Mr President, Commissioners, ladies and gentlemen, this is a lesson in political evolution. An open declaration – I do not need to go into the details – means in the eyes of Parliament that the contents of the declaration must be laid out clearly and unambiguously on the table, so to speak. In 1979 it was turned into a disguised declaration and, since that time, the argument has run and run. It is running in Member States and has long been running here in Parliament and in the Commission. Right up to the time the Commission presented its proposal, the Commission services tried to make it clear to us that this was an open declaration. This assessment was finally reaffirmed in its own proposal. Parliament then approved this fine proposal after making a few improvements, calling for a positive list for example. Then it went to the Council, where a bit of wheeling and dealing went on, which resulted in a half-open declaration. That was only to be expected from the Council. What disappointed us was the fact that the Commission adapted its proposal, which was reasonable and urgently called for an open declaration, to suit the Council. In the meantime, I had been in contact with all the associations which were involved in this area: the cooperatives, especially the Association of the Compound Feedingstuffs Industry and the Rural Credit Association of Germany. All of them tried their hardest to explain that this open declaration would not in fact be permissible or implementable. This continued in the Council when the associations were unsuccessful in Parliament. The Council and, as has already been said, the Commission reacted to this. Now we have a situation where we have a disguised half-open declaration. Interestingly, the then Federal Minister of the Federal Republic of Germany worked on this. He did not, however, issue a protocol stating that he, in fact, wanted the open declaration. When the BSE crisis hit, this Minister wrote to me saying that, as rapporteur and chairman of the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development, I should make sure the open declaration was implemented with no ifs or buts. And that was the very Minister who had been in favour of the half-open declaration. A real lesson in political culture. Now we are faced with a different situation in Member States, especially in Germany, and once again we have a wave of excitement over BSE. Now, all those who before had their foot on the brakes are coming and telling us to implement the open declaration. This is now our task. My suggestion is that we stick with the original Commission proposal and our amendments. We, in this Parliament, will implement the open declaration. We will enter into negotiations with the Council and, if necessary, we will frustrate them in Parliament and put the blame on the Council if political groups do not get what they want. Commissioners – those of you who are involved in this – I guess you will just have to get used to the fact that this Parliament will endorse my recommendation. I hope we have you on our side and that, in your role as mediator, which you have to assume, you will support our position in the negotiations which must get under way with the Council, as we are now at the codecision procedure stage. We are on the right track. We want the open declaration with no ifs or buts and we also want the positive list. Mr Byrne, in our proposal for an amendment, we are giving the Commission a goal to aim for. Not immediately, we know this is not possible, but by the end of the year, we want at least a Commission proposal which will signal to us what direction it could go in. You see, we are prepared to make compromises here too. (Applause)

Political group: Verts-ALE