During a discussion on Thursday 12 January on the final report of the investigative committee on the Volkswagen scandal (the EMIS committee), several MEPs highlighted problems with work schedules.
This criticism was formulated, for example, by Christine Revault d’Allonnes Bonnefoy (S&D, France) and Seb Dance (S&D, United Kingdom). The social democrat MEP said she regretted the clashing of work by the EMIS committee and legislative work on the regulation on reception and market surveillance of motor vehicles (see EUROPE 11664), as the vote on the latter takes place on 26 January, a month before the before on the EMIS report on 28 February.
Another area of grievance pointed out by both MEPs is the fact that hearings are taking place after finalisation of the ‘factual’ part of the report. MEPs debated the final version of the report in the morning, only to hold a hearing in the afternoon with the Slovak secretary of state for transport, Viktor Stromček, and the Italian transport minister, Graziano Delrio.
Upcoming amendments. The MEPs all agreed that the report was balanced and consensual, including the two co-rapporteurs, Gerban-Jan Gerbrandy (ALDE, the Netherlands) and Jens Gieseke (EPP, Germany). Revault d’Allonnes Bonnefoy said, however, that her group would be lodging a number of amendments on the sections of the report relating to conclusions and recommendations. She said they had installed a number of hooks and would now be able to hang their political positions on them and go on to develop them. This announcement was of concern to the EPP co-rapporteur, who warned of the danger of excessive numbers of amendments.
What about monitoring? Wim van de Camp (EPP, the Netherlands) raised the question of the European Commission’s mentoring of recommendations once the report’s been adopted. He asked how one could ensure the Commission acts on Parliament’s recommendations. He noted the lack of political impact of the scandal, regretting that unlike what’s happening in the United States, no commissioner or politician has resigned. He said in this regard that there was a clear difference between what is happening on either side of the Atlantic when it comes to how the scandal is emerging, with recent commitments by Volkswagen to compensate US consumers (see EUROPE 11653).
Gieseke says diesel is a technology for the future. Unsurprisingly, Gieseke argued in favour of diesel which, he said, was a technology of the future that makes it possible to effectively combat climate change and air pollution using existing particulate filters. The co-rapporteur took on the job when Pablo Zalba (EPP, Spain) left. His appointment raised eyebrows among a number of observers since the German MEP, from Lower Saxony (where Volkswagen’s headquarters are based, (see EUROPE 11674) has never made a secret of his pro-diesel views.
After nearly a year of work, EMIS unveiled its report on 19 December, drawing up an unfavourable balance sheet for the behaviour of the member states and the European Commission (see EUROPE 11692).
MEPs now have until 3.00pm on 18 January to lodge amendments. Examination of the amendments will take place on 9 February and the committee will vote on 28 February. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)