Mr President, Madam Vice-President, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to confirm first of all that the majority of the group of course supports the Commission proposal, along with the essential proposals to improve it that have been made by Mr Lisi. The proposal has a clear two-pronged approach. It firstly calls on the airlines to use the volunteering principle, whereby the airline makes offers to individuals to identify those who do not urgently have to take the next flight, but could also take the one after that. It is true that experience in America with the volunteering system has been positive. If there are not enough volunteers, however, and everyone wants to go home or to their business appointment and passengers are denied boarding, then they must have some legal redress. They have booked a flight, they have an OK on their ticket and they therefore have a right to board. If the airline overbooks in its own economic interests, because it knows that there are a lot of no-shows, then it must pay if it cannot uphold the booking. It is as simple as that. Because if passengers have an OK on their ticket they have the certainty that they can travel, and if they cannot then the carrier has to pay. Commissioner, you were, of course, a little harsh about the level of the payments. My colleague, Mrs Foster, with whom I do not always agree, said something that is very true. Air prices have fallen in recent years and that is why the argument that we should set compensation very high, so as to take account of recent cost increases, is clearly flawed, because air prices have fallen. Most of us in any case are familiar with the ingenious system of special tariffs, which mean that you can easily fly at more reasonable prices than those prescribed. With this in mind, please understand that we have reduced the compensation to a level that we deem to be economically fair. Our view is that if excessive compensation is paid to passengers who are not taken on board, the carriers will pass on these costs to all passengers, and then general price levels will rise, which will affect more people than those denied boarding. I say to Members of the – we usually see eye to eye, but today, exceptionally, we do not – that we have to set a flat rate of compensation for two reasons: firstly, the prejudice suffered by anyone who is denied boarding is always the same, whether they have paid EUR 150, EUR 500 or more for their ticket. They have been given a guarantee that they will fly and they are left behind. It is completely irrelevant how much the ticket cost. Their confidence has been damaged, and more besides. That is why I believe that the low-cost carriers, which actually do not have any problems with overbooking because they do not accept more passengers than have booked, should also compensate passengers for any injury caused if they cancel a flight for economic reasons, and they obviously do this from time to time. We need uniform tariffs so as to make the job of the poor airport staff easier. You see, if a passenger is denied boarding or a flight is cancelled, we want the compensation to be paid at the gate. You really cannot expect the poor flight attendant to calculate thousands of prices and people to wait until she has calculated the individual compensation entitlements. I therefore believe that our proposal is quite sensible. With your permission, on behalf of my colleague, Mrs Ria Oomen-Ruijten, who is unfortunately unable to speak this evening and who has asked me to make some points for her, I should like to refer once again to the split vote that we are proposing on Article 3(2). This states that the regulation does not apply to passengers travelling at a reduced fare which is not available directly or indirectly to the public. We fear that this wording is very vague. We should state quite clearly that a passenger travelling at a reduced fare also has a right to full compensation. I believe that it is very important that the provision is interpreted in this way. Commissioner, I should like to ask you one more question. As you know, Mr Lisi has made a very good proposal on Article 13, namely that the Member States have to ensure that if a carrier pays compensation and is not in actual fact responsible for the delay or cancellation it may have recourse to those responsible, whether it be air traffic control or other bodies, including state-owned systems. With a view to ensuring fair burden-sharing, can you assure us that, if we make the airlines responsible for paying compensation in the first place, they will also be able to have recourse to any state-owned organisations that have caused the delay or cancellation? You would assist us greatly if you were to support this portion of our amendments.

Political group: PPE-DE