Considerations on COM(2000)489-1 - Committee on Safe Seas and amending the Regulations on maritime safety and the prevention of pollution from ships - Main contents
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| dossier | COM(2000)489-1 - Committee on Safe Seas and amending the Regulations on maritime safety and the prevention of pollution from ships. |
|---|---|
| document | COM(2000)489  |
| date | November 5, 2002 |
(2) By its Resolution of 8 June 1993 on a common policy on safe seas(7), the Council approved in principle the establishment of a Committee on Safe Seas and the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (COSS) and called on the Commission to present a proposal to set up such a committee.
(3) The role of COSS is to centralise the tasks of the committees set up under the Community legislation on maritime safety, the prevention of pollution from ships and the protection of shipboard living and working conditions and to assist and advise the Commission on all matters of maritime safety and prevention or reduction of pollution of the environment by shipping activities.
(4) In keeping with the Resolution of 8 June 1993, a Committee on Safe Seas and the Prevention of Pollution from Ships should be set up and assigned the tasks previously devolved to the committees established under the aforesaid legislation. All new Community legislation adopted in the field of maritime safety should stipulate recourse to the Committee thereby set up.
(5) Decision 87/373/EEC has been replaced by Council Decision 1999/468/EC of 28 June 1999 laying down the procedures for the exercise of implementing powers conferred on the Commission(8), the provisions of which should therefore be applied to COSS. The purpose of the latter decision is to define the Committee procedures applicable and ensure more comprehensive information to the European Parliament and the public on the work of the committees.
(6) The measures required to implement the aforesaid legislation should be adopted in accordance with Decision 1999/468/EC.
(7) The aforesaid legislation should also be amended to substitute COSS for the Committee set up by Directive 93/75/EEC or, where appropriate, for the ad hoc committee established under any particular act. This Regulation should in particular amend the relevant provisions of Council Regulations (EEC) No 613/91 of 4 March 1991 on the transfer of ships from one register to another within the Community(9), (EC) No 2978/94 of 21 November 1994 on the implementation of IMO Resolution A.747(18) on the application of tonnage measurement of ballast spaces in segregated ballast oil tankers(10), (EC) No 3051/95 of 8 December 1995 on the safety management of roll-on/roll-off passenger ferries (ro-ro ferries)(11) and Regulation (EC) No 417/2002 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 February 2002 on the accelerated phasing-in of double hull or equivalent design requirements for single hull oil tankers and repealing Council Regulation (EC) No 2978/94(12), in order to insert a reference to COSS and to stipulate the regulatory procedure laid down in Article 5 of Decision 1999/468/EC.
(8) Moreover, the aforesaid legislation is based on the application of rules resulting from international instruments in force at the date of adoption of the Community act in question, or at the date specified by the latter. As a consequence, Member States cannot apply the subsequent amendments to these international instruments until the Community Directives or Regulations have been amended. This has major disadvantages owing to the difficulty of ensuring that the date of entry into force of the amendment at international level coincides with that of the Regulation integrating this amendment into Community law, not least the delayed application within the Community of the most recent and most stringent international safety standards.
(9) However, it is necessary to draw a distinction between the provisions of a Community act making reference, for the purposes of their application, to an international instrument and Community provisions reproducing an international instrument in full or in part. In the latter case, the most recent amendments to the international instruments cannot in any case be rendered applicable until the Community provisions concerned have been amended.
(10) Member States should therefore be permitted to apply the most recent provisions of international instruments, with the exception of those explicitly incorporated in a Community act. This can be done by stating that the international convention applicable for the purposes of the Directive or Regulation concerned is that 'in its up-to-date version', without mentioning the date.
(11) For reasons of transparency, the relevant amendments to international instruments that are integrated in Community maritime legislation should be made public in the Community through their publication in the Official Journal of the European Communities.
(12) A specific conformity checking procedure should, however, be set up to enable the Commission, after consulting COSS, to take whatever measures may be necessary to exclude the risk of amendments to the international instruments being incompatible with the aforesaid legislation or Community policy on maritime safety, the prevention of pollution from ships and the protection of shipboard living and working conditions in force or with the objectives pursued by that legislation. Such a procedure should also prevent international amendments from lowering the standard of maritime safety achieved in the Community.
(13) The conformity checking procedure will only be fully effective if the planned measures are adopted as speedily as possible, but at all events before the expiry of the deadline for the entry into force of the international amendment. Consequently, the time available to the Council to act on the proposed measures in accordance with Article 5(6) of Decision 1999/468/EC should be one month.