During a debate on new rules giving bus and coach passengers' rights comparable to those of air, rail and sea passengers in the European Parliament this morning, Czech GUE/NGL MEP Jaromír Kohlíček welcomed the "reasonable compromise", the result of long negotiations and conciliation with the Commission and Council, but identified significant problems.

The Services Directive, adopted in 2006, is a crucial step in improving the functioning of the Single Market for services. It covers a large variety of services accounting for 40% of EU GDP and estimates predict that the implementation of the Services Directive has the potential to bring about economic gains of up to €140 billion, representing up to 1.5% growth of the EU GDP.

The situation in Lampedusa reveals the inadequacy of EU migration policies as well as their dependence on the presence of dictators such as Ben Ali and Gaddafi. Furthermore, the humanitarian situation may soon deteriorate beyond Lampedusa as a series of countries from Morocco to Syria may each present a humanitarian risk.

We all want these revolutions to go well, if not the EU could be faced with its most serious humanitarian crisis, akin to the 1956 Hungarian crisis that prompted the creation of the UNHCR.

"It is absolutely essential to convene an extraordinary Council of EU Heads of State and Government in the next few days to deal with an epic emergency comparable in intensity and scale to the fall of the Soviet Bloc in 1989", said Mario Mauro MEP, Head of the Italian Delegation (PDL) of the EPP Group in the European Parliament, explaining the content of a letter he sent today to the European Council President, Herman Van Rompuy, to the European Commission President, José Manuel Barroso, and the European Parliament President, Jerzy Buzek.

CEEP at MEDPOL

This was the key message that Carl Cederschiöld, President of CEEP, presented at the Macroeconomic Dialogue meeting with the European social partners today in Brussels.