Verbatim report of proceedings

Wednesday, 16 November 2005 - Strasbourg

20. Humane trapping standards

  President. The next item is the report (A6-0304/2005) by Mrs Scheele, on behalf of the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, on the proposal for a directive of the European Parliament and of the Council introducing humane trapping standards for certain animal species (COM(2004)0532 C6-0100/2005 2004/0183(COD)).

  Stavros Dimas, Μember of the Commission. (EL) Mr President, I should like to start by congratulating the rapporteur on her very honest and assiduous work and I should like to say that the proposal for a directive being debated is designed to introduce standards to safeguard relatively humane trapping conditions for the animals trapped.

This proposal is dictated by the obligation for the European Community to give international commitments to Canada, Russia and the United States. These international commitments and obligations derive from the agreement on international humane trapping standards signed in 1998 between the European Community, Canada and the Russian Federation and from another agreement of similar content signed between the European Community and the United States in the form of agreed practices.

The agreement with Canada and Russia, which has already been ratified by the European Community and Canada, will enter into force immediately after its imminent ratification by Russia, a procedure which, according to the Commission's official information, has already been set in motion. Consequently, unless the relevant Community legislation is adopted, the European Community will not be in a position to honour its international commitments when the agreement enters into force.

The scope of the proposed directive is truly restricted. Nonetheless, if it is adopted, it will provide a framework for the adoption of common standards in the European Union in order to limit unnecessary suffering and distress for the animals trapped. The proposed standards are based on the results of serious scientific work within the framework of the International Organisation for Standardisation and, more importantly, have been adopted by the World Conservation Union.

The proposal also makes provision for the Member States to be able to maintain in force and apply stricter national provisions. Furthermore, the draft directive adds to and does not subtract from existing standards on the basis of current Community legislation. For example, the ban in the European Union on the use of leghold traps based on Council Regulation 3254/91 will continue to apply even after the new directive is adopted.

I must emphasise that, during the course of the procedure, we are willing to examine the relevant amendments in order to take account of the concerns expressed by various political groups and numerous animal welfare organisations and the Commission intends to continue to work in this direction.

The rejection of the proposal will mean that the European Union will be left without any trapping standards in the immediate future and that the European Community will be unable to honour its international obligations.

To close, I should like to stress that I shall take account of Parliament's opinion and I shall evaluate the positions formulated both in Parliament and in the Council. On this basis, the Commission will decide on possible action, including the possible withdrawal of the proposal. At the same time, the Commission is planning to prepare a study with a view to updating the scientific basis for any proposal on the adoption of trapping standards. The relevant consultations with the interested parties will, of course, also be included.

Finally, I should like to express my wish to maintain good cooperation with you in the future.

  Karin Scheele (PSE), rapporteur. – (DE) Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, after a very tense debate on chemicals policy, it is a great relief to get back to considering a topic on which there has already been a very broad majority in the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, and on which I assume there will be one tomorrow as well.

As Commissioner Dimas said, the Commission proposal of 2004 is the instrument whereby the international agreement is to be implemented. My proposal that it be rejected was adopted virtually unanimously by the Environment Committee, with 47 votes in favour, 3 against and 2 abstentions. I will now proceed to explain why mine was one of the votes against.

As the proposal is covered by the chapter on environmental policy, the European Union is obliged to take the latest scientific knowledge as the basis for the legislative proposal. Such a basis is absent; all that has been done is to incorporate, almost word for word, the agreement negotiated ten years ago. There are also legal incongruities between the proposal and other EU legislation, including, for example, the directive on the protection of animals used for experimental purposes and the habitats directive. The Commission proposal would allow the trapping and killing of animals protected by the habitats directive. There are, as we all know, certain circumstances under which trapping methods and traps may be necessary, but we stated from the very outset that it was inappropriate to describe the directive as laying down humane trapping standards. The proposal is very weak and will do nothing to reduce the suffering of animals caught or killed by means of traps.

The Commissioner has himself made clear, and I do myself believe, that we have to recapitulate a certain amount of history if the firm rejection by Parliament is to be understood. It was in 1989 that Parliament adopted a resolution calling for a ban on the use of leghold traps in the European Union and on the import of furs and fur products from countries in which they were used. By way of a response to this, a regulation on this subject was adopted in 1991, which prohibited, with effect from 1995, the use of leghold traps and the import of the furs of thirteen named species from third countries. This ban does not apply where one of the two conditions is complied with. That is also the reason for this international agreement. Suitable legislation or administrative regulations are in force to prohibit leghold traps except where the methods used to catch the animals listed meet internationally agreed humane trapping standards.

This EU regulation would make it a matter of the utmost necessity that trapping standards be established at international level in order to obviate a ban on imports. It was threats on the part of the USA and Canada to contest these import restrictions before the WTO that resulted in the negotiation of an agreement between the EU, Canada, Russia and the USA, which only the EU and Canada have so far ratified. The trapping standards prescribed in the agreement reflect norms already in force in Russia, Canada and the USA and can in no way be categorised as humane. It was as long ago as 1997 that the European Parliament adopted a report that described the international agreement as wholly inadequate in terms of either animal welfare or the environmental objective and expressed the view that it was wholly unacceptable that the European Union should sign up to it. An agreement offering not even the most minimal guarantee that the other parties would abandon the use of leghold traps within a speedy and specific timetable is not one that should even be put forward for serious consideration. This House adopted this report by a large majority in 1997.

So much for the historical review. I hope we will, tomorrow, get a broad majority for the rejection of what I regard as a very poor proposal from the Commission, and also that the Commission will demonstrate that it has some grasp of what democracy is and will withdraw it.

  Horst Schnellhardt, on behalf of the PPE-DE Group. – (DE) Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, let me start by thanking the rapporteur, Mrs Scheele, for the cooperation in the drawing up of the report we are considering today, which was very fair, indeed positively agreeable, even though we were not of one mind on every issue. We did, though, eventually agree, and so I can say, quite simply, that there are many roads that lead to Rome.

This item on its order of business is characteristic of what makes the European Parliament peculiar. We are concerning ourselves with the transposition of an international agreement between Canada, the USA, Russia and the EU, even though this agreement was – as the rapporteur said – rejected in 1998. Only in the European Parliament can such a thing happen.

Speaking personally, I do not find this situation so problematic, having, at that time, voted in favour of the agreement or, to put it another way, against its rejection, because I was confident that the participating countries actually would maintain the standards required, and because I was keen that these countries’ indigenous peoples should not lose their livelihood and should be able to live from trading in skins and pelts.

That is certainly defensible on the grounds that trade was freed up, but something else that was achieved – and this was another reason why I voted in favour at the time – namely that cruel traps that tormented animals were banned, some of which, leghold traps, for example, were no more than instruments of torture. What made this achievement possible was years of pressure exerted by the European Parliament, by the Commission, and also by the animal welfare organisations.

The Commission directive that we have before us today contains all the measures of the agreement that facilitate trade, by which I mean primarily the import of animal skins and furs into the European Union. It is for this reason that we believe that its implementation would have an impact on the internal market and should therefore be subject to Article 95 as its legal basis. The fact that this is not the case is another reason for us to vote against this report.

Even though my amendments did not attract the support of a majority in this House, I should nonetheless like to bring them to the Commission’s attention. It may be that the time is not ripe for certain regulations. I proposed that these Commission proposals should find their way into a regulation calling on the Member States to transpose the agreement, and consequently committing them to all that it would entail – reporting and so on – as well. I regard this as the right approach.

I also agree with the rapporteur that we need to make improvements to the parameters and also require research, but this is not a task for the European Union, but rather for the Member States, where conditions vary so widely that due regard must be had to subsidiarity. That is why we have rejected the Commission proposal.

  Dorette Corbey, on behalf of the PSE Group. – (NL) Mr President, I will do my best. Today – or rather tomorrow, in fact – we face a very tricky decision. We will be voting in favour of rejecting the Commission proposal, but I, for one, will do so reluctantly. We in this Parliament have a duty to contribute to the legislative process and we will be rejecting the proposal tomorrow without giving an indication as to how things should be done instead. That is, to my mind, a missed opportunity. It appears that all parties had grievances. Some thought the proposal was going too far, while others felt it did not go anything like far enough.

We ought, though, to decide one way or another. The Commission would also have something to use as a basis if it tables a fresh proposal to implement the international treaty. I must, of course, also say a word about the muskrats. Needless to say, the Dutch dikes must be protected. We cannot promote animal welfare that is at the expense of our safety. I am not all that keen on drowning sets, though, and I would urge you as yet to review the trapping of muskrats and the methods used for it.

To my mind, the following conditions must certainly be met before drowning sets can be installed. First of all, we must have reached plague proportions and, with it, damage to the dikes. This damage is evident in a number of locations in the Netherlands, namely in Frisia and South Holland, but in Brabant, this damage is far less pronounced. The second condition is that the drowning set is only to be used if prevention has proved ineffective or is impossible to implement, and the third condition is if no animal-friendly alternatives are available. Whilst it is disappointing that Europe will not table a workable directive in the short term, it is not the end of the debate.

Neither should this, to my mind, spell the painful end of muskrats. For the time being, it is up to the Member States to take their own measures. I would therefore urge you to thrash out alternatives and reduce the animal suffering to a minimum. Rejecting this directive should not be an excuse in the Netherlands not to enter into the debate of muskrat control, and while I am on the subject, I should like to thank Mrs Scheele for triggering an enormous discussion, which we would not have had without her amendment. So let us therefore see the present situation in a positive light and do something that this House has not yet done by seizing the chance to make prevention a priority, developing the necessary alternatives, so that the Netherlands can make an important contribution to a fresh legislative proposal.

  Jules Maaten, on behalf of the ALDE Group. – (NL) Mr President, my group supports Mrs Scheele’s proposal to reject the Commission proposal. I think that she has demonstrated beyond doubt that this is an example of bad legislation. For example, the drafting of standards which traps must meet has not been underpinned by sound scientific research. The criteria to be met by traps and tests for the same are arbitrary. It is, of course, difficult to measure the suffering of animals. Where does stress end and the battle for life begin?

Moreover, especially in the catch involving live traps, the proposal does not cover the humanity of alternative methods that might have to be used to kill the animals. Animals often drown in a different way, are clubbed to death or kill each other. There is inconsistency between this proposal and the Habitat Directive. Certain animal species that are protected under the Habitat Directive – I would particularly mention the ban on catching and killing such wild animals as the otter, beaver, wolf and lynx – are also listed in the annex to the proposal on humane trapping methods. What are we to make of this? Other animals too that fall within the scope of this proposal, including the marten and the badger, are protected or preserved in certain areas.

In connection with this directive, I too cannot help but briefly mention a typically Dutch safety issue, namely the protection of its low lands from flooding by dike breaches. On account of its way of life, the muskrat undermines dikes, which forms a real threat to safety and public health in the Netherlands. While that animal is a foreign species and should, of course, be controlled in the most humane way possible, there is at the moment no useable and more humane method of control that is as effective as the drowning set. A ban on the drowning set – and I can imagine that the proposal will at some point return to such a ban – makes the effective control of muskrats impossible. Dutch safety and public health would be at risk as a result.

On behalf of the muskrat, we must also find more humane trapping methods that can be used, but until such time as suitable alternatives are found, I think a clear exemption position for the Netherlands or for a situation in which safety is at risk, would be welcomed.

I would like to finish off with a comment of a more general nature. In the European Union, we are indulging in animal protection à la carte. A great deal is happening in the area of, for example, cutting down on animal tests. The cosmetics directive or REACH is a case in point. We also do something about international animal transports. This is all very important but also highly arbitrary. We have to ask ourselves what Europe would like to do, or indeed has to do, in the area of animal protection.

Do we want a ban on collecting lapwings’ eggs in the Netherlands, or bull fighting in Spain or the fattening of French geese for foie gras, because those customs are animal-unfriendly or are they national matters to which Europe’s interference does not add any value? It would not be a bad idea for us in this House and in the EU to think about what we do and do not want to do in the area of animal protection, rather than indulging in protection à la carte at random.

  Marie Anne Isler Béguin, on behalf of the Verts/ALE Group. – (FR) Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I would also like to congratulate our rapporteur on the perceptiveness she has shown in this matter, and we fully support her proposal to reject the Commission proposal. We can also endorse her arguments. Nevertheless, I would like to stress a few points.

First of all, Commissioner, I would like to say that I very much appreciate the preparations you have made in terms of following up this project, in view of the European Parliament’s position. I would like to stress how inconsistent the Commission’s management of this issue of humane trapping has been. We must remember that, in 1998, the European Parliament rejected the conclusion of tripartite agreements with Russia, Canada and the United States, because it felt that they were not ambitious enough to be effective. Unlike today’s events, though, the vote in 1998 was of no consequence, because the Council could have concluded the agreements even against Parliament’s wishes. This time, however, the Commission has proposed a European directive to implement those same agreements, in other words a project that does not achieve the objectives it has set itself. So why, under such circumstances, would Parliament accept such a weak proposal? That is our question to the Commission.

With regard to the content, too, we find this proposal unacceptable. Not only has it been criticised by scientists, as my fellow Members have already said, and by animal welfare organisations, but it also does nothing to reduce the suffering of trapped animals. In this connection, I think we must look at the arguments put forward by Mrs Scheele, who explains quite specifically that we are not reducing this suffering at all.

One final, vital point: this draft is unacceptable because, at the end of the day, it flouts European law, in that its positive list includes species protected under Article 12 of the Habitat Directive. It includes the otter, the wolf, the beaver and the lynx. And you know, Commissioner – and I am well aware of this, coming from France – how difficult it is to enforce the Habitat Directive, to protect wolves and to try to explain the situation.

It is therefore for all these reasons that we are rejecting this proposal and that, in truth, Commissioner, we are counting on you to act as an intermediary between Parliament and the Commission and to get it to withdraw this draft.

  Jonas Sjöstedt, on behalf of the GUE/NGL Group. – (SV) Mr President, this proposal for a directive from the Commission is no great success. Everyone, from hunters to those whose job it is to protect animals, may be said to be dissatisfied with its content. Our political group concurs with the criticism made. In particular, the content is obviously not based on the latest scientific findings, as a proposal for a directive of this type should, in fact, be.

It is therefore time to withdraw the proposal and start again from the beginning. As we see it, it is a question of obtaining a balance in the proposal. Animal protection must come first, meaning that considerable improvements to the proposal are required. When the relevant regulations are laid down, it will, however, be important not unnecessarily to regulate hunting rules in the Member States to a degree greater than that required to protect animals against suffering. In the future too, this must, in the main, be an issue for individual nations. We hope that the Commission will come back with a new proposal. We would thank the rapporteur for her work and shall vote in favour of the report as it stands.

  Johannes Blokland, on behalf of the IND/DEM Group. – (NL) Mr President, my group supports the proposal to reject this directive, albeit on the basis of arguments that are different from the rapporteur’s.

Firstly, I take the view that this directive would render the effective control of pests impossible in certain Member States – I am thinking especially of the muskrat in the Netherlands. This can have major consequences for public safety. As long as the proposal contains no exemption in this respect, I cannot lend it my support. Commissioner Dimas said that he could understand the concerns of many organisations. I would like to know if he could also understand the concern we in the Netherlands have for the safety of our citizens, if dikes are undermined by muskrats digging burrows.

My second argument for rejection concerns the legal foundation. Protocol 33 to the EC Treaty grants the EU competence in the area of animal welfare only in the framework of agricultural, transport, internal market or research policy. The draft directive implements the international agreement on humane trapping methods, which was concluded in the context of the common trade policy. Since the proposal harmonises the Member States’ standards for animal traps within the internal market and does not serve a direct environmental goal, Article 95 alone can be seen as the correct legal foundation for this proposal. I would like to have Commissioner Dimas’ reaction to this.

  Jean-Claude Martinez (NI). – (FR) Mr President, Commissioner, for the third time since 1991, in other words in 15 years, our Parliament, as usual during the night sitting, is discussing the issue of traps and their ‘barbarism with a human face’.

In 1991, for example, we banned leghold traps and imports of fur from foxes, otters, lynxes and 13 species of animal from Canada and the United States. The ban was intended to apply as of 1995. In 1998, however, the Commission explained to us that it was necessary to extend the life of leghold traps in the interests of Inuits and their traditional hunting practices, even when the Inuit trappers in question are multinational fur companies with premises on Fifth Avenue in New York.

In this very place, before the Irish Commissioner Mr Mac Sharry, I described an animal from the far North, the bones in its foot shattered, its tendons crushed and its arteries severed, which tears off its own foot and drags itself over the red-stained snow to die 20 metres away under the fir trees, all for the profit of a luxury industry run by people who are about as Indian as I, with the name Martinez, am genetically Swedish.

This evening, then, in response to the directive on humane traps, which is supposed to enable us to take action to manage fauna, to protect dykes, to protect cultures and to respect the Treaties, I say ‘No! No!’, because, for every muskrat or badger that creates danger, we trap 10 silver foxes that create a profit. So, Mr President, Commissioner, let them live!

  Richard Seeber (PPE-DE). – (DE) Mr President, I, too, would like to thank the rapporteur for the report. The vote in committee produced a clear result. I believe that we all, in principle, are glad to see regulations on the protection of wild animals, and so I regard an all-round approach as desirable. Let us just consider the great differences between the Habitats Directive, the Birds Directive and the protection afforded to other animals: those differences are not always justified.

Account must, of course, also be taken of animals’ capacity for causing the sort of damage that endangers lives. I believe that we need to draw a distinction and simply give priority to human well-being. Let us just remember the breaches in the dams, of which we had such a powerful description from our Dutch fellow Members.

That having been said, we do, as legislator, have to consider how we can come to the right decisions given the powers with which we have been endowed. As the basis of these powers has already, however, been the subject of dispute, considerations of legal certainty demand that this issue be examined with great thoroughness. If we follow the reasoning of the Commission and this House’s Legal Affairs Committee, the basis is Article 175 and that immediately following it.

Since, though, this proposal does not take account of the most up-to-date scientific knowledge, I believe that the whole thing needs to be rejected. This is too important a matter for us not to seek out the best for animals as much as for human beings.

It should also, of course, be borne in mind that the doctrine of subsidiarity requires that the Member States be given the opportunity to enact stringent animal protection rules, whilst also prioritising the safety of human beings.

  Linda McAvan (PSE). – Mr President, I am not going to break the mould because I too support the idea of rejecting this proposal. As everybody else has said, it is hard to see any animal welfare benefits in what the Commission is proposing. I understand that the Commission’s own Scientific and Veterinary Committee queried the proposal, and there are even some question marks about how it was consulted.

It is also perplexing – and I raised this in committee – to see a list of 19 species to be covered by the directive and then to discover that some of them were actually protected species in the European Union. It seems strange to describe how to trap animals that you are not allowed to hunt by law. I would appreciate the Commissioner’s comments on that.

They say that you cannot please all of the people all of the time, but I am afraid that this proposal does not seem to please anybody at all. Therefore, I was pleased to hear that the Commissioner is prepared to listen to Parliament and to find an alternative way forward on this issue.

Mrs Scheele has done a very good job and we have a united front in Parliament, which is very different from the debate the Commissioner witnessed on REACH yesterday, the outcome of which we will see tomorrow in the vote.

  Mojca Drčar Murko (ALDE). – (SL) If the purpose of this Directive has been to introduce humane trapping standards for certain animal species, then that purpose has failed. Its failure to take into account the latest scientific research evidence is contrary to certain other items of EU legislation and it will do nothing to ease the suffering of the wild animals which are trapped. In terms of the psychological and behavioural development of mammals, the main moral objection to the use of trapping methods as a means of killing is that the period between the animal being trapped and becoming unconscious, or its death struggle time, is too long.

The fact remains, however, that the international agreement entered into by the EU, Canada and the Russian Federation, the environmental component of which this Directive wishes to transpose into EU legislation, is the first of two which deal specifically with the question of wild animal welfare, despite the fact that its primary purpose is to facilitate fur trading.

I would like to draw your attention to Article 5 of this agreement, which comprehensively obstructs the efforts of countries which have already introduced hunting regulations surpassing international standards. If the existing standards only derive from a set of lowest common denominators, parties to this agreement will not be encouraged to consider developing more humane standards.

  Jillian Evans (Verts/ALE). – Mr President, I would like to echo the comments that have already been made by several other Members in support of the position of Mrs Scheele, the rapporteur, in her report. As we have heard, colleagues want to reject the Commission proposal for a number of different reasons; but we are in agreement about the rejection.

As has already been said several times, this proposal has been criticised by anyone who is involved in this area – by the scientists, by animal welfare groups, by pro-hunting groups – because it is not based on the latest scientific research evidence and it certainly does not prevent, or even reduce, the suffering of animals in traps. This Parliament has often shown its political will to protect animals and this weak proposal certainly does not achieve that. The standards here are not humane. We are not talking about a few animals, but about millions of animals that are trapped every year in the European Union.

There are many areas where the proposal falls short of what can be achieved or what could be achieved to improve animal welfare. For example, it allows traps that are not classed as humane to be used while better traps are developed, but no time limit is put on this. The priority is for trapping to continue. There are no safeguards, as we have heard already, to protect endangered species from being killed in traps in some areas where we know those species are found. The only way to do that would be to ban traps in those areas. So for these reasons, and for many other reasons, it is not acceptable and the Commission should produce a new proposal.

  Hélène Goudin (IND/DEM). – (SV) Mr President, the Commission’s proposal concerning trapping leaves a very great deal to be desired. Under the proposal, traps are to be tested according to strict standards, special training for trappers is to be introduced and home-made traps are only to be permitted in exceptional circumstances. If this proposal is adopted by the European Parliament, it will, in practice, be impossible to engage in trapping in the Nordic countries. It is gratifying that the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety rejected the Commission’s proposal. Hunting issues must be decided at national or local level, not in Brussels.

I want to draw Members’ attention to the fact that the Committee on Legal Affairs has issued an opinion concerning the proposal’s legal basis. This opinion has been incorporated into the report by the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety and recommends that Article 175 form the legal basis for the proposal. This article concerns the EU’s environmental policy. The protection of wild animals is not, however, a part of the EU’s environmental policy and does not even come within the EU’s competence. If Article 175 were to constitute the legal basis, there would be a great danger of more and more matters such as this being regarded as EU issues and dealt with at EU level.

I agree with the rapporteur, Mrs Scheele, that the Commission’s proposal should be rejected. Mrs Scheele is proceeding, however, on the basis that the proposal is not sufficiently far-reaching. I am of the opposite view. Of course, rules are needed, including in connection with trapping, so that, for example, animal protection is guaranteed. These rules must, however, be laid down by the Member States and not in Brussels.

  Christofer Fjellner (PPE-DE). – (SV) Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I understand that this proposal will probably be rejected tomorrow. That is partly because powerful forces here in Parliament seem to want to regulate trapping in detail and almost put an end to trapping as such. It appears almost as though the ultimate objective is that trapping should not take place in Europe. For such people, this proposal is quite simply not sufficiently far-reaching. Even though they are often described as friends of the environment, they often make demands that are anything but environmentally friendly. The fact is ignored that trapping is an important part of caring for wildlife and the environment. I can quote, as an example of this, something I heard about the other day, namely that there are species of sea birds that depend on Finns catching, for example, raccoon dogs, which do not naturally belong to the local fauna but which have been imported.

In my opinion, the Commission’s proposal is not too limited. On the contrary, it really goes much too far. Moreover, the Commission is trying to extend its powers to issues that the Member States really are best placed to deal with.

I have two arguments I hope the Commission will take on board with a view to possible future proposals. Firstly, I think that we must take the existing international agreements as our starting point and not try to extend them in a way that is in danger of creating new barriers to trade. In the last analysis, doing that only hits individual manufacturers and hunters and creates problems. What is more, I think that, instead of taking a cue from the Commission and extending the agreement, it would have been enough to demand that the Member States themselves implement parts of this agreement.

Secondly, this proposal would give rise to a lot of bureaucracy, which might be done away with. Member States such as Sweden have efficient systems whereby all traps are tested. In order to avoid bureaucracy, it should have been possible to approve the results of tests already carried out on various traps. I hope that the Commission will take these arguments on board and not just listen to the arguments of those who wish to put a stop to trapping.

  Robert Evans (PSE). – Mr President, the Commissioner spoke earlier on about our international obligations. I would argue that the so-called international agreement is at best ambiguous. I am no legal expert, but the Commission must agree that there are serious legal inconsistencies between this proposal and other EU policies, to which both Mrs McAvan and Mr Blokland, from different starting points, have drawn attention.

Mr Maaten mentioned the Habitats Directive. However, there is also the protection of laboratory animals in research. These and others are serious and sound policies for the protection of wildlife and animals that are sadly used in laboratories.

This is an important subject; it cannot be left merely to the luck of the toss. Air in the atmosphere and the air we breathe is rightly considered a subject necessary for environmental legislation at EU level. I would say to the previous speaker, Mr Fjellner, that this proposal falls into the same category of being important and necessary, but at the moment it fails to take account of many previous decisions.

As Mr Schnellhardt noted, we have to work with other countries in the world – the United States, Canada and Russia. However, for our own credibility, I would argue that we can do better than this and we have to do so.

I commend the rapporteur for her work and, speaking on behalf of this Parliament’s Intergroup on Animal Welfare, I too call for withdrawal of this proposal, because, sadly, it will do nothing for the welfare of animals. In the light of what the Commissioner has heard tonight, I suggest that to avoid humiliation tomorrow, he withdraws it before it is put to the vote in plenary.

  Margrete Auken (Verts/ALE). – (DA) Mr President, I naturally agree with both my own group and the others that have put forward arguments against the Commission’s proposal, and I shall not go over these arguments again in this Chamber. In actual fact, I asked to be given the floor just to remind people that animals that live almost unobserved in the wild have better lives than animals kept in cages. We have seen dreadful pictures from China of bears kept in cages for the sake of their fur, but it is not, of course, only bears with which we are concerned here. In Denmark, we have large fox farms, and these are dreadful too, no matter what type of trapping is practised. Fox farming is outright cruelty to animals. I think that we must include other animals as subjects of this debate instead of ignoring this problem and only taking an interest in the cruelty to animals caused through trapping. I should like to emphasise that we must broaden our perspective in order to avoid legitimising the brutal treatment of animals on farms in both China and Denmark.

  Piia-Noora Kauppi (PPE-DE). – Mr President, Commissioner, I could not disagree more with the previous speaker. I think the farming of animals for fur in Europe is in much better shape than farming animals in China. Deer farming, fox farming and mink farming are totally different issues.

I would like to take this opportunity to express my support for Mrs Scheele’s conclusion that the Commission proposal should be rejected. However, I do not agree with her reasons for doing so. Firstly, the legal basis of the Commission proposal is questionable. This proposal seeks to implement a trade agreement allowing the EU to comply with its international trade obligations, but its contents relate to the welfare of wild animals, for which the EU does not and should not have competence. The Treaty only empowers the EU to take responsibility for animal welfare in the context of agriculture, transport, internal market research and areas such as the welfare of farmed animals, fur farming included.

Secondly, the Commission has failed to provide an impact assessment of the proposed directive. The estimated cost of testing for a single type of trap varies from EUR 30 000 to EUR 100 000. Carrying out the testing by technical means would make the requirements more reliable, cheaper and easier to measure and standardise across the Member States. But there is a problem, as Mr Evans said. Laboratory animals are animals too and we have to take care of their welfare as well. Furthermore, the idea that home-made traps would require a special permit for each use is hallucinatory. How does the Commission think the permit requests of tens of thousands of Finnish trappers would be handled in Brussels?

Thirdly, like many of the previous speakers I would like to underline the detrimental effects of the proposal on the conservation of wildlife and nature. The raccoon dog, which is not a native species of Finland but is an extremely efficient predator of birds and other wildlife, can only be effectively managed by trapping. If the trapping were made as difficult as the proposal suggests, the loss of biodiversity would be enormous.

In general, it is essential to rely on local knowledge in applying trapping and hunting legislation. Only local people have sufficient knowledge of the local flora and fauna to help set up balanced legislation. The wrong kind of intervention at EU level can compromise an otherwise noble objective, as in all areas where subsidiarity should be upheld. I sincerely ask the Commission to withdraw this proposal in order to avoid humiliation tomorrow.

  Hans-Peter Mayer (PPE-DE). – (DE) Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I shall try to encapsulate much in a short space of time. Hundreds and thousands of animals are caught in traps all over the European Union, and the practice is primarily used to manage animals living in the wild and, in particular, to combat pests, of which muskrats are but one example.

It was in 1998 that the EU, together with Canada, Russia and the USA, concluded the agreement on international humane trapping standards. These countries are the principal exporters of furs and pelts, and the EU, in two decisions, rightly justified this by reference to its competence in general economic policy and, in particular, in policy affecting the internal market. The present proposal for legislation constitutes an attempt at transposing this agreement into EU law; the substance of it is that the Commission is arguing for a balance – which certainly stands in need of further discussion – between the need for the avoidable suffering on the part of animals to be limited and the need for trapping as a means of catching them.

It has to be said, though, that the proposal takes environmental policy as its primary basis, but the EU is responsible for the well-being of animals only in conjunction with other policy areas, such as agriculture, transport, the single market or research. It follows that it possesses no general competence with regard to the well-being of animals in the wild. This House, of course, is – as of course, am I – all in favour of safeguarding the well-being of animals in the wild, but that, as a subject for legislation, is a matter for the Member States. It is because the European Parliament, as the European legislature, must respect the Member States’ rights under subsidiarity that it must reject this proposal for legislation irrespective of the good intentions it contains.

I have to tell the Commissioner that the enactment of relevant regulations by the Member States will discharge the European Union’s obligations.

  Stavros Dimas, Μember of the Commission. (EL) Mr President, I should like to start by saying that democratic procedures include the rejection of proposals and I do not consider that to be humiliating or embarrassing. It is part of the democratic process which we must take into account.

As I mentioned earlier, I have taken account of the position of the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety concerning the rejection of the Commission proposal and I have heard this evening all the different opinions formulated here, opinions which may in numerous instances have had various starting points but which almost all arrived at the same conclusion.

The proposal for a directive being debated would have filled a legal gap, given that, if we exclude the 1991 Council regulation, there is no other legislation on trapping standards at European Union level and, at national level, the existing legal framework is very restricted. In all events, this proposal would add to the existing legislation of the Member States, not subtract from it: where there is stricter legislation, this would continue to apply.

Nonetheless, given your concerns and taking account of the Council's position, I wish to inform you that the Commission will examine its next steps on this proposal very carefully, including of course the possibility of withdrawing it. At the present stage, however, I would like to say that we need to examine all the relevant parameters.

  President. The debate is closed.

The vote will take place on Thursday.