Brussels, 18/05/2010 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday 18 May, MEPs decided to extend the European Commission's mandate for finalising the migration process from the Schengen Information System, the Schengen area police database. In practice, this involves moving from the first generation (SIS 1+) to the second generation (SIS II), which will include biometric elements (EUROPE 10138). SIS II was supposed to become operational by 2007; since then, Parliament has constantly criticised the project delays and overspending. Nonetheless, it did prove necessary to modify the legal instruments governing migration from the system before they expired. The report by Carlos Coelho (EPP, Portugal), adopted in plenary session, points out that current legislation sets the deadline at 30 September 2009 for migrating to SIS II, with the possibility of a prolongation until 30 June 2010 at the latest. The Commission decided to use this possibility and extended the deadline until 30 June 2010. The report underlines the fact that “this time limitation clause must be maintained. The new deadline must be aligned on current forecasts according to which SIS II should be operational before 31 December 2011”.
The Commission did not want to be constrained by time limits and is again expected to benefit from a possible extension by way of committee procedures that take into account the possible necessity of shifting SIS II towards a replacement scenario in the event that the tests fail. After the vote, Coelho stressed that “we have reaffirmed the need to use better technology available and to respect timetable and cost efficiency criteria”. He also indicated to the Commission that “we have agreed to finalise the migration process by keeping it under parliamentary control because Parliament is co-legislator for the legal basis of SIS II and for the draft budget”. MEPs insisted on the fact that they must be fully informed about the results of the tests before submitting a favourable opinion. In the event of the SIS II project failing, Parliament reserves the right to request that the European Court of Auditors proceed to a detailed audit of the project management and the financial impact of this failure on the Community budget. The commissioner for internal affairs, Cecilia Malmström, declared that she was the first person to acknowledge that “SIS II saga has been very long” but she said that she would try and tackle the minutiae of the problem in a transparent way. She explained that experts would be presenting conclusions on the situation on 3-4 June. The Commission, however, would like to review the timetable and technical conditions before accepting any proposal, explained the commissioner. A second SIS II test is planned for the autumn and an emergency plan exists if there is a problem, concluded Malmström. (B.C./L.G./transl.fl)