Will the first Citizens' Initiative to reach public hearing go the distance and transform national water and sanitation policies across the EU? We ask Matthias Groote.

Flood of signatures sweeps citizen water initiative to top of agenda

https://api.multimedia.europarl.europa.eu/documents/20125/16493272/n004-0003-enxx.srt

Water is a commodity all Europeans  should have guaranteed access to.

This is the demand  of the first European Citizens' Initiative,

with almost 1.9 million signatures  submitted to the European Commission.

In February, the European Parliament, too,  will debate this initiative.

and have selected three  which I'd like to share with you.

Hi, my name is Pablo Sánchez, I'm one of  the coordinators and co-organisers

of the European Citizens' Initiative  Right2Water.

Given that the United Nations declared in  2010 water and sanitation as a human right,

don't you think that our European  Citizens' Initiative will help to introduce

this political statement  into European legislation,

given that no EU Member State  has this in their constitution?

You have to say this is  a very strong signal which is being sent

by this first successful  Citizens' Initiative.

I can't see any Member State  daring to just ignore all this.

You can't simply ignore it.  It is a massive movement within the EU.

I'm very hopeful that something  tangible will result from it.

What does this mean in legal terms?  What actually needs to happen?

On a European level,  which is all I can comment on,

the Commission must produce a binding  proposal, a binding legislative procedure,

which then passes through Parliament  and the Council of Ministers.

What this initiative  has clearly already achieved,

is that water policy  is at the top of the agenda right now.

It's not in any national constitution yet.

To be fair, water policy is mainly a matter  for European legislation.

So we need to bear the right  to clean water in mind

when it comes to the next treaty reform.

I don't know yet,  that's hard for me to predict.

Let's move on to the next question.  Here we go.

The European Commission has publicly  declared that water is a public good.

Don't you think that our  European Citizens' Initiative will be useful

to keep water and sanitation out of  internal market rules and liberalisation

We have been working on  the Concessions Directive here

and the Right2Water initiative  ran simultaneously.

It would never have occurred  to the Commission and Mr Barnier,

to exclude water  from the Concessions Directive

And the pressure mounted  due to millions of signatures.

Let's be clear about this, initially,  water was going to be privatised.

Not privatised by us, this needs to be  decided nationally, on a local level.

but to make it obligatory that Member States  have to issue concessions

was part of the initial directive, and was  then nipped in the bud by Mr Barnier.

It's often said, the devil is in the detail.

Do you know that the UN Special  Rapporteur on the human right to water

has confirmed in writing to the organisers  of this Citizens' Initiative,

that human rights are neutral  on the ways public services are organised,

so governments are free to use  public sector or private sector operators,

and the Commission can't really do much.

What I think is really important, and this  is shown by the number of signatures,

there has been a veritable rush  of people eager to sign,

is that citizens don't want  a total privatisation of the water supply.

They don't want it to become  a commodity like any other,

they want it to remain a public commodity.

The UN describes it differently, as the  gentleman with the question pointed out.

But we in the European Parliament  are the legislative,

and I'm taking  this citizens' initiative very seriously,

including the initiative's general impetus,

that people in the EU feel uncomfortable  when it comes to privatisation,

especially regarding the number one  food item, which is what water is.

They don't want it to become a market item.

Each citizens' initiative starting here will  of course cause a so-called lobby battle.

Has the so-called water lobby  been to see you or the Commission?

This is a first, it's the first successful  citizens' initiative in the EU.

So we discussed this with the coordinators,  not shirking any problems,

why the hearings with the initiators  were taking place in the first place.

Some colleagues brought up the idea  of consulting experts.

some wanted an expert of a particular  persuasion, others wanted a different area,

so in the end we said we will simply  handle the whole matter in a way

whereby the initiators  of the citizens' initiative are present

so they can point out to us  what they actually want to achieve with it.

Matthias Groote, many thanks.  -Thank you.