The transport committee of the European Parliament voted yesterday evening on a regulation aimed at modernising port services and operations and at creating framework conditions to attract investment in ports.
The author of the parliamentary report, S&D MEP Knut Fleckenstein, reshaped the original legislative proposal in order to improve efficiency and financial transparency, while ensuring more social rights for workers. He also tried to bring enough flexibility to different existing models by referring to the organisation of port services with provisions on minimum requirements.
Knut Fleckenstein said:
"For the first time in the course of the long discussions on the port package, we have the ports, the terminal operators and the unions on board.
"We managed to put a clear stop to the Commission's former ambition of liberalising port services. Instead, the regulation now focuses on financial transparency, which is important in relation to the debate on state-aid rules."
S&D spokesperson on transport, Ismail Ertug MEP, said:
"The rapporteur and the S&D Group have fought hard to steer the report in the right direction: strengthening social rights, creating more transparent rules for the financing of ports and ensuring respect for the existence of different port models throughout the EU."
The report is expected to go to the plenary vote in March.
