Fuldstændigt Forhandlingsreferat

Onsdag den 14. december 2016 - Strasbourg

9.12. Adgang til markedet for havnetjenester og finansiel gennemsigtighed for havne (A8-0023/2016 - Knut Fleckenstein) (afstemning)

– Am Ende der Abstimmung:

  Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis, Member of the Commission. – Mr President, honourable Members, first of all I wish to thank Parliament, its rapporteur Mr Fleckenstein, as well as the shadow rapporteurs in the Committee on Transport and Tourism, for the important work that they have accomplished. The Commission welcomes the agreement reached in the trilogues.

Maritime ports are vital for the European economy, for an efficient internal market and to connect Europe to the world. With their logistic and industrial activities, maritime ports provide employment to three million Europeans. They are also critical for development of short-sea shipping as an alternative to road transport as part of our strategy to decarbonise transport. This is why maritime ports are extremely valuable assets ...

  President. – Commissioner, the United Kingdom Independence Party has no English interpretation, therefore they are protesting.

  Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis, Member of the Commission. – That is what we will achieve with the Regulation discussed today, and that is why the Commission considers this file as a priority under its work programme for 2016. First, the Regulation will ensure greater transparency for the use of public funds in ports. Many receive considerable financial support ...

(The President asked the speaker to pause while technical checks were made to the sound system)

  Der Präsident. – Herr Kommissar! Wir haben ein Problem. Gehen Sie mal auf Kanal 0, vielleicht können Sie dann etwas verstehen.

For the english translation – channel 0.

Versuchen Sie es noch einmal.

Herr Kommissar, warten Sie mal. Der Herr Kollege hat ein Problem.

  James Carver (EFDD). – Mr President, I know that this is your last day, and you and I have crossed swords on a number of occasions, but I must say that I am disappointed that you had to make a political joke out of a disability. My colleague, Mr Agnew, is hard of hearing and he does rely on his earphones. I felt it necessary to point out that the Commissioner is speaking English, but obviously Mr Agnew has a need to use earphones. I think it is disappointing and I would expect better in the European Parliament.

  Der Präsident. – Okay! Bitte, Herr Kommissar!

  Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis, Member of the Commission. – Further regulation will ensure greater transparency for the use of public funds in ports. Many receive considerable financial support from both national and European Union budgets. Transparency will contribute to a genuine level playing field between European ports. It will also help make public funding more efficient. The Court of Auditors stressed the necessity to address this issue in a recent report.

Second, the regulation creates a common framework for the provision of port services. This framework brings legal stability for the tendering of port services. It will end today’s unclear situation where ports policy is not decided by EU legislation, but rather by judgment of the European Court of Justice on a case by case basis.

Third, it will ensure better training of port workers in line with the work undertaken by the social partners. Finally, the regulation will contribute to our decarbonisation strategy. We need to green the shipping industry and promote short-sea shipping. This requires investment and the right type of investment in ports.

Many of you attach great importance to clear and simple state aid rules. The Commission shares its attachment. We have been working a lot on the issue of state aid in ports over the last months. My colleague Commissioner Vestager and I are making sure that the views of European ports are adequately taken into account.

Replying last week to a preliminary question from Mr Fleckenstein, the Commission clarified the framework for state aid in ports, including the general block exemption regulation. The situation is as follows: a new set of infrastructure analytical grids was published on 2 December. With this document, the Commission explains which infrastructures are considered to be non-economic and therefore should not fall under state aid rules. These infrastructures include defence infrastructure, such as docks, and access infrastructure to ports, such as a river flowing through a port that can be used by anyone.

Last week, the Commission also completed its second public consultation on the general block exemption regulation. Its objective is to identify which public investments in port infrastructure are considered state aid but are unproblematic and therefore do not need to be notified. We are now analysing the replies to improve the text further and adopt the regulation in 2017.

The result of the analytical grids and the revised general block exemption regulation will be more legal certainty and more clarity, but there will be no change in the decision-making practice of the Commission. With this work, we are doing exactly what you have been calling for under Recital 45 of the Port Services Regulation. However, for institutional reasons and to recall the better law—making principles agreed between the Commission and the co—legislators, we will record a statement from the Commission to be inserted regarding this recital.

The text is balanced. It is the result of three years of discussions with all stakeholders. All major organisations representing the European port sector stand behind it – the trade unions, port authorities, port terminal operators and port services providers. It received strong support in the Transport Committee and was accepted unanimously by Member States. It is now time to conclude the legislative procedure at first reading. All the circumstances allow it.

(Loud applause and cheers from certain quarters)

  Der Präsident. – Vielen Dank, Herr Kommissar, für die Aufklärungen. Mein Eindruck war, dass das sicher eher für die Debatte vorgesehen war. Sollte die Kommission bei weiteren Abstimmungen noch ausführliche Deklarationen haben, empfehle ich, dass wir die dem Protokoll hinzufügen.

Das ändert nichts an der Tatsache, dass das, was Herr Andriukaitis gerade vorgetragen hat, ein sehr, sehr weitreichender Vorgang und Beschluss ist, den wir hier gefasst haben. Aber parlamentarische Arbeit ist ja für Sie sekundär.

  Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis, Member of the Commission, in writing. –

Commission statement on recital 45 of the compromise agreement reached by the co-legislators on the Proposal for a Regulation establishing a framework on market access to port services and financial transparency of ports

The Commission considers that recital 45 should not have been included for the following reasons.

First, the recital does not relate to any of the enacting terms of the regulation and hence does not comply with the principles of the Interinstitutional Agreement on Better Law-Making. In that agreement, the European Parliament, the Council of the European Union and the European Commission confirmed that they remain fully committed to the Interinstitutional agreement on common guidelines for the quality of drafting of Community legislation, which provides that the purpose of recitals is to set out concise reasons for the chief provisions of the enacting terms, without reproducing or paraphrasing them, and that recitals should not contain normative provisions or political exhortations.

Second, the Commission recalls that the notion of State aid within the meaning of Article 107(1) TFEU is an objective one, enshrined in the Treaty and not at the disposal of the Union legislator. It can only be applied as such by the Commission or national courts in specific cases, subject to the control of the Union courts.

Third, the wording of the recital may create confusion. Having regard to the Treaty notion of State aid, it cannot be claimed that public funding of all access and defence infrastructure accessible to all users on equal and non-discriminatory terms always falls outside the scope of the State aid rules. The Commission’s decisional practice shows, for instance, that public funding of certain access infrastructure located within the area of a port may constitute State aid.