Inés Ayala Sender, rapporteur. – (ES) Mr President, I shall begin with a long list of acknowledgments. I must first of all thank the Commission for having submitted a document that provides us with an urgently needed instrument. I must therefore thank the Commission, as represented here by Vice-President Tajani, for having done us this favour of giving us an instrument that today, in 2008, is absolutely necessary after a really poor 2007, in terms of the progress in road safety that had been made before then. It is particularly necessary since we are now very close to the deadline – which is just two years away – for fulfilling the commitment and meeting the target set by all the European Union Member States of reducing road deaths by half. I therefore thank the Commission for that.

My thanks also go to the French Presidency (even though they have just left this Chamber), because I believe they convinced us, through their efforts and tenacity, that it was possible to make progress with this dossier. It proved to be complicated at the beginning because of its implications, but they convinced us that it was worthwhile.

I have to say, however, that subsequently, bearing in mind that there were other more important dossiers, we did have some problems when it came to understanding the motives of the Legal Service. We thought that it should always help the presidencies-in-office to advance their priorities and objectives, but in this case we found instead that it was of little use to us.

At one point, the Justice and Home Affairs Council put forward some conclusions with the best of intentions, but they did not help us maintain the strict approach that this text or instrument that we were working on was strictly a road safety instrument designed to prevent road traffic problems and accidents and driver impunity.

Lastly, I give special, warm thanks to the shadow rapporteurs, particularly Mrs Fouré, who worked alongside me in the sense that we made a good team at improving this text, as well as the rest of my fellow committee members, Mr Cocilovo, Mrs Lichtenberger and my other colleagues. I think together we have finally succeeded in moulding a better text.

I believe we have succeeded in rounding off the procedure or system in those areas where certain issues were missing, such as getting subsequent administrative offences once the information has been exchanged and notification made. In the case of those Member States where these offences are administrative in nature, a complementary procedure was lacking, and I think we have at least proposed a possible solution.

It is also significant that we have enhanced the controls. We are aware that we do not normally have a chance to enhance controls in matters of road safety, and in this case the Commission helped us.

It was also necessary to guarantee personal data protection, to recognise the work done by victim support groups, and to explain how this system should affect motorists.

We therefore do not understand why the Council has decided to stick to a position and a legal basis that does not help us in any way at all. Instead, it blocks any possible way forward. I must point out in this respect that we in Parliament and the Commission are convinced that the right basis is a road safety basis, and that this is an important first step towards improving precisely this area, which all of Europe’s citizens are hoping will be improved. It must therefore remain a third pillar subject. The third pillar is about to expire, however, since the Treaty of Lisbon (ratified by the Member States, which are now dragging their feet in the Council) aims to eliminate the third pillar. Some of them now see it as something to brandish to stop this text progressing.

We hope and trust that the problems caused by the legal basis will be resolved. (The people will not understand when we explain to them why we cannot give them a basic instrument to improve road safety and prevent the impunity of those non-resident drivers who drive across our countries and break the law because they feel they cannot be punished.) We really cannot understand how those problems can continue. Hence we call on the forthcoming Czech Presidency to put aside its reservations and take a step forwards for the sake of road safety.