WRITTEN QUESTION No. 3906/97 by Cristiana MUSCARDINI to the Commission. Structural Funds for Tuscany and breach of anti- seismic legislation
Date: 1997-12-11
Institutions: European Parliament, MUSCARDINI
Subjects: Structural Funds, Tuscany, administrative transparency, fight against unemployment, financial control, industrial development, national law, safety standard, seismic monitoring

C 187/82

EN

Official Journal of the European Communities

16. 6. 98

1.  Will the Commission therefore call on the Italian Government to make Malpensa feasible to use before it

takes any decision to increase the volume of traffic at that airport?

2.  Will it take steps to ensure that flights from Milan Linate Airport to other Union destinations, especially
Brussels, are not discontinued, given that flights from Milan to Brussels (the capital of Europe) are just as
important as those from Milan to Rome (the capital of Italy)?

Joint answer
to Written Questions E-3905/97 and E-3956/97
given by Mr Kinnock on behalf of the Commission

(29 January 1998)

1.
Council  Regulation  (EEC)  No  2408/92  on  access  for  Community  air  carriers  to  intra-Community  air
routes (1)  allows  a  Member  State  to  regulate  the  distribution  of  traffic  between  the  airports  within  an  airport
system, provided that such regulation is without discrimination on grounds of the nationality or identity of the air
carrier, and otherwise respects the general principles of Community law. The Commission, acting at the request
of a Member State or on its own initiative, examines such national traffic distribution rules and decides whether
the Member State may continue to apply them.

Furthermore, under the Commission(cid:146)s decision of 15 July 1997 authorising the State aid granted to Alitalia, the
Italian authorities undertook not to give Alitalia priority over other Community companies. This principle also
applies to the application or amendment of rules for the distribution of traffic within the same airport system.

The Commission is in contact with both the Italian authorities and airlines operating out of Linate, to ensure that
the criteria for the Milan traffic distribution rules and the envisaged date of their implementation comply with the
requirements of Community law described above.

2.
On the wider question of access to Malpensa, both the Commission and the European Investment Bank
have consistently stressed the need for adequate access to Malpensa 2000. Assurances were given by the Italian
authorities about the timely completion of the remaining essential road access works, followed by progressive
inauguration of rail access facilities, at a meeting between those authorities, Commission representatives, the
airport management, and other interested parties in October 1997. It was also reported at that meeting that the
matter  of  taxi  operations  and  fares  to  and  from  Malpensa  has  been  taken  up  by  the  Lombardy  regional
government, and that legislation is pending on the whole question of public transport access.

(1)  OJ 240, 24.8.1992.

(98/C 187/129)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-3906/97

by Cristiana Muscardini (NI) to the Commission

(11 December 1997)

Subject: Structural Funds for Tuscany and breach of anti-seismic legislation

Tuscany is widely believed to be a region which receives generous Community funding. Nevertheless, there are
major  failures  in  the  efforts  to  combat  unemployment  and  stimulate  industrial  development  ›  two  of  the
objectives receiving funding. One example of this is a factory (for making high-precision machinery) on which
construction  began  14  years  ago  but  which  is  still  not  able  to  begin  production  because  the  Regional  Civil
Engineer has not certified it as being in breach of anti-seismic legislation. For the past 14 years, political and
bureaucratic  posturing  by  the  Regional  President,  who  refuses  to  order  the  firm  constructing  the  factory  to
comply with the legislation, and the Mayor of the Commune of Pisa, who has declared the factory a danger to the
public and to private individuals, has made it impossible to begin production and hire labour.