MEPs sign up for soil directive - but lighter rules

摘要

The European Parliament's Environment Committee this week surprised many by voting with a comfortable majority to back an EU soil directive, albeit pruned from the original proposal and with much more flexibility to member states in how they apply the future law.rnSeveral MEPs, mainly from the centre right European People's Party (EPP), had wanted to reject the proposal outright as unnecessary, backing the line that Parliament's Legal Affairs Committee took in a secondary opinion on the draft directive. However on 9 October only 13rnMEPs voted to reject the proposal and 45 backed the report from Spanish MEP Cristina Gutierrez-Cortines, who herself is from the EPP.