Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-01-14-Speech-2-024"
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"en.20030114.1.2-024"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, at times in this debate you get the impression that we have been building a European Union for only a short time and are addressing issues that actually ought to have been dealt with long ago.
It is inherent in the very concept of the internal market that freight and passenger transport should have an appeal that gains them acceptance. The national railway companies' actions in recent years have predominantly been characterised by the fact that they have continued to try to cordon off their markets, while at the same time coming to terms with the consistent and dramatic decline in their figures in the freight transport sector. The only way of putting freight transport back on track at all is to ensure, firstly, that cross-border journeys can operate more smoothly in the future and, secondly, that the market is opened up and competition introduced, so that those who wish to offer attractive freight transport services have the opportunity to do so, and – so far at least –it has usually not been the national rail companies that have done this.
When I hear people argue that liberalisation would mean job cuts then I only have one thing to say in reply: if the current trend continues there will not be any jobs in the rail freight sector at all, a result of the railways' conscious decision to neglect freight transport because it is not worth their while.
I can only say that those who are well intentioned towards the railways have to ensure that the rail systems are compatible across Europe, that the highest safety requirements are put in place and, in addition, they must ensure that the railways are customer-friendly, which means that they should be reliable, that they should have attractive services on offer and that they should stick to their timetables.
I can only hope that we and the Commissioner can push this through together in the Council. Measures in other areas – the Single European Sky to name but one example, when we wanted to have Europe designate airspace blocks in the future, because the national Member States had been failing to do so for decades – were repeatedly blocked by the Council, because they thought that all of this could be resolved bilaterally. I can only say that the Member States should have done it long ago, and now we are going to do it instead!"@en1
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