Brussels, 04/07/2007 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 11 July, the European Parliament will adopt its opinion on first reading of the draft direct which will complete the liberalisation of the postal sector by opening up the handling of mail of less than 50 grammes to competition. If the outcomes of the meetings on this issue of the three main political groups - EPP-ED, PES and ALDE - are anything to go by, Parliament will approve the compromise adopted two weeks ago in the transport committee (see EUROPE 9449).
At a meeting on the Christian Democrat group on Tuesday 3 July, German rapporteur Markus Ferber put forward six further amendments. Two will be submitted on behalf of the group during the plenary session. The first will allow small member states with low populations to reserve this area for the national service until 2013, as the Parliamentary committee had already allowed for the member states which joined at the 2004 enlargement, and those with difficult topography (especially a large number of islands). Experts felt that this was to satisfy a specific request from Luxemburg. The second amendment will allow member states to introduce a system to compensate users in the event of loss or theft of mail or damage to it. The EPP-ED group also picks up the amendment from Hungarian MEP Etelka Barsi-Pataky to provide increased the legal security of the area which can still be reserved for the historic postal operator.
Mr Ferber could not persuade his colleagues to adopt the four other amendments. One of them stipulated that member states could not grant a share of the obligations deriving from the universal postal service (UPS) to more than one operator. When asked by EUROPE on Wednesday, the rapporteur said he did not intend to submit in his own name amendments other than those of the EPP-ED group. “I am sticking to the compromise,” he said.
The majority of Socialist MEPs will support the transport committee compromise, as Labour member Brian Simpson, PES group leader on this issue, wants. No further amendments, therefore, are expected from the PES group, which would appear to be willing to support the three new EPP-ED amendments. Making a last-ditch stand, Frenchman Alain Savary (PES) and Belgian Alain Hutchinson (PES) will submit amendments which will: - reinstate the possibility for member states to retain a reserved area to fund the UPS; - call for a single date for the completion of postal liberalisation, insofar as the introduction of a reciprocity clause (which would prevent a public operator in charge of a reserved area to win markets in member states which have already fully liberalised their postal sectors) seems inappropriate to them; - reject the date of accession being used as a criterion for an exemption. If they do not win on this, as would seem to be what will happen, the French and Belgian delegations could vote against the opinion in plenary session. There will be a further meeting of the Socialist group on Tuesday evening.
On Tuesday 3 July, Mr Hutchinson, accompanied by a public services trade union delegation, handed in to Internal Market Commission Charlie McCreevy and EP President Hans-Gert Pöttering the “SOSposte.eu” petition signed by 130,000 citizens who fear the loss of the postal service if funding for the UPS is not guaranteed, and 1.6 million job losses.
In line with their position during the parliamentary committee vote, the Liberals are expected to vote for the compromise on the table. “The group as a whole, including the French and Italian members, is ready to accept the compromise,” the ALDE group spokesman said on Wednesday. He acknowledged, however, that French Liberals had problems with the reciprocity clause. At a seminar for journalists on the completion of the internal postal market, UK MEP Bill Newton Dunn said on Tuesday 3 July that his group was still divided between the British, Dutch, Germans and Scandinavians, who were in favour of liberalising as quickly as possible, and the French and Italians, who wanted a postponement. The Liberals will meet again on Monday evening.
At the same seminar, Eva Lichtenberger (Greens/EFA, Austria) said the Greens were sceptical of the compromise on the table. She highlighted the difficulties of funding the UPS in a fully competitive environment. Warning of mailboxes bulging with junk mail, she said she thought that the conditions of postal sector workers would, unlike in Mr Ferber's vision, deteriorate. For the GUE/NGL group, Dutch MEP Erik Meijer noted the difficulties that came from the gradual liberalisation of postal services in his country where 6,500 people could lose their jobs, and it was the same situation in Spain, Sweden and Denmark. “The GUE/NGL groups proposes rejecting the compromise,” he said, because member states once again would have to subsidise the unprofitable segments of the postal market ignored in this competitive game. (mb)