mr president i would also like to congratulate mr lambsdorff for the excellent work he has done and of course his shadows particularly mrs cederschiöld but let me also underline something that mr toubon said the fantastic work done by the french presidency in achieving agreement on this directive
i hope that when we return to it in a few years time we will realise that we should not have been afraid to talk about a european defence equipment market because of a common european market
it is in the common defence interest of europe and it is in the common interest of europe to have more competition
let me highlight one part of this directive which is highly important for many member states
this is particularly the text concerning subcontracting
i am very happy that the agreements reached with the council and the commission on the text concerning subcontracting have reflected to a large extent what parliament has been pushing for namely that there is more transparency in terms of subcontracting secondly that there is no discrimination on a national basis when subcontracts are being drafted and finally that national authorities have the ability to allow contractors to subcontract up to thirty of their contracts
this is in the interests of bringing our industry together across europe
