Historic support in vote for local Euro MP's call for action on the Europe-wide emergency number

9.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Thu 6th Sep 2007

The European Parliament has overwhelmingly adopted a Written Declaration requesting an evaluation of the Europe-wide emergency number: 112

The Written Declaration was championed by a cross-party coalition led by Diana Wallis, the local Liberal Democrat Euro MP and a Vice President of the European Parliament. In fact the Declaration, which was adopted by the European Parliament yesterday, had the largest majority ever to have been attained (512 members out of a total of 785, and still counting) with such Declarations.

Diana Wallis said:

"The tragic natural disasters which occurred in Europe this summer, and in particular the catastrophic floods in Yorkshire and elsewhere, should remind us how important it is for all of our citizens to know this Europe-wide emergency number, which is already in operation in all 27 Member States. This is all the more so with millions of Britons now living abroad, and more going on holiday. Another crucial aspect is that all calls should be properly dealt with.

"Unfortunately, a large majority of UK citizens are not familiar with the 112 number, and too many problems persist where the necessary technology or organisation is often lacking.

"Despite legislation going back 16 years and several problems areas identified, the European Commission has only published one implementation document, which turned out to contain inaccuracies."

Diana Wallis went on to say:

"Now that the Parliament as a whole has overwhelmingly endorsed my declaration, I fully expect the European Commission to create a European day (on 11 February) to promote awareness of 112 and to proceed without delay to an evaluation of all 112 services in Europe.

"To date, only Portugal has made such an evaluation. I hope that it will show leadership and encourage the other Member States to go through the same process."

Notes:

A study last year by the Institute for Public Policy Research suggested that one in 12 British nationals may be living abroad, a total of about 5.5 million.

The Declaration as adopted:

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+WDECL+P6-DCL-2007-0044+0+DOC+PDF+V0//EN&language=EN

Only Written Declarations obtaining support from an absolute majority of the Parliament's members are formally adopted. In practice, this is very rare, with only two such declarations succeeding this year. Not only did this Declaration reach a majority, it has actually rallied the largest number of signatures ever.