliament states in a resolution that there are serious deficiencies in the application of the agreement and calls for the suspension or the termination of the agreement, the Commission commits to considering Parliament’s political request with the utmost attention while deciding on whether to make a proposal, in full respect of the procedures and competences defined by Article 218 of the Treaty.
Having examined the scope, let me return to some other points. The agreement reduces the retention period for which PNR data may be stored by US authorities from 15 to 10 years for serious transnational crimes. Only for terrorist offences would the data be used for 15 years as under the existing agreement and – an important new element – PNR data will be depersonalised six months after it is sent by the carriers, making those data elements which can be linked to an individual passenger invisible.
There are also important safeguards on data provisions. In order to prevent illegal profiling, in particular, the agreement prohibits automated decisions affecting passengers. A human being must always take the final decision. New rules on data security are included to prevent data being lost or disclosed to the public. The agreement clarifies and strengthens passengers’ right to access, correct and, where relevant, delete the PNR data stored in the US databases. It also contains a detailed provision on administrative and judicial redress under US law. The rules on sharing onward transfers of PNR data have been tightened. This can happen only on a case-by-case basis, not in bulk, and only for the specific purposes of the agreement itself.
The agreement is very clear on the method by which PNR data can be transferred: all air carriers must transfer data by the ‘push’ method within two years. The aviation industry has assured the Commission that air carriers are prepared to make the necessary investment in that timeframe. ‘Pulling’ of data by the US authorities will not be entirely prohibited, but the conditions governing this are precisely defined and limited to exceptional cases. In the current agreement, ‘push’ is not the norm. Now it becomes the norm. ‘Pulling’ is very exceptional and its use will be logged and, of course, checked thoroughly by the Commission.
Finally, there are provisions to ensure that the agreement is correctly applied. Several bodies from within and outside the US Department of Homeland Security will have independent oversight over it. We will have regular joint reviews and a full evaluation after four years. In order to make this effective, there will be records and logs of processing of PNR data. There are also clear rules on the resolution of disputes between the EU and the US and on suspension and termination of the agreement.
I recognise that many Members still have questions and think this is a difficult decision. I fully respect that and am ready to respond to all your questions. This is an international agreement. Like all international agreements, it is not 100% perfect. We have to give and take. The Commission has presented to Parliament and the LIBE Committee a draft agreement from May. There you gave clear instructions on where to make changes. We went back to the US and achieved a lot of those changes: on purpose limitation, scope, retention periods and other points. We now have an agreement that fully respects EU law.
This brings me to my final point, on the absence of better alternatives. Further negotiations with the US are not a real option – so what will happen if you vote it down today? What will the consequences be? It would be damaging for the transatlantic relationship because this data will be collected anyway and we would lose a very important chance to influence US policy on the use of that data. Secondly, we would leave the air carriers in a very difficult situation because they will be required to transfer the data, but there would be no legal basis in the EU for this transfer. So this would leave us in legal limbo, with potential lawsuits by passengers and a very difficult situation. Finally, and most importantly, we would fail to protect the interests of the more than 48 million passengers flying from the EU to the US every year. In the absence of the agreement, there would be no binding international rules to protect the passengers’ privacy.
One cannot exclude the possibility that there will be bilateral agreements with the US between our Member States, but I do not believe that the Member States could bilaterally obtain a level of protection of passengers’ rights that goes beyond what we have achieved today. For all these reasons, I ask you to endorse the new agreement today.
With regard to the necessity of PNR data, the Commission has presented evidence to Members of the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) on several occasions. It shows that PNR data is important in fighting terrorism and a major tool in fighting drug and people trafficking. For example, PNR has played a pivotal role in cracking some recent cases of terrorism – the Mumbai plotter David Headley, the New York City subway plotter, the Times Square plotter – and we have all read about the atrocities that could have been perpetrated in these cases.
Secondly, this is a major improvement to the existing agreement from 2007. It is a clear step forward from the draft agreement that the Commission presented to the LIBE committee in May, where we asked your advice. In that regard we did a good collective job in pushing the US to make further concessions. This is a good example of how the new Treaty of Lisbon works: the three institutions working together with very clear signals from the European Parliament and the Council so that the Commission could be very clear in its negotiations with the Americans.
This good collective work brought more clarity, stronger reciprocity and a better protection of passengers’ rights to privacy, without undermining the effect of the PNR system and security on both sides of the Atlantic. It also reflects the concerns that you expressed in your resolution two years ago and respects fundamental rights and the principle of proportionality. Let me outline some details of this agreement.
The agreement, unlike the current one, is one single legally-binding text written in ‘proper treaty language’. It strengthens reciprocity and security on the EU side by obliging the US to share leads derived from PNR data with the law enforcement authorities in the EU. It sets strict limits on the purposes for which PNR data may be used. This is a concern for many Members, as I am aware, and I also heard the objections by the rapporteur. I would therefore like to read out the declaration on behalf of the Commission:
‘The Commission considers that the agreement sets forth a precise description of purpose and scope, clarifying the purposes for which PNR will be collected and used. The definition of terms and the detailed description of the uses of PNR in Article 4 ensure that the purpose limitation of the agreement is in line with relevant EU laws on the protection of personal data and privacy. The purposes for which PNR can be collected and used are limited to the prevention, detection, investigation and prosecution of terrorist offences and certain transnational crimes.’ The agreement provides, in Article 4 (1), the first detailed definition of the terms ‘terrorist offences’ and ‘transnational crimes’.
Article 4 (2) of the agreement allows for the potential use of PNR on a case- by-case basis for the protection of vital interests of any individual, or if ordered by a court. These uses are, both by their nature and in view of the experiences we had in the joint reviews, very exceptional. In Article 4 (3) the agreement clarifies how PNR may become relevant when passengers travel to or from the US. In this regard the agreement merely clarifies that PNR may, in accordance with its scope and purpose, be processed to identify persons who require further examination. This does not constitute a further purpose for the processing of PNR data.
Article 4 (4) explains that the agreement is without prejudice to domestic law enforcement, judicial powers or proceedings, where other violations of the law of indications are therefore detected in the course of the use and processing of PNR.
This provision aims to clarify that domestic powers are not affected by the agreement in cases where other offences are detected in the course of using PNR. This clarification does not affect or extend the purposes for the use of PNR."@en1
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