WRITTEN QUESTION E-0627/02

by Wolfgang Kreissl-Dörfler (PSE) to the Commission

(6 March 2002)

Subject: Conservation of wild birds directive

In 1999 the Commission initiated proceedings for failure to act against the Federal Republic of Germany (action No 1999/4095) in response to the incomplete transposition of Directive 79/409/EEC(1) (conservation of wild birds directive) in connection with the federal German hunting laws. Although the Commission has already sent letters of formal notice to the Federal German Government, the latter has not even amended the federal regulation governing hunting seasons, which still authorises the hunting of birds, even during migration back from their wintering areas and during the breeding season. Instead, the Federal German Government has asked the Commission to set up a working party with the task of drawing up interpretations of the relevant provisions and thus highlighting the scope for circumventing the ban on spring hunting (Article 7 of the conservation of wild birds directive).

1. Who are the members of this working party?

2. What time-frame has the Commission laid down for the drafting of the interpretations by the working party?

3. Does the Commission take the view that the judgments concerning Article 9 of the directive already handed down by the CJEC and national administrative courts are not sufficient, so that additional interpretations are genuinely needed?

4. What measures does the Commission plan to take in order to prompt the Federal German Government, which has thus far merely paid lip service to the need to transpose the conservation of wild birds directive, to speed up the transposition process?

(1) OJ L 103, 25.4.1979, p. 1.

Answer given by Mrs Wallström on behalf of the Commission

(2 May 2002)

The establishment of a working group to assist the Commission with developing guidance on interpretation of the hunting provisions of the Birds Directive, Council Directive 79/409/EEC of 2 April 1979 on the conservation of wild birds, is at the initiative of the Commission and has been approved by all Member States, within the framework of the Committee for the Adaptation to Technical and Scientific Progress for the Birds Directive.

This is a logical continuation of earlier work on the key concepts of Article 7(4) relating to Period of Reproduction and prenuptial Migration of Annex II Bird Species in the EU, now completed.

1. The Working group is composed of experts from BirdLife International, the Federation of Associations for Hunting and Conservation of the Union (FACE) and official nominees of Germany, France, Italy, Austria, Finland and United Kingdom.

2. The intention is to provide a document of the Commission during 2002.

3. The guide will be fully in accordance with the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice on hunting and based on sound scientific principles. However, there are still issues related to the practice of hunting for which the Court has not given interpretation (e.g. the French Conseil d'Etat has recently referred questions relating to the possible use of Article 9 derogations for hunting to the Court). The Commission, in preparing the guide, has stated from the outset that definitive interpretation of environmental legislation is the role of the Court.

The Commission is pursuing the alleged infringement of the Birds Directive by a number of provisions in the German Federal and regional hunting legislation in the framework of case 1999/4095. On 20 December 2001 the Commission decided to bring the matter before the Court. Since this decision was taken, new developments in the German legislation intervened or are imminent, which the Commission must assess before the decision to apply to the Court can be implemented.