Commission rebuked over delay on trap ban

Date: 14/12/1995

By Michael Mann

ANGRY MEPs attacked Commission Vice-President Sir Leon Brittan this week for failing to explain in person the proposed one-year delay in the ban on imports of furs from animals caught with jaw-type leghold traps.

The onslaught was led by the chairman of the European Parliament's environment committee, Socialist MEP Ken Collins, who accused Brittan of sending Environment Commissioner Ritt Bjerregaard “to do his own dirty work”.

Bjerregaard, not on this occasion the villain of the piece, told the Parliament's plenary session on Monday (11 December) that the Commission had made its decision to allow more time for discussions over 'humane' trapping methods with the US, Canada and Russia. She also claimed that the introduction of the ban would have brought the Union into direct conflict with its trading partners in the World Trade Organisation (WTO), where it would almost certainly have faced a legal challenge.

Bjerregaard pointed out that the ban could not come into force as planned on 1 January 1996 because the Commission had not prepared implementing legislation to give it a legal footing.

Collins scorned this argument, asking whether each time the Council decides on a regulation, “the Commission has the power to decide on its own whether or not that regulation will be implemented?” He also wondered why Brittan had not looked at the issue of possible trade difficulties while he was negotiating the GATT accord on behalf of the EU.

Collins attributed the decision to what he called “the supremacy of free trade over any consideration of animal welfare ... or the environment”.

Bjerregaard promised proposals to give legal force to the decision to delay the ban as quickly as possible, but was told by Collins that as far as the Parliament was concerned, the ban would come in on 1 January if MEPs had not finished their deliberations before then. Most other party groups supported Collins' view. Several speakers also voiced doubts that the extra year would be sufficient time to find an agreement on humane standards.

MEPS are expected to support a resolution being voted on by the Parliament today (14 December) which includes a commitment to look into the practicality of taking the Commission to court over its decision. It also calls on the Commission to produce a study on the real economic damage which would be caused to native North American trappers by the ban, and to work with them to look into “environmentally-sustainable economic” alternatives.