Meeting of the Committee on International Trade on Recommendations to the European Commission on the negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) in the EP in Brussels.Statements by Bernd LANGE (S&D, DE), Rapporteur, Ignacio GARCIA, EU - TTIP Chief Negotiator, David MARTIN (S&D, UK), Jaroslaw WALESA (EPP, PL), Jude KIRTON-DARLING (S&D, UK) and Christofer FJELLNER (EPP, SE).

Brussels

debate

Committee on International Trade

FJELLNER, Christofer (EPP, SE)

LANGE, Bernd (S&D, DE)

MARTIN, David (S&D, UK)

Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T)

KIRTON-DARLING, Jude (S&D, UK)

GARCIA BECERRO, Ignacio (ES)

WAŁĘSA, Jarosław (EPP, PL)

Recommendations to the European Commission on the negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP): extracts from the debate on the report by Bernd LANGE (S&D,DE) at the Committee on International Trade

SOUNDBITE (German), Bernd LANGE (S&amp;D, DE), Rapporteur, "We the European Parliament clearly can take position on the principle of rules, creating rules for a global market in the interest of citizens and not of some economic sectors."

SOUNDBITE (English), Ignacio GARCIA, EU - TTIP Chief Negotiator, "One of the important audiences going to be the U.S. Congress, I think some of you referred previously to the question is the U.S. committed to these negotiations and I think the next 3 months are going to be critical from that point of view."

SOUNDBITE (English), Ignacio GARCIA, EU -TTIP Chief Negotiator, "Anything that we do in the TTIP implies harmonising and that will be not be a lot, in so far what we do in TTIP in terms of harmonising it be could only be harmonisation up wards, harmonisation downwards is simply not an option in the discussions with the U.S."

SOUNDBITE (English), David MARTIN (S&amp;D, UK), To the US, I think we have to be very clear that we politically back some of the COM ambitions and give Ignacio a stronger hand with the counter part in the ISD. For example on public procurement, we have to be very clear, 'by America' is not compatible with an U.S. -EU free trade agreement. We have to make clear to the Americans that we still strongly believe in geographical indicators and we expect them to part of the agreement even though they are still pushing back very hard against that."

SOUNDBITE (English), David MARTIN (S&amp;D, UK), "Also it is easy to dismiss the 147.000 people who opposed ISDS as at fore clicking a button, 147.000 felt strong enough to click that button, that is must more response refer to any Commission and European Union consultation, so we can't likely dismiss this and our document has to make it very clear that we take in account their concerns. Some others said that we have to do the same with services, there can be no threat to public services through TTIP."

SOUNDBITE (English), Jaroslaw WALESA (EPP, PL), "Under TTIP we will remove all duties on imports from the U.S. where the gas prices are a third or a quarter of our price, the electricity is one half, they have no REACH, they have not ITS, for some time I kept asking the European Commission to explain its logic and plans on how to deal with the heavy industry sector."

SOUNDBITE (English), Jude KIRTON-DARLING (S&amp;D, UK), "One element which isn't in here but which is part of the public debate is the impact is the TTIP negotiation is having on other parts of the world, particular developing countries."

SOUNDBITE (English), Christofer FJELLNER (EPP, SE), "These are the two leading economies of the world, the 2 economies with the highest standards in the world and if we can't agree how we will ever create international binding agreements on different areas."