Madam President, Commissioners, it seems to be ladies’ night here this evening. The aim of eco-design is to integrate technical possibilities when they are at their greatest. More than 80% of environmental damage is determined at the manufacturing stage of a product. We learnt this whilst considering this Directive. We also know that the EU has adopted many rules to eradicate dangerous substances. We have rules on waste management with quantitative targets for recovery and reuse. It was a relatively natural course of action, then, for the committee to lay a certain emphasis on energy consumption, in particular, in its consideration of the proposal. I should like to make a point of this, as strong criticism seems to have been levelled at our work, stressing the energy aspect. This is against a background in which energy consumption has continued to increase substantially in most parts of Europe, and many Member States are having difficulty meeting the Kyoto objectives. New tools for saving energy are important, therefore. Latest reports in my home country indicate that it is set to exceed the CO2 emissions quota for the 2005-2007 period by 14%. Criticism has also been levelled at the ‘top-runner’ approach that we have used here. I believe, however, that there is a great deal of misunderstanding about what we mean by this. We want the leading and best technology as a yardstick for future implementing measures. This forms a framework for decisions, but does not exclude anyone from the market. On the contrary, I think that we have a system that leaves scope for continuous improvement. The report is also criticised for not having heeded the three pillars of sustainable development. It is said that we have given priority to the environment at the expense of social and economic issues. That criticism is wrong, and I think that this is self-evident if one studies what we say about the life-cycle approach and our support for small- and medium-sized enterprises. We are aware of the economic issues, the social issues and the possibilities, but also the risks. When all is said and done, early attention to environmental issues, as the Commissioner also said, is more economical than many other methods of environmental governance, for instance subsidies, and also labelling, unfortunately. It has become apparent that we obtain very little value for money from subsidies at the intervention stage. I should also like to point out that, just as we did when we were considering the Green Paper on Integrated Product Policy, we have given our support here to measures applicable to SMEs. We also call on the Commission to establish a database in order to facilitate the incorporation of the life-cycle approach and eco-design into the activities of all enterprises. This is an innovative concept. The scope is broad, but in actual fact what we have here is an organised regulatory framework for how to proceed, how to choose what is important and how to set requirements in the future: the prototype for good governance, in other words. There have been no objections here in Parliament to the fact that the European Parliament will not in future be determining how much energy a product should consume. On the contrary, we are saying that this will be determined where there is the expertise. In my opinion, what we are proposing is an important simplification. Self-regulation also has a role to play, in Parliament’s view, but only if it produces better, faster results than would the regulated procedure. Unfortunately, although I did not quite catch what the Commissioner said at the end, I do not think that this Parliament will at any rate be able to reach agreement with the Council at this reading, and that means we lose a fair amount of time. We had wanted to make faster progress, and we want the Directive to define a work plan, including for the products that are responsible for 40% of carbon dioxide emissions. We want to proceed quickly, as it is our opinion that much time has been lost. I wish to thank my fellow Members for their constructive cooperation on the preparation of this report. I should like to express my thanks for your understanding when I took over from Mrs Ries, who became Belgian State Secretary for European Affairs. I should also like to thank the Commission for its goodwill in wishing to reach a speedy agreement with the Council. I also think that we have been very united, and that has been a great strength. Our views still differ on a number of small points, for instance with regard to the legal basis and conformity assessment, but we shall not let the details obscure the fact that we have been united. Parliament wants rapid progress and wants to implement the necessary measures promptly. I hope that the Council, and Parliament with the new Members elected after us, will be able to reach swift agreement on this so that there is no further delay to these important measures.

Political group: ELDR