mr president the situation for our group is very clear
we heard on the one hand from the council that if a european arrest warrant is executed properly and effectively and not in the many trivial cases we have seen its advantages outweigh those disadvantages
the commissioner set out what is a credible report a serious report which tells us that if we can deal with trivial cases and disproportionality and with the procedural guarantees then the european arrest warrant can still be a valuable way of catching serious organised criminals
we should not forget the twelve zero figure i feel very strongly about the fact that in my constituency of london we caught the attempted bombers of july two thousand and five
when we understand the serious and symbolic effect of these cases the european arrest warrant can and should work
the oral question we have today for our group is very simple
we are now in the area of moving from the reports to the action and we have a situation where we have two hard cases
one is the lack of proportionality
this will not be solved overnight and i commend the commissioner i am talking about judicial training for ensuring that we fix the issue of trivial cases dominating and creating a credibility problem for the european arrest warrant
but that also requires the council i am not referring just to hungary i am talking about the member states to help us in pushing forward the procedural guarantees and the issue of unacceptable pre-trial detention periods for many citizens in my own country
these are the situations which create the problems for a tool which could be effective if used properly
but the hardest case is going to be creating an even playing field in relation to procedural defence rights
this is why within my group which has called for the letter of rights we take seriously both the quality and speed of the legislation which we need to ensure that the european arrest warrant can be the effective tool that it should be for catching serious organised criminals and that its credibility must not be diminished by the many trivial cases and uneven playing field that we currently see
this is the position we want to see for our group and we believe the commitment is here
but we must pay close attention particularly to the member states when they ask for the european arrest warrant to be effective but on the other hand do not carry out the actions to help us get the legislation to create that even playing field
