WRITTEN QUESTION P-1420/03 by Mario Mastella (PPE-DE) to the Council. Violation by the Polish Government of international conventions on the custody of children.
Date: 2003-04-14
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: Italy, Poland, child, custody, illegal restraint, judicial cooperation in criminal matters in the EU, jurisdiction, parental responsibility

26.2.2004

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 51 E/87

Answer given by Mr Monti on behalf of the Commission

(5 May 2003)

As noted by the Honourable Member, on 2 April 2003 the Commission imposed a fine of
EUR 16,68 million on six French farmers’ unions for infringing the competition rules. The infringement
took the form of an agreement to fix between farmers’ unions and slaughterers’ unions a minimum
purchase price for certain types of cattle and to suspend and subsequently restrict beef imports from other
Member States. The decision will be published as soon as possible in the Official Journal of the European
Union.

As indicated in its decision, the Commission recognises the importance of trade union activity and the
freedom associated with it. However, this freedom does not authorise trade union organisations to violate
knowingly public order rules such as those governing competition. The Commission would point out in
this connection that the French Competition Council regularly imposes penalties in respect of offences of
this nature committed by trade union organisations, including those working in the agricultural sector.
Trade union activity should, rather, involve using all legal means to assist members. Moreover, as far as the
Commission is aware, no agreements on prices or on suspending imports have been concluded by
operators in the other Member States hit by falling beef prices.

The Commission is, of course, perfectly aware of the context of the specific crisis which hit the beef sector,
as the many regulatory measures taken to stabilise the market clearly demonstrate.
It spent over
EUR 1,5 billion on stabilisation measures; incidentally, France was authorised to grant over EUR 300 million
in direct aid to farmers hit by the crisis. It applied for the first time a specific provision enshrined in point
5(b) of its Guidelines on the method of setting fines (1) in order to reduce substantially (by 60 %) the fine
which would otherwise have been imposed.

The Commission cannot take a position in the abstract on how issues of this nature will be dealt with in
future. All competition issues need to be examined on a case-by-case basis. It can guarantee only that it
will fulfil its duties as guardian of the Treaty by enforcing competition rules whenever it is notified that
they have been infringed.

(1) OJ C 9, 14.1.1998.

(2004/C 51 E/099)

WRITTEN QUESTION P-1420/03

by Mario Mastella (PPE-DE) to the Council

(14 April 2003)

Subject: Violation by the Polish Government of international conventions on the custody of children

In August 1999 Mrs Karolina Paetz Pozza (Polish), the wife of Mr Paolo Pozza (Italian), on the pretext of
taking the couple’s children, Valentina and Federica (aged 2 and 7), to Poland on holiday, illegally kept
them in the country and subsequently prevented them from going to school and meeting their father.
These facts are borne out by a motion tabled by Senator Mauro Fabris which was adopted by the Italian
Senate.

Despite rulings by Italian and Polish courts giving custody of the two children to Mr Pozza, the latter has
been unable to bring the children back to Italy, although the Poznan police had the wherewithal to
repatriate to the two girls.

The failure to return the girls is attributable to the Polish police’s inability to enforce on its own territory a
custody order issued by Italy and based on the principles laid down in two international conventions to
which both Poland and Italy are signatories, namely the Luxembourg Convention of 20 May 1980 on
Recognition and Enforcement of Decisions concerning Custody of Children and the Hague Convention of
25 October 1980 on International Child Abduction.

C 51 E/88

Official Journal of the European Union

EN

26.2.2004

Given the above, would the Council state:

1. what steps it intends to take with a view to ensuring effective judicial cooperation with Poland in
custody and international child abduction matters in the run-up to the country’s now imminent
accession to the European Union as a full Member State;

2. how it intends to go about ensuring that existing international agreements on the custody of children
are fully complied with by the relevant judicial authorities, both in Poland and in the Member States;

3. whether it would not agree that it should exert some pressure on the Polish Government with a view

to rapidly resolving this distressing and regrettable family problem?

Reply

(29 September 2003)

The Council does not comment on specific cases before the courts in the Member States or in the acceding
countries. However, the Council
is able to tell the Honourable Member that its subsidiary bodies are
currently examining a proposal for a Council Regulation concerning jurisdiction and the recognition and
enforcement of judgments in matrimonial matters and in matters of parental responsibility.

One of the salient features of the Regulation concerns the wrongful removal of children in a Community
context. Provisions are to be laid down to determine the court which will have jurisdiction in a case where
a child has been wrongfully removed from one Member State and taken to another, as are measures
relating to the return of the child to its habitual residence. As has been stated on a number of occasions,
the Council considers that this Regulation should be approved as swiftly as possible.

As far as the international conventions referred to by the Honourable Member are concerned, it is not for
the Council to ensure that they are applied by national courts.

(2004/C 51 E/100)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1427/03

by Laura González Álvarez (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

Subject: Transport difficulties on the Balearic Islands

(23 April 2003)

One of the declarations annexed to the Treaty of Amsterdam recognises that island regions suffer from
structural handicaps which impair their economic and social development, and acknowledges that
Community legislation must take account of these handicaps so that specific measures can be adopted in
favour of these regions to integrate them better into the internal market on fair conditions.

Furthermore, paragraph 13 of
the European Parliament’s Resolution of 12 February 2003 on the
Commission White Paper ‘European transport policy for 2010: time to decide’ highlights ‘… the need for
transport policy to contribute to economic and social cohesion, and take into account the specific nature
of most remote, island and mountain regions and regions with low population density, through measures
designed to offset as much as possible their disadvantaged situation and to ensure territorial continuity’,
while paragraph 14 calls for ‘… the growing liberalisation of the transport sector to be accompanied by
investment, mobility, subsidies, price support and maintenance of services for remote and
guarantees,
island regions’.

Bearing in mind that Spain’s Balearic Islands suffer from a series of handicaps primarily affecting transport
and, consequently, the supply conditions for essential products, that they also suffer from a lack of water