German Bundestag Printed Paper 17/5194 17Th Electoral Term 23 March 2011
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German Bundestag Printed paper 17/5194 17th electoral term 23 March 2011 Motion tabled by the Members of the Bundestag Dr Günter Krings, Dr Hans-Peter Uhl, Reinhard Grindel, Peter Altmaier, Günter Baumann, Manfred Behrens, Clemens Binninger, Wolfgang Bosbach, Helmut Brandt, Michael Frieser, Dr Franz Josef Jung, Günter Lach, Stephan Mayer, Stefan Müller, Beatrix Philipp, Armin Schuster, Ingo Wellenreuther, Volker Kauder, Gerda Hasselfeldt and the CDU/CSU parliamentary group and the Members of the Bundestag Hartfrid Wolff, Gisela Piltz, Manuel Höferlin, Dr Stefan Ruppert, Jimmy Schulz, Serkan Tören, Birgit Homburger and the FDP parliamentary group in respect of the Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council “Towards a stronger European disaster response: the role of civil protection and humanitarian assistance” (COM(2010) 600 final; Council document 15614/10) Here:Opinion delivered to the Federal Government pursuant to Article 23 paragraph 2 of the Basic Law in conjunction with section 9 of the Act on Cooperation between the Federal Government and the German Bundestag in Matters concerning the European Union Effectively structuring disaster response in Europe The Bundestag is requested to adopt the following motion: I. The German Bundestag notes: Cooperation in responding to disasters is a matter of international legal concern and an expression of solidarity between the Member States and towards third countries. With the Lisbon Treaty the Union has been endowed with the competence to encourage cooperation between Member States in order to improve the effectiveness of systems for preventing and protecting against natural or man-made disasters and for dealing with such disasters. Pursuant to Article 196 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), the aims of the Union are to support and complement Member States’ action in the area of civil protection, promote swift, effective operational cooperation between national civil-protection services and promote consistency in international civil-protection work. Cornerstones of the Commission’s strategy towards a stronger European disaster response are the creation of a European Emergency Response Capacity Printed paper 17/5194 – 2 – German Bundestag – 17th electoral term (disaster response capacity) and the development of a European Emergency Response Centre (single ECHO emergency response centre) while ensuring closer coordination with the United Nations. An asset pool is to be established in which the Member States, on the basis of pre-agreed contingency plans, register on-call assets for deployment by the Commission and in which additional EU-funded assets are made available. The civil protection and humanitarian aid crisis rooms are to be merged. The individual response instruments are to be made more consistent and are to include the European External Action Service (EEAS) as well as military assets. And, finally, the EU response is to be made more outwardly visible. II. The German Bundestag welcomes in principle the Commission’s proposal to develop a more effective and more efficient disaster response and, to this end, to better combine the most important civil protection and humanitarian aid instruments. 1. It recalls, however, the treaty-defined competences of the European Union in the area of civil protection and refers to Article 196 paragraph 2 of the TFEU, pursuant to which any harmonisation of the laws and regulations of the Member States is excluded. Pursuant to Article 2 paragraph 5 of the TFEU, actions of the European Union to support, coordinate or supplement actions of the Member States may not supersede their competence. Civil protection is a matter falling primarily within the purview of the Member States. Observation of both the prohibition of substitution and the subsidiarity principle is hence unequivocally the conditio sine qua non for all reflections on improving the efficiency and rapidity of disaster response and creating synergies between civil protection and humanitarian aid. 2. Disaster response inside and outside the EU is predicated first and foremost upon the existence of strong and efficient disaster response capacities in the Member States. Provision of – even merely complementary – EU-funded assets, including operational command and control of the Commission over these assets, would absolve the Member States of their own responsibility instead of encouraging their ownership. In addition, it would contravene Article 196 of the TFEU, pursuant to which EU action can solely serve to support and complement action by the Member States. There is no legal basis for a parallel competence of the Union in this area. The assets of the Member States therefore remain the sole basis for a common response. In the vertically structured emergency preparedness and response system of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Länder are primarily competent for the operational sector. Figuring crucially in the decentralised German civil protection system are above all the fire brigades and the many non-governmental relief agencies, which rely on time-tested volunteer and predominantly local and regional structures. The assistance of the THW (Federal Agency for Technical Relief) is regularly available in case of disasters inside and outside Europe as well. Should gaps in disaster response become apparent in the context of EU-wide needs assessments, the EU must play a coordinating role to ensure that the gaps are plugged by the Member States themselves. It is not, however, the task of the EU to develop disaster response capacities of its own alongside those of the Member States. This would, inter alia, seriously interfere with the work of the outstanding volunteer civil protection services in Germany. German Bundestag – 17th electoral term – 3 – Printed paper 17/5194 3. The German Bundestag furthermore recalls that Germany has concluded bilateral assistance agreements with all its neighbour states and several other states. Many regions and other Member States have likewise concluded such assistance agreements among themselves. In practice, these bilateral emergency assistance mechanisms are generally activated first, before recourse is taken to the civil protection instruments of the EU. The Community Civil Protection Mechanism established in 2001 and recast in 2007, which coordinates in-kind assistance provided by the Member States, has functioned successfully and proved its worth not only inside the EU, its focal region, but also in disasters outside the EU. Within this framework the Commission already has at its disposal the Monitoring and Information Centre (MIC) and the Common Emergency Communication and Information System (CECIS), both of which are operationally active and stand by to assist the Member States in a coordinating capacity. Member States pre-commit deployable contingents, modules and Technical Assistance and Support Teams (TAST). Additional resources include an exchange programme for experts as well as workshops and training exercises. Since 2006, moreover, the EU has had a set of Crisis Coordination Arrangements (CCA) at its disposal. Shortcomings of the existing Community Mechanism have not been expressly highlighted by the Commission. Nevertheless, the Bundestag in principle welcomes measures to make this Mechanism more efficient and effective. These include the planned development of reference scenarios, continued mapping of existing national assets and more rapid mobilisation of the available assets. Coordination measures by the MIC, however, must continue to be activated only at the request of a Member State or the Council Presidency (in the event of a disaster outside the EU). Pursuant to Article 222 of the TFEU, the other Member States are called up on to act jointly in a spirit of solidarity in the event of disasters. Independent administration and deployment of the assets by the Commission, by contrast, would inadmissibly encroach on the competence of the Member States envisioned under the Treaty. Automatic mechanisms may not be permitted to arise. 4. The Bundestag welcomes closer dovetailing of civil protection and humanitarian aid and stronger coordination between the MIC and the humanitarian aid crisis room (ECHO). It is additionally of the opinion that coordination with the United Nations should be further improved. However, the Bundestag rejects the establishment of a new EU response centre in the form of an independent European Emergency Response Centre with command authority on grounds of lack of competence. It furthermore points out that according to the European Consensus on Humanitarian Aid, humanitarian aid provided outside the Union is immediate emergency aid and is always need based. 5. The Bundestag refers to the Oslo Guidelines and the European Consensus on Humanitarian Aid, pursuant to which military assets may only be used in very limited circumstances as a last resort where there is no comparable civilian alternative for meeting a critical humanitarian need. It stresses that it is still left to each Member State to decide for itself whether and under what conditions it will deploy military assets in civil protection and delivery of humanitarian aid. Printed paper 17/5194 – 4 – German Bundestag – 17th electoral term 6. The Bundestag in principle welcomes measures to improve the visibility of the EU response; this should not, however, become an end in itself. National contributions should continue to be visible. III. The German Bundestag calls on the Federal Government to 1.