Food information to consumers: ENVI postpones vote to next parliamentary term

The Environment Committee has decided (with 26 votes for and 10 votes against) to postpone its vote on the proposal on food information to consumers. In the view of the almost 1200 amendments tabled to the draft report by Renate Sommer (EPP-ED, DE), MEPs followed the rapporteurs request to assign her to submit a new draft report, incorporating as many amendments as possible, but this is unlikely to be done until after the elections. A new deadline for amendments will then be opened.

Ahead of the vote the rapporteur had explained that according to her the dossier is too complicated and complex and it has not been possible to agree on any compromise amendments on the key points. Therefore the new Parliament should get the possibility to deal with the dossier in the beginning of the next legislative term.

She was supported by John Bowis (EPP-ED, UK), according to whom one of the main issues to be solved is, which system to apply. He thinks the traffic light system would be too simplistic and a system based on GDA (Guideline Daily Amounts) too complex, and believes the industry will come up with possible solutions if it gets the necessary time. Dagmar Roth Behrendt (PSE, DE) thinks that it would be impossible to come up with a sound piece of legislation if the dossier would be voted this month, since everybody has a different view for example on alcohol labelling, labelling of the country of origin , the traffic light or the GDA system.

On the other hand Chris Davies (ALDE, UK) spoke against a postponement of the vote. He accepted that the dossier was a very complex one but underlined that nonetheless a lot of work had been done and therefore the report should be voted on now. He was supported by Kathalijne Mari Buitenweg (Greens, NL) who underlined that the committee had worked a lot on the dossier and that anyway the new EP would always have the possibility to alter the decision.

Next steps: The rapporteur will have to submit a new draft report, taking into account as many of the tabled amendments as possible. Since the last ENVI committee meeting in this legislative term is hold on 31. March, it is technically impossible to finalise the work during this legislative term. This implies that the vote is postponed to the next parliamentary term, when a new draft report will be presented and a new deadline for amendments will be set.

Procedure: The decision was based on rule 185 (5) of the parliaments rules of procedure which says: "In the light of the amendments tabled, the committee may, instead of proceeding to a vote, request the rapporteur to submit a new draft taking account of as many of the amendments as possible. A new deadline shall then be set for amendments to this draft."