Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, this draft Directive seeks to amend for the twenty-fifth time Council Directive 76/769/EEC relating to restrictions on the marketing and use of certain dangerous substances and preparations. Existing chemicals legislation states that, as soon as a substance or preparation has been classified as carcinogenic, mutagenic or toxic to reproduction, it must be included in this annex and not released onto the market. This proposal applies to 44 new substances which must be added to this list. I believe we are all agreed that that is a very good thing that this be done and that we must of course adopt the proposal to add these substances. When Parliament debated this matter for the first time, we considered that there were two deficiencies in existing legislation that we very much wanted to remedy. We believed that we did not need to wait for the new chemicals legislation and wanted, for the sake of public health, to make amendments more promptly. The first deficiency was that the use in consumer articles of CMR substances – carcinogens, mutagens or substances toxic to reproduction – was not prohibited. Articles of this kind include flooring, toys and textiles such as we come into contact with every day as consumers and which cause us genuinely to become exposed to these chemical compounds. We therefore wanted a ban. The second deficiency led to our naturally wanting a ban on the use of CMR products in cosmetics. The Council has since rejected Parliament’s amendments. Where cosmetic products are concerned, our proposal has however been accepted. At a conciliation, it was agreed to ban category 1 and category 2 CMR substances in the cosmetics directive when the seventh amendment was made. It can therefore be stated that Parliament’s proposal concerning cosmetic products has been accepted. When it came to consumer articles, there were three main reasons why the Council wanted to reject Parliament’s amendments. Firstly, it believed that there were no relevant scientific evaluations or risk assessments. In fact, risk assessments have actually been carried out. There has also been a proposal from the Commission to the effect that, since the use of chemicals by consumers cannot be controlled, safety can only be ensured by prohibiting the general use of substances and preparations that are carcinogenic, mutagenic or toxic to reproduction. In the committee’s and my own view, there is no reason not to make the same assessment in connection with the use of consumer articles. The argument does not, then, hang together in this respect. Secondly, the Council referred to the fact that we are concerned here with a very large and unspecified number of products. As I see it, that is a completely baffling argument. It should be exactly the other way around. If there are now so many products containing, for example, carcinogenic substances, there is surely genuine reason to take action instead of merely saying that, because there are such a lot of products, nothing can be done. Thirdly, the Council stated that this issue will be addressed in the context of developing the new chemicals policy. That is very commendable, and I am really pleased about it. I believe that the proposal it may be possible to put before Parliament some time in June concerning the new chemicals legislation will also take these products into account. It will, however, take a very long time before that legislation comes into force, so it would have been helpful to have obtained this amendment at the present stage. Now, at second reading, it might have been imagined that we should have tabled the same amendment. I have chosen, however, not to do so, and my colleagues in the committee were of the same view. We brought debate of this matter to a head when the twenty-third amendment was adopted following Mr Nisticò’s report. The same debate was conducted then, and it did not actually lead to anything. I have therefore chosen to recommend to Parliament that, on the grounds that we have had our proposals concerning cosmetic products accepted, it adopt this second-reading recommendation concerning the Council’s common position. We have come to the end of the road where the proposals relating to the second type of product are concerned. We must accept matters as they stand.

Political group: Verts-ALE