Brussels, 14/10/2005 (Agence Europe) - The large number of amendments proposed by the members of the committee on transport to the report by Georg Jarzembowski (PPE-DE, Germany) on the draft directive on access to port services have revealed the uneasiness of many MEPs, who now want to try to “make a bad proposal into something better", according to the German social democrat Willi Piecyk. The positive scope of the proposal is very limited, said Saïd El Khadraoui (PSE, Belgium), in whose view “we can either improve it, with 300 amendments, or reject it and propose something else in conjunction with the parties concerned”. Jook Lagendijk (Greens/ALE, Netherlands) proposed to reject the proposal, stressing that “just because we are against this proposal does not mean that we are against competition!”. Gilles Savary (PSE, France) admitted that he had “never really understood this text, because there is no problem with lack of competitiveness in European ports”. Given these raised shields, Corien Wortmann-Kool (PPE-DE, Netherlands) correctly noted that the European Parliament can reject the proposal, but it does not have the power of initiative, and that there is no guarantee if it is rejected that the Commission will choose to propose another specific directive on port service; it could integrate them into the general directive on services, she said. “Rejecting this proposal would be an easy solution which would not move things along”, said the rapporteur Mr Jarzembowski, stressing: “I will work with those who want a specific directive”, otherwise the Commission will settle problems case by case. The Commission representative brought up the misunderstandings caused by the proposal, pointing out that the original objective was to facilitate access for service providers by guaranteeing equal and transparent conditions, not to increase competition between ports. The Commission chose to propose special regulation for ports, governing specific issues of technical and nautical services, piloting and self-handling, rather than waiting for a judgement from the Court of Justice to decide whether they are commercial services like any other. The choice of a directive rather than a regulation leaves more room for manoeuvre for the Member States, “who are in favour of this proposal, which the European Parliament does not like”, the Commission representative acknowledged, responding to Gilles Savary, who stressed that “when the Member States do not like a proposal, Barroso withdraws it, and when the European Parliament does not like it, the Commission trots it out again!”. Service providers have an interest in protecting themselves from competition, and "the European Parliament now has an opportunity to draft an excellent compromise", the rapporteur concluded on a more positive note.