Proposition 53K1257

Projet de loi modifiant la loi du 9 juillet 1984 concernant l'importation, l'exportation et le transit de déchets.

General information ¶

Submitted by

CD&V Leterme Ⅱ

Submission date

Feb. 25, 2011

Official page

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Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

EC Directive EC Regulation administrative sanction waste fine industrial waste environmental protection export

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP Open Vld MR VB

Abstained from voting

∉ N-VA LDD

Party dissidents ¶

• Peter Luykx (CD&V) abstained from voting.

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

March 31, 2011 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

The draft law amending the law of 9 July 1984 on the import, export and transit of waste was discussed at the committee meeting of 15 March 2011. The draft law sets out the sanctions for violations of the provisions of a number of European regulations which belong to the federal jurisdiction on the transit of waste.

The Regulations provide that Member States are responsible for setting the penalties for non-compliance with the rules imposed by the Regulations. In addition, the bill transposes a number of articles of Directive 9998/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 November 2008 which fall within the federal jurisdiction under Belgian law. Finally, this preliminary draft introduces a system of administrative fines to enable faster and more effective enforcement of the law. The new law also sets out the powers of officials authorized to carry out controls on the transit of waste.

Minister Magnette frames the distributed powers in this matter. In order to ⁇ a coherent policy, an update is urgent.

Mr. Bert Wollants asked during the discussion to pay attention to five points.

First, the Regions should be involved in the preparation of such legislation. Second, the draft appears to include, in addition to transit, a reference to the transport of waste, while this is a regional competence. Third, the formulation of the control powers is too broadly understood. Fourth, this bill amends the law of 9 July 1984. According to this law, the King may, in some cases, take measures to revoke or amend the provisions of the law through a KB. The Legislative Chambers shall be notified of this before it is published in the Official Journal. Mr Wollants asks whether this is in accordance with Community law. He also asks why the new law should no longer inform Parliament before it is published in the Official Journal. Fifth, in the law, the employer is no longer held liable, but the notifier. This changes the scope of the law.

Snoy and Muylle find that the State Council has made an observation on the obligation of the judge to proceed to the qualification of the crime in accordance with the division of competence. The harmonisation of the sanctions could be done through a cooperative alliance. Both are wondering how far this stands.

Mrs. Muylle also calls attention to the legislative technical observations of the State Council and asks the Minister to address them.

Mr Bonte also regrets that the comments of the State Council have not been taken into account. The Minister said that consultations with the West were held where necessary. The Minister is not opposed to legislative improvements.

In the article-by-article discussion a lot of comments are made and amendments are submitted. I will give you an overview of these amendments.

In the discussion of Article 5, Mr. Wollants submits an amendment that wants to remove the provisions on the transport of waste, as it is a double legislation at the regional and federal level. The Minister does not endorse the amendment. It is rejected with 9 against 4 and 1 abstinence.

Mrs Snoy submits an amendment extending the retention period of the register of hazardous waste. The Minister has no objections to this amendment. It was adopted with 8 votes for and 5 abstentions.

In the discussion of Article 8, Mr. Wollants submits an amendment to remove Article 13 of the Act of 1984 as unnecessary, in view of the Law on Labour Contracts of 3 July 1978. The Minister argues that European legislation does not allow free judgment for Member States. This amendment was rejected by 8 votes against 3 and 3 abstentions.

During the discussion of Article 10, Mr. Wollants again submitted an amendment in order to better define the control powers of the officials. The Minister disputes the usefulness of this amendment. Mr Wollants criticizes this and wants to uniformise the controls with this amendment. This amendment is also rejected with 8 votes against 3 and 3 abstentions.

The amended bill is voted in its entirety, taking into account the legislative improvements, and the bill is adopted by 10 votes in favour and 4 abstentions.

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, I thank Mrs. Muylle for playing my spokesman in this story. However, I will add a few elements that I think are very important.

Per ⁇ it is good to overlook what the transit of waste actually is. As far as there are enthusiasts of creative power distribution in the hall, this is one.

Transit of waste means that waste comes from abroad, goes through Belgium and then goes back abroad. All other transport of waste belongs to the competence of the Regions. This means that the regional inspection service, when it wants to inspect a truck, must determine that its competence expires, although the waste is exactly the one for which it is competent, but merely because they are on the wrong side of the border. Then, a call should be made to the federal inspection services. This is actually a difficult matter.

A typical example of such transit transportation, which has recently appeared in the press, concerns the waste electrical appliances from Germany that go through the port of Antwerp to Ghana. Some may have seen the report Vranckx “Our waste in Africa”. You know the story.

It is a good thing that we are working on this, that we ensure that the inspections can be better conducted and that we can better punish.

I have a personal connection with this file because in a past life I myself have done those checks for years and have practical experience in this area. I know how one thing actually goes in his work. Based on this, my group thought it was useful to link this practical experience with the legislative work in order to work constructively on better legislation.

We submitted a number of constructive amendments, but there was, unfortunately, little animo. Therefore, I would like to return to a number of issues to show the importance of them and to emphasize that they are good amendments that should be supported. There are three amendments.

First, concerning the supervisory rights. Mrs. Muylle has spoken about it recently. It is in the interest of the controls that the supervisory rights are adapted to the work in practice. If one has to let a certain transport go because one just does not have the right to do the control, then there is something wrong.

In 2008, we did this exercise in the Flemish Region very extensively. We, together with the colleagues of sp.a, CD&V and Open Vld, have worked on the environmental enforcement decree. In practice, one was very satisfied with the way some things have been improved. They use these tools today.

As a result of the report Vranckx, which I just talked about, by the way, a resolution has been adopted specifically asking the federal government to improve that, to ensure that the resources are there to properly control. That resolution was signed by the sp.a, CD&V, Open Vld and by our friends of Green!. I think it is important that we pay attention to this.

We have formulated the following proposals. First, it is necessary to ensure that the supervisory authorities can also use photographic material to make observations. We have introduced this addition specifically in Flanders because there were problems identified in this regard. Therefore, we must work on this.

Furthermore, we would like to provide for Flanders that the carrier and the accompanying of the transports can be involved in the checks. After all, a number of the checks take place on ADR transports, dangerous substances, tankers. It is not easy to control those things. It is therefore important that people who are trained to do so, such as those accompanyers and carriers, can be directed by the inspectors.

Strangely enough, the law stipulates that landfills of waste, so where they are stored in anticipation of further transport, are not checked after 20:00. I have a slight suspicion when the most misleading things will happen there.

Second, the responsibility is placed on the notifier. The current law indeed stipulates that the employer is responsible for what his staff performs. If a carrier is not in order, then ultimately its employer is responsible. However, the Minister now designates the notifying person as responsible. The notificator is actually the first step in the whole process. Usually it is the owner of the waste. He starts the transport, calls a carrier for the transport, to eventually reach a recipient who will process the waste. The present draft law states that only the notifier is responsible for what his staff does, and therefore neither the carrier nor the transport company nor the recipient. This is not true and is not aligned with practice.

Third, the so-called risk-free transport. The Minister found it necessary to include in the law that the transit of waste must take place, for example, without noise barriers.

I wonder how that will go in his work? Since the regions are currently busy making noise loading cards for railway traffic, among other things, I can imagine that there is noise impediment. How can one transport something without noise obstacles? According to the Minister, it is about transit, not about transport. You know what I said in the beginning: please tell me the difference.

Colleagues, I think we have a chance to do something about this. We have submitted an amendment – it is up to your banks – with which we improve a number of things specifically in the area of supervisory rights, to ensure that we can get a good control. Those other 2 provisions are also important, but in practice they are completely inapplicable: it is not beautiful in legislation, but it also does no harm to anyone. A notorious CD&V’er from Erpe-Mere once said: that doesn’t eat bread. Well, I think he’s right and that’s what it is about.

For my Flemish colleagues, I made it a little easier. The things you find on your bench are those things you have yourself approved in the Flemish Parliament. Exactly the same things that we found necessary to use and which you hopefully vote for today, but in the committee you voted against in any case. I hope you can show a little bit of steadfastness and make sure that we can come up with a better policy.