Erik Meijer, on behalf of the GUE/NGL Group. – (NL) Mr President, the three reports presented again at third reading as the third railway package are concerned with a variety of very different issues. The most pressing of these issues is the need for train drivers to be able to stay at the controls when crossing national borders rather than having to hand over to their foreign colleagues. From the point of view of train crews all three versions had room for improvement. But my Group is happy with the compromises reached by the rapporteur, Mr Savary, and we shall support version three in the vote.

On passengers' rights in international rail transport, we have let an opportunity slip. One area in which the European Union can do something useful is offering maximum safeguards for international rail passengers against the negative effects of competition, unnecessary fragmentation amongst rail operators and national short-sightedness. The European Commission put forward a good proposal to provide a good long-distance service, as before, in respect of ticket sales and information. Due to competition and cost-cutting that service is increasingly restricted to individual Member States and their immediate environs. Germany alone has a good system here and all other railway undertakings would do well to emulate its example.

At Mr Sterckx’s instigation a majority of the House has markedly shifted the emphasis elsewhere. Far more attention is now being paid to compensation for delays in domestic rail services and far less to the steady deterioration in international services. In reply to passengers who complain that they waste time unnecessarily because they have to buy another ticket once they have crossed the border, the Commission says that it came up with a good proposal but that the European Parliament blocked it. Because there is no better alternative at the moment, and because we approve other parts of these proposals, we shall vote in favour of this end result. We shall continue to press for the improvements which formed the nucleus of the original proposal and which, sadly, are missing.

For my Group, the third part remains the most controversial. Not only now, but also in the two earlier railway packages Mr Jarzembowski has advocated more competition and the operation of market forces. That starts with international freight transport, but ultimately encompasses all rail traffic including domestic passenger traffic. This means that the poorer working conditions in freight transport by road and air also become the norm in rail transport. My Group thinks it should have been the other way round, leading to better safeguards in and regulation of road and air transport. We do not agree that competition is a better answer than good cooperation between national railway undertakings to the problems in international freight transport or even passenger transport. And we shall not be voting for these proposals in the third reading.