Delays hinder progress of ‘Auto-Oil’ deal

Date: 03/07/1997

By Michael Mann

CONCERN is growing that further progress on proposals to reduce poisonous emissions from cars could be delayed until the end of the year.

MEPs have already signalled clearly that they will push for tougher standards than those agreed by environment ministers at a meeting last month.

But delays in translating the text and the appointment of a new parliamentary rapporteur on fuel standards mean it could be December before the full Parliament votes on the issue again.

Euro MPs are still waiting for the agreement reached at the June ministerial meeting to be formally transmitted to them, and officials are anticipating some delay in preparing precise translations.

A further spanner has been thrown into the works by the election of the French Green MEP Noël Mamère, who was rapporteur for the first reading of the fuel standard proposals, to the French national assembly. This will almost inevitably delay the follow-up report on the agreement reached by ministers.

Finnish Green Heidi Hautala, who is expected to take up the cudgels, is likely to adopt a fairly hard line. In an opinion prepared for the Parliament's economic and monetary affairs committee on the engine emission standards proposal, she took a tougher approach than the official rapporteur, German Socialist Bernd Lange.

Lange this week welcomed the fact that environment ministers had been able to reach a common position at their June meeting, but stressed that they had not gone far enough for his liking.

“It is pleasing that they reached agreement, but what they agreed fell rather short of what we were hoping for. There are still a number of areas of uncertainty over what was in the deal. We will get together and push to have things tightened up. We have a number of things we will concentrate on,” he said.

These include the decision to set only indicative emission standards for 2005, delays in introducing a 'cold-start' test for pollution levels and shortcomings in in-use compliance tests.

Lange also stressed that he would have to operate in tandem with whoever inherited the fuel standards dossier, but was nevertheless optimistic that he could begin work on his follow-up report by September.

Whatever the time-scale, Lange pledged to finish his work as rapidly as possible so the final showdown with EU governments in conciliation talks could follow soon.

But some parliamentary officials believe the Luxembourgers, who took over the EU presidency this week, are rather less anxious to push the 'Auto-Oil' proposals than their Dutch predecessors.

As MEPs prepare to steer ministers closer to the 'green' views of the Nordic-led bloc and away from the concerns of the poorer southern states, lobby groups are also shaping up for the next stage of the battle.

The oil industry association Europia expressed disappointment at the Council of Ministers' common position, saying that while the Commission's original proposals would have enabled clean air objectives to be achieved, “the political views that drove the unnecessary tightening of the fuel proposals do little or nothing for air quality but add approximately 60-70&percent; to the costs”.

On the other side of the fence, a coalition of environmental groups, who described the deal as “not great, but better than expected”, have pledged to concentrate their efforts on strengthening car exhaust standards.

They claim that the fuel specifications agreed by ministers have more regard for industrial concerns than human health.