After four long rounds of negotiations, the Council and Parliament have reached an agreement on the vaccination certificate which should facilitate travel between European countries this summer. According to information gathered last night, the compromise text must be approved by the civil liberties commission, and then by the parliamentary assembly in the first half of June, for an entry into force hopefully on 1 July, in time for the summer break. .
The subject of the agreement is a regulation of about ten articles. The digital certificate will result in a QR code that will reveal whether the person has been vaccinated, tested negative, or has fallen ill with the virus and is now immune. Parliament negotiated with two objectives in mind. The first was to encourage the free movement of people by making tests free. The second objective was to avoid as much as possible margins of discretion at national level.
Loading…
Some countries – Germany and Sweden – did not want to give up their rights to control national borders. The result is that Article 10 specifies that member countries must “refrain from imposing further travel restrictions”, such as new tests or quarantines unless the health situation requires it. Any measures must be ‘necessary and proportionate’.
In order to ensure the free movement of people, Parliament insisted during the negotiations with the Council for the tests to be free. Worried about the costs, the member countries could not give their agreement, so much so that it was the EU executive who promised new fresh money to pay for clinical examinations: “To further guarantee the availability of affordable tests, the European Commission is committed to mobilize additional funds for 100 million euros ”.
The rapporteur for the European Parliament, the Spanish Socialist MEP Juan Fernando López Aguilar, explained last night in a press conference that without this agreement, national measures would have created “confusion and discrimination”. Governments have ripped a six-week transition period during which they will have time to organize to issue the certificate but will still be obliged to recognize their partners’ certificates.