The Maltese Presidency of the Council of the EU announced to MEPs on Friday afternoon 10 February that the first interinstitutional meeting on revision of the founding regulation of the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), scheduled for Monday 13 February, had been cancelled. This last-minute decision has displeased some, including Parliament's rapporteur.
“During my work in the European Parliament, I have negotiated with a lot of Presidencies (Ed: of the Council). Never has such a situation happened”, Jean-Marian Marinescu (EPP, Romania), rapporteur for the transport and tourism committee, told EUROPE. He was very unhappy that the Secretariat of the Council had acted “unilaterally” and “without consulting the European Parliament”, and had, on Friday afternoon, proposed the cancellation of the trialogue meeting.
Disagreement over agenda of first meeting. The reason behind the decision to cancel appears to be disagreement between the Parliament and the Council over the agenda of this first meeting. MEPs wanted to discuss the technical issues while the Council wanted to discuss the political points, a number of sources have told EUROPE.
The decision by the Council to cancel the meeting is unjustifiable in Marinescu’s view. “Even a plenary agenda may be modified at the beginning of the meeting. That is not a reason not to be present at a trilogue”, he raged.
Other Parliamentary sources to whom EUROPE has spoken have also expressed their annoyance at this last-gasp decision, indicating that the cancellation was definitively confirmed only on Monday morning. What makes this decision all the more incomprehensible for a number of sources is that the agenda had been known for several weeks.
Council ill-prepared. It is being suggested by a number of sources close to the matter that the Maltese Presidency preferred to postpone the meeting so that it could prepare the position it will argue with the Parliament rapporteur who is believed to be “particularly well prepared”.
A meeting is scheduled in two weeks’ time to come to definitive agreement on the timetable for the interinstitutional negotiations. The date of the next meeting has not, as yet, been confirmed.
The revision of the EASA regulation is one of the major initiatives in the aviation strategy which is proposing an extension of powers to cover the activities of civilian drones and some areas of security – though the member states are divided on this last point (see EUROPE 11721). (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)