4 Amendments of Catherine BEARDER related to 2010/2205(INI)
Amendment 5 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
2. CDeplores the fact that sustainable development and social and human rights appear to be increasingly dealt with as an afterthought by the Commission when negotiating Free Trade Agreements and Trade Association Agreements, and emphasises the European Parliament's desire to have these aspects of trade agreements taken seriously and not denigrated to secondary status in the lists of the EU's negotiating priorities; further to this, calls on the Commission to systematically include a chapter on sustainable development containing a CSR clause in the free trade and investment agreements it negotiates with third countries, and specifically covering compliance with and implementation of, the ILO's eight core conventions and four priority conventions together with a basic list of environmental agreements, and requires that this chapter be subject to the same enforcement mechanisms and infringement procedures as the rest of the agreement;
Amendment 12 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Considers that the implementation of these basic standards by partner countries should be subject to continuous monitoring, andor companies operating in partner countries, should be subject to continuous monitoring by an independent body which will not be subject to influence or pressure from either the signatories to the agreement or from business interests, and furthermore, requests that effective and transparent procedures should be in place to penalise non-enforcement or infringements both in the territory of the partner country and in the Member States;
Amendment 16 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4 a (new)
Paragraph 4 a (new)
4a. Also calls on the Commission to set down clearly, ahead of the finalisation of any agreement, the evidence which will be required in order to establish a breach of these standards by either a company or partner state, and the bodies deemed to have the authority to call for an investigation into such a breach;
Amendment 21 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5 a (new)
Paragraph 5 a (new)
5a. Acknowledges the Commission's efforts in promoting CSR among European companies, and welcomes it as a useful and voluntary method of encouraging and promoting best practice by European companies in their operations abroad; underlines the high risk that European companies operating under the looser regulatory regimes in many trading partner countries may not respect the basic social and environmental rights required of them in Europe; calls, therefore, on the Commission to come forward with a new, non-voluntary, proposal for regulating the activities of EU based companies in their operations abroad, which ensures that EU companies respect basic human and environmental rights in all their activities both within and outside the EU; this proposal should be separate to all CSR proposals, but should establish a basic minimum standard, above which companies who choose to undertake CSR obligations are free, and encouraged, to surpass, but which all companies must adhere to;