Air transport: common rules for civil aviation security

In its common position adopted unanimously, the Council accepts the 2 amendments rejected by the Commission, while rejecting 10 amendments that the Commission had accepted, albeit that the Commission gave its agreement in principle to some of these amendments. The Council agrees to 2 amendments agreed by the Commission. The 2 rejected amendments concern the transposition by reference of standards produced by an external organisation (ECAC) and the deletion of a Community control mechanism aimed at verifying that more stringent measures adopted by Member States remain proportionate and do not affect the proper functioning of the internal market. The 10 amendments rejected by the Council and previously accepted by the Commission may be placed into 4 groups: 1) where they raise the important issue of public financing of security measures; 2) where they refer to current budgetary practice; 3) where the Council had modified the text of the original proposal in a way that largely responds to Parliament's amendment; 4) amendments which seek to enhance the effectiveness of security measures in general. Furthermore, in its common position, the Council does not accept 12 amendments proposed by the European Parliament. These are as follows: - including a reference to the financing of additional security measures; - the confidentiality aspects included in a new Article "Dissemination of information"; - unannounced inspections; - third-country dimensions; - the reference of standards produced by an external organisation (ECAC); - Community control mechanisms aimed at verifying that more stringent measures adopted by Member States remain appropriate and do not affect the functioning of the internal market. In addition, the Annex to the common position contains common basic standards on air security measures. In the Commission proposal, the standards were similar to those in ECAC Document 30. It was proposed that, at a later date, a committee procedure could be used to bring the standards into line with the Community's current needs. The Council felt that a committee procedure would considerably delay the introduction of measures that were required urgently. it therefore instructed the ad hoc multi-disciplinary Working Party set up following the extraordinary Council on 14 September 2001 to start work at once on bringing the standards into line with current requirements. �