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Revised bank data deal illustrates Liberal MEPs' influence
July 8, 2010 12:00 PM
Sarah has led insistence that our bank data should be subject to privacy safeguards.
The European Parliament has today approved a reworked EU-US agreement on access to Europeans' banking data for tracking of terrorist finance after rejecting an interim deal in February on grounds that it insufficiently safeguarded privacy.
Work to improve the data protection safeguards, such as shorter storage times and stronger supervision and redress rights, was led by Liberal (ALDE) group MEPs.
UK Liberal Democrat European justice & human rights spokeswoman and London MEP Sarah Ludford commented:
"This much improved agreement combines security and justice. MEPs rightly insisted that EU privacy standards could not just be brushed aside."
"We had to fight hard to push EU governments to be tougher with the Americans. Without the clout of MEPs - led by Liberals - some of European citizens' rights would have been sacrificed."
"It is only thanks to MEPs that EU will develop its own capacity to search bank transactions in a targeted way. Then there will be no more need to transfer European data in bulk to the US."
"Being tough on civil liberties is not being 'on the terrorists' side'. Representing a city that 5 years ago was subject to deadly terrorist attacks - and for decades suffered IRA bombs - I am absolutely committed to fighting terrorism."
Notes to Editors
Under the Lisbon treaty European Parliament consent is needed for all international agreements. An interim 'SWIFT' or 'Terrorist Financing Tracking Programme' agreement was rejected by MEPs in February due to substantial privacy concerns. Bilateral legal assistance agreements have since been used to send US authorities any necessary counterterrorism information.
EU governments approved last week a new text negotiated by the European Commission with the US authorities. MEPs' vote in favour of the agreement today means it will come into force on 1 August 2010. The EU will assess the functioning of the safeguards involved in early 2011.
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