EN    EN  COMMISSION OF THE E UROPEAN COMMUNITIES 
Brussels, 27.6.2005 
COM(2005) 277 final 
2002/0254 (COD)   
OPINION OF THE COMMISSION 
 
pursuant to Article 251 (2) third sub-paragr aph, point (c) of the EC Treaty, on the 
European Parliament’s amendments to the Council’s Common Position regarding the 
proposal for a 
DIRECTIVE OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL 
 
concerning the quality of bathing waters 
AMENDING THE PROPOSAL OF THE COMMISSION  
pursuant to Article 250 (2) of the EC Treaty 
 
EN 2   EN 2002/0254 (COD) 
OPINION OF THE COMMISSION 
 
pursuant to Article 251 (2) third sub-paragr aph, point (c) of the EC Treaty, on the 
European Parliament’s amendments to the Council’s Common Position regarding the 
proposal for a 
DIRECTIVE OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL 
 
concerning the quality of bathing waters 
1. BACKGROUND  
PROCEDURE 
The proposal COM(2002) 581 final was transmitted to the European Parliament and 
the Council in accordance with the co-decisi on procedure provided for in Article 175 
(1) of the EC Treaty. 
The European Economic and Social Co mmittee gave its opinion on 19th June 2003. 
The Committee of the Regions ga ve its opinion on 9th April 2003. 
The European Parliament gave its opin ion at first reading on 21st October 2003. 
Following the opinion of the European Parlia ment and pursuant to Article 250(2) of 
the EC Treaty, the Commission adopted an amended proposal COM (2004) 245 final 
on 5th April 2004. 
Following the opinion of the European Parlia ment and pursuant to Article 250(2) of 
the EC Treaty, the Council adopted the Common Position formally on 20 December 2004. The Commission’s Communication on th e Common Position was adopted on 
4
th January 2005 and the European Parliament adopted its position on second reading 
on 10th May 2005. 
OBJECTIVE OF THE COMMISSION PROPOSAL 
The Commission’s proposal was intended to replace the existing bathing water 
directive which was adopted in 1976. That directive, while been very successful in promoting higher standards of bathing water,  is considered to be outmoded and to 
represent the state of technical and sc ientific knowledge in the mid-70s. The 
Commission’s proposal increased the severi ty of the mandatory microbiological 
standards for Community bathing wate rs and updated the management and 
monitoring regime. 
 
EN 3   EN 2. COMMISSION COMMENTS  
2.1. General 
On 11th May 2005, the European Parliament a dopted 26 of the 54 amendments that 
were tabled. Out of the 26 amendments adopted, the Commission can accept 10 amendments in full, 1 amendment in part a nd a further 3 amendments in principle. 12 
of the adopted amendments are not acceptable to the Commission. 
2.2. Detailed Comments 
2.2.1.  Amendments Accepted in Full  
Amendments 9, 17, 19, 21 and 33  concern improvements to the provision of 
information to the public and the Commission can accept them. Amendment 2 
changes the text of recital 11 to include references to di rectives dealing with access 
to environmental information and public par ticipation in the draw ing up of plans and 
programmes and is a useful clarification. Amendments 13 and 26  bring forward 
respectively the dates for developing beach prof iles and for the entry into force of the 
directive. The Commission considers that th ese amendments are acceptable and will 
expedite the implementation. Amendment 25 allows the technical updating of the 
directive to include viruses as well as bacterial indicators. Given that viral contamination is an important consideration in bathing waters and that the Commission is currently promoting resear ch on this issue under the 6th Framework 
Programme, this is a constructive addition to the text. Amendment 10 is a minor 
wording change to Article 5. 
2.2.2.  Amendments Accepted in Part  
Amendment 15 concerns the consultation and participation of interested parties in a 
number of the measures foreseen in th e directive. The Commission can accept most 
of the text as proposed, but considers that  Member States can only be required to 
create the conditions for interested parties to  give their input to the process: Member 
States may not be able to identify all su ch parties and they certainly cannot oblige 
them to take part. 
2.2.3.  Amendments Accepted in Principle 
Amendments 16 and 22 concern the establishment by the Commission of an EU wide 
symbol (16) or system of symbols (22) for providing information to the public. The 
Commission can accept to develop standard sy mbols, but these should be restricted 
to providing information on the classificat ion of the bathing water quality according 
to the directive and perhaps warnings in th e case of short-term pollution incidents. 
Amendment 55 proposes quality standards fo r the classification category 
“sufficient”, which are considerably mo re stringent than those in the Common 
Position. While the standards as proposed in  the amendment are far too severe to 
gain the necessary support in the Council,  a certain degree of tightening up of the 
standards is one possible option for bridging the gap between the two institutions. The Commission can therefore accept the princi ple of this amendment in so much as 
it serves to develop an agreement be tween the Council and the Parliament. 
 
EN 4   EN 2.2.4.  Amendments Not Accepted 
Amendments 1, 3 and 14 concern emergency planning pr ovisions which do not need 
to be included on a directive dealing with bathing water. The Common Position 
already contains suitable provisions for d ealing with short-term pollution events, but 
there is no need to extend the scope of the directive to include actions more properly covered within the framework of civil prot ection and disaster response. Amendments 
6 and 7 seek to advance the dates for complia nce with the quality standards in the 
directive. The dates established in the Common Position are aligned with the effective date for achieving good status  under the Water Framework Directive 
(2000/60/EC) and this synchronisation was don e deliberately in order to streamline 
the process of planning and investment. For this reason, the Commission supports the 
dates in the Common Position and cannot accept these ame ndments. Amendment 4 
seeks to introduce a new definition of s hort-term pollution which is ambiguous and 
difficult to implement and control. Acco rdingly, the Commission cannot accept this 
amendment. Amendment 11 introduces information elements which are already 
present in the Common Po sition (Article 12) and is therefore redundant. 
Amendment 20 requires translations of information in English and French to be 
made available to the public. However, the local authorities are far better placed to decide upon the appropriat e languages to be used and the Commission does not 
consider it appropriate to impose a language regime as suggested. Amendments 23 
and 24 impinge upon the Commission’s right of initiative and for that reason cannot 
be accepted. Amendment 34 allows calculation methods to  be used in cases where 
water samples are not stored or processed correctly. This will simply encourage bad 
practice and is not acceptable. Amendment 36, seeks to limit the length of the time 
that the “sufficient” classification category remains in use to 8 years after the entry 
into force of the directive. As this would mean that the “sufficient” category would 
disappear by 2013 and the date for complia nce with the quality standards is 2015, 
this amendment is not compatible with th e rest of the text and cannot be accepted. 
2.3 Amended Proposal 
Pursuant to Article 250(2) of the EC Tr eaty, the Commission amends its proposal as 
set out.