Wolf Klinz, rapporteur. – (DE) Mr President, first of all, I agree with the Commissioner that this is indeed not the end of the story. We now need to get started on implementation, and one reason why we have set relatively tight deadlines for Parliament and for the Council is that we want to ensure that we do not have to wait too long for implementation. We need to keep up the pace, because we can see that the markets are changing at a tremendous pace, and if we are constantly lagging behind we will not be able to achieve our targets fully, or perhaps not at all.

Today’s debate has shown that we have broad cross-party support for the compromise we have negotiated here. I acknowledge that Mrs Lulling sees things a bit differently in this respect, but I am reasonably confident that the future will show that her concern that Luxembourg’s position as one of Europe’s central investment fund centres could be damaged will prove to be unfounded, and that, on the contrary, this new UCITS directive could also provide opportunities for this financial centre.

Mrs Berès is absolutely right: what this is really about is finally creating a real internal market in the investment funds sector. This sector is an example of the fact that, though we talk about the internal market, in many cases we do not yet have one. That is crucial. No one disputes that it will lead to a completely new and very ambitious level of cooperation, including between the supervisory bodies, but we need to achieve that in any case. In other fields, too, the supervisory bodies need to work more closely and more constructively together, and trust each other more, than they have in the past. If the UCITS directive can give a gentle nudge to encourage that, then in my opinion that is all to the good.

The Level 2 measures to which the Commissioner referred are legion, and need to be dealt with within a short time; that much is true, but we all have an interest in ensuring that this does happen.

That, however, is not the end of things: the industry itself also needs to do its own homework. The Commission, and we here in Parliament too, have deliberately chosen not to raise the issue of fund processing at all, because we are working on the assumption that the industry will keep its promise to deal with this matter on its own, without legislative pressure. It has been working on this for quite some time now, and we still have nothing concrete to show for it. I hope that it will soon be able to put something on the table, otherwise we will have no choice but to take further action in the foreseeable future.

In conclusion, I would like to thank not only the Commission but also, and in particular, the Council for their cooperation and for their active support. I am also grateful to all the representatives of the other groups, particularly Mrs Berès, Mrs Gottardi, Mr Gauzès, and also Mrs Lulling, who, as we have seen again today, defended her interests valiantly but was still perfectly willing to compromise where possible. Thank you very much.