Mr President, I had not followed the last report in any detail but if Commissioner Wallström is in the same sort of mood as Commissioner Bolkestein, I am glad I am not tabling any amendments today. On a complete change of note, a few weeks ago I was reading to my daughter, Kate, from A Christmas Carol by the 19th-century British author Charles Dickens. Scrooge sat in his counting house, he wrote. 'The city clocks had only just gone three, but it was quite dark already and candles were flaring in the windows of the neighbouring offices like ruddy smears upon the palpable brown air.' It must be a great cause for cheer in European cities today that we no longer have to breathe that 'palpable brown air'. It is a sign of environmental progress and achievement that air quality now is better than it has been for centuries. But there is more yet to be done, and in its Clean Air for Europe programme the Commission has identified particulates and ozone as two priorities for action. Ozone pollution contributes to the premature death of tens of thousands of people each year; it causes breathing difficulties, coughs, headaches and eye irritation. The World Health Organisation has not been able to identify a threshold below which there are no effects. It can also damage vegetation, reduce crop yields and stunt the growth of forests and, like acid rain, it can eat into and destroy the fabric of buildings and works of art. And so we have this draft directive to address the problem. It started out as a remarkably weak proposal, the key element of which was to set targets for 2010 for the maximum number of exceedances above WHO guidelines, but these targets would not have been binding on Member States. It also called for the preparation of short-term action plans to deal with acute problems and for more public information and health alerts. During the course of the past two years, Parliament has been able to use its codecision powers to give this legislation some teeth. We have strengthened the public's right to information. We have made it easier for recalcitrant countries to be named and shamed into improving their performance. We have ensured that damage to materials is included amongst the criteria for consideration. We have re-emphasised our wish to see long-term reductions in ozone levels achieved by 2020 in line with the National Emissions Ceilings Directive proposals. But above all, we have addressed the issue of the non-binding short-term targets. Instead of Member States having to work to achieve these 'as far as possible', which was the original proposal, we have insisted that effective measures shall be taken unless the targets cannot be achieved by 'proportionate measures'. I want to emphasise that we agreed this wording because both the Commission and our own legal services advised us that it would make the provisions of the directive enforceable and that Member States could be taken to the European Court of Justice if they failed to take such measures. In other words, we have used our codecision powers to transform a statement of good intent into a legally binding commitment. Even so, the European Environmental Bureau has criticised us, asking: 'Why do we need a directive at all if the 2010 targets are not fully binding?' But this misunderstands the nature of ozone pollution. It is hugely transboundary. While peak exceedances are falling across Europe, the average level is continuing to rise, almost certainly as a result of pollution generated far from our shores. I do not believe that Spain, or Italy, or Germany, or any of us should face the prospect of legal sanctions because they are being polluted from China. That would not be fair and it would not be realistic. I want Member States here to be required to do all that they can realistically to meet the targets, no more and no less. I think that 'palpable brown air' gave a lot of character to the story of Scrooge. But it is not appropriate now. Perhaps I will ask my daughter, Kate, if she will write a 21st-century version featuring clean air. However, with the assistance of the Commission and the last Belgian Presidency, Parliament has been able in the meantime to use its negotiating powers to turn a simple wish list into a requirement for our various governments to take action which will significantly improve air quality across Europe. We have secured greater changes and a more ambitious directive than we could reasonably have expected when the draft was first proposed. We can be proud of what we have achieved.

Political group: ELDR