The Interinstitutional Agreement (see EUROPE 12157/11) on proposals establishing the centralised information system 'ECRIS-TCN' on convictions of third-country nationals is about to receive its final confirmation from the European Parliament on Tuesday 12 March.
As a reminder, the preliminary solution found between the co-legislators after months of blocking finally includes in the system EU nationals who also hold third-country nationality (dual nationals), as requested by the Commission and the EU Council. However, for dual nationals, it provides that the system will only include fingerprints when they have been collected in accordance with national legislation in the course of criminal proceedings.
The logic of voting in plenary should be similar to the one that led to the vote in the Parliamentary committee (see EUROPE 12178/32). According to our information, the EPP, ECR, ENF and EFDD groups - forming a majority - should vote in favour, while the ALDE, Greens/EFA and GUE/NGL groups should vote against. The S&D group intends to abstain.
During the debate preceding the vote on Monday 11 March, however, tensions over the inclusion of dual nationals were still as high as ever.
The European Commissioner for Justice, Věra Jourová, and the Parliament rapporteur, Daniel Dalton (Great Britain, ECR), defended the outcome of the interinstitutional negotiations, which they consider “balanced”.
Should non-EU criminals be allowed to hide their convictions from European courts when EU nationals cannot? For Mr. Dalton, this is the main question that members must ask themselves during the vote.
“I cannot support the result of the trilogue. I’m deeply disappointed of the decision to include 'dual nationals' in the ECRIS TCN system. From the beginning, it was clearly a red line for me as shadow rapporteur for ALDE”, said Angelika Mlinar (ALDE, Austria), asking other groups to vote against the agreement.
For her, this difference in treatment is clearly discriminatory and will create for the first time the notions of “first and second class citizens”.
After considering for a time to vote against the agreement, the S&D group finally decided to abstain, Anna Hedh (S&D, Sweden) announced.
The debate concluded with a series of warnings from the rapporteur. “Let’s be clear, if colleagues here vote to reopen the deal, you are putting your own citizens at risk”, he said, accusing some political groups of using this legislation as a political tool. (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)