Mr President, common regulation of the conditions under which third-country nationals shall have the freedom to travel in the territory of the Member States, is much to be welcomed. During the Committee's deliberations, the fragmentary attempts at regulation, based on French and Portuguese initiatives, were repeatedly subjected to criticism. There was a demand for a more global approach to mobility in the Schengen area, a demand which has been met by this Commission proposal for a directive. On the one hand, the conditions under which third-country nationals have the freedom to travel for a maximum of three months are to be regulated and harmonised, thus complying with the obligation laid on the Council by the Treaty of Amsterdam to lay down these conditions within five years of the Treaty entering into force. On the other hand, a quite new instrument – that of the specific travel authorisation – is to be introduced, permitting the extension of freedom to travel to six months under certain special conditions. Let me say at the outset that I do not understand why a directive was chosen in preference to a regulation as the legal instrument in this instance. The text is framed in sufficiently definite terms. Since a directive needs to be transposed at national level, the application of the instrument is delayed for an unspecified period of time. This instrument, moreover, replaces, among others, Regulation 1091/2001, which has already entered into force. This, then, is another reason why a regulation would be the more appropriate legal instrument. There has been no essential change to the freedom to travel enjoyed by third-country nationals who are not required to have a visa and by holders of a longer-term residence permit. There is, though, a new regulation for those holders of the national visa issued by the Member States for longer-term residence who are not yet in possession of the residence permit. Contrary to the Commission's proposal, such third-country nationals should, in my judgment, continue to be permitted to travel on Member States' territory even before they apply for the residence permit. It would represent a retrograde step back to the legal situation under the Schengen Convention if freedom to travel were to be granted only once that application were made, and would be comprehensible to none of the parties affected. Moreover, there is no evident reason why this category of persons should be treated differently to, and worse than, other third-country nationals covered by the directive when it comes to the date on which their freedom to travel begins. Third-country nationals travelling with a national visa would, in any case, then have to fulfil the same conditions as those travelling with a standard Schengen visa. This is a result of putting the visas on an equal footing as regards unrestricted travel. It means that the consultation procedures between the Member States on the confidential lists 5A and 5B in the Consular Instructions must also apply to national visas. Those Member States with reservations about nationals of certain third countries would otherwise have no possibility of taking cognisance of them and monitoring them if national visas were issued by other Member States, resulting in a security loophole that the events of 11 September have made quite unacceptable. Although there was lively discussion on this point in Committee, an overwhelming majority of its members supported my proposal. This result confirms the Committee's strength, which lies in its ability to reach, in response to changed conditions, a new decision on a matter on which there has already been a vote.

Political group: PSE