MEMBERS of the European Parliament voted 299-292 against the imposition of a tax on all ships calling at EU ports to create a shipbreaking fund to pay for costly ship recycling facilities
MEPs vote 299-292 against shipbreaking tax, evading EU scrap control MEMBERS of the European Parliament voted 299-292 against the imposition of a tax on all ships calling at EU ports to create a shipbreaking fund to pay for costly ship recycling facilities in the European Union and closing the wrecking beaches in India.
Earlier, the European Community Shipowners' Associations (ECSA), the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) and the Asian Shipowners' Forum (ASF) had united to condemn the tax, reported London's TankerOperator."This is an unacceptable tax on trade and will cause grave offence to the EU's trading partners, not just major ship recycling nations such as China and India, but to major shipping nations such as Japan and Singapore," said ECSA secretary general Alfons Guinier. Condemning the vote were environmentalists, trade unionists and human rights groups, under the banner of the NGO Shipbreaking Platform."Let's face it, the parliament failed to uphold its own principles and to deliver as promised," said Patrizia Heidegger, executive director of the NGO Shipbreaking Platform. "Last year, one European ship was sent to a substandard beaching yard in south Asia every day. The EU needs to move now if it really wants to hold European shipowners accountable."The fund was proposed by Carl Schlyter of the leftist Greens-EFA and was opposed mainly by members of EPP - the centre-right European People's Party - the biggest political group in the EU Parliament.
The fund, if created, would finance clean and green recycling and hazardous waste management within the EU facilities. It would also prevent ships from re-flagging outside of the EU, a common practice when ships are sold for beaching. Whereas 40 per cent of the world's fleet is European-owned, only 17 per cent fly an EU flag.
