Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-06-18-Speech-3-392"
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"en.20080618.28.3-392"2
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"Mr President, I would like to begin by thanking the rapporteur for his work and for his tireless willingness to discuss the matter at hand.
The proposed directive on the inland transport of dangerous goods integrates international rules for the transport of dangerous goods into Community law and extends their application to national transport. It updates the existing four Directives and four Commission Decisions on the transport of dangerous goods and merges them into one simplified piece of legislation. It is a welcome example of a European law which genuinely reduces red tape and embodies the principle of better law-making.
Regulation of the transport of dangerous goods is important for our transport system. The total amount of dangerous goods transported in the Union is about 110 billion tonne-km/year, and safe transportation of these goods is essential, on both traffic safety and environmental grounds. The provisions ensure a high level of safety in international and national transport through the application of harmonised rules, which will have a positive effect on the internal market in transport. At the same time, uniform rules make things easier for transport operators and thus improve intermodality. Multimodal transport processes are encouraged.
What is particularly welcome, from my perspective, is the expansion of the scope to include inland shipping. In future, uniform safety provisions will apply to all the inland waterways in the EU. This will improve working conditions on board and enhance transport safety. It will also offer benefits in terms of environmental protection and reduce costs. This is likely to improve the opportunities and market prospects for inland shipping, which in turn will ease the burden on our roads and, again, help to protect the environment.
The Council’s common position, which was adopted without amendments by the Committee on Transport and Tourism, contains two amendments to Parliament’s position at first reading. Firstly, the common position introduces a provision which allows Member States to regulate or prohibit strictly for reasons other than safety during transport the transport of dangerous goods within their territory. This provision is purely declaratory in nature and is included for the purpose of clarification. We had various discussions about it.
Secondly, the common position provides for financial support from the Commission to the Member States for the translation of the ADR (European Agreement concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Road), RID (Regulations concerning International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail) and ADN (European Agreement concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Inland Waterways) and their amendments into their respective official languages. I must admit that I was initially sceptical about this amendment. The European Commission has assured me, however, that this approach is essential in order to ensure the quality of the translations and thus facilitate proper implementation of the provisions. It is also cheaper, incidentally.
In short, then, all the amendments are acceptable from our point of view, which means that we can now finally bring this important and generally non-contentious matter to a conclusion."@en1
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