BRUSSELS — The European Parliament backed a conservative push Thursday to pause parts of the EU’s wastewater cleanup law, over fears that making drugmakers pay to remove micropollutants could fuel medicine shortages.
Lawmakers in Strasbourg voted in favor of a proposal to suspend industry’s obligation to pay to remove pollutants such as antibiotics and microplastics from wastewater, in a move that risks putting Europe’s polluter-pays principle in the law on hold.
Members of the European Parliament agreed that this should happen immediately, while the European Commission undertakes a new independent study into the costs of removing these pollutants, as well as determining which sectors are most to blame for them.
“Given the growing doubts surrounding the underlying cost assumptions and the potential impact on the availability of medicines, an independent reassessment and a temporary suspension of the relevant obligations are the right course of action,” European People’s Party MEP Oliver Schenk told POLITICO after the vote.
The vote follows lobbying from the generic medicines sector over what it says is a disproportionate levy on drugmakers. The medicines and cosmetics sectors are required to pay up to 80 percent of the cost of an additional wastewater treatment process under the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive.
The medicines sector argues the European Commission’s modeling of pollutants is flawed, that other sectors are also to blame, and that the costs of removing them would be far higher than the Commission projected.
“Europe cannot seek to bring pharmaceutical production back with one hand while making it economically less attractive with the other,” Schenk added.
“If we want strategic autonomy, we must also create the right framework conditions to achieve it.”
But while the majority of lawmakers from the center and left also agreed that a new independent study on pollution and costs is needed, they decried any suspension of the polluter-pays principle — known as the “extended producer responsibility” (EPR) in the directive.
Jutta Paulus, MEP with the Greens, said the conservative and right-wing alliance had a desire to “rip up the rules at the cost of our waterways and public health.”
“The right is muddying the waters when it comes to the rules on municipal wastewater treatment. Without clear rules, citizens will be left to foot the bill for water pollution caused by products from the pharmaceutical and cosmetics industries,” Paulus told POLITICO.
“Those who pollute our waters should pay,” she said.
Cross-party support
Lawmakers voted on a series of amendments from the EPP and the right-wing Conservatives and Reformists to a joint resolution from the Socialists and Democrats, the Greens, The Left and Renew.
This joint position affirmed the importance of the polluter-pays principle but called for an independent study to review pollution and sector cleanup costs. It also called for the Commission to guarantee safeguards to prevent drug shortages.
However, not only did amendments from the European People’s Party pass, but so too did those from ECR, which went even further in calling for industry payments to be stopped.
While the EPP called for payments to be suspended only if the results of the study revealed risks to drug supplies, the ECR called for the scheme to be paused while the study is happening. The amendments passed, some narrowly: The EPP’s proposal was pushed through with 305 in favor, 238 against, and 11 abstaining; The ECR proposal passed with 282 votes in favor, 245 against and 13 abstentions.
Overall, the amended resolution passed with 294 votes in favor, 245 against, and 28 abstentions.
Socialists and Democrats MEP Tiemo Wölken said that by supporting the ECR amendments, “which deleted the need to protect public budgets and denounced the principle of EPR as a whole, the EPP revealed its true colors: this was never about improving the system or safeguarding access to medicines, but instead part of their wider ideological battle against holding polluting industries responsible.”
Vlad Vasile-Voiculescu, from the centrist Renew group, 14 of whom supported the amendments, said that suspending the extended producer responsibility will not solve the challenges facing Europe’s pharmaceutical sector.
“What it will do is postpone investment, weaken legal certainty and delay action to reduce harmful micropollutants in our waterways,” he said. “We need practical solutions to protect medicine supply, not political shortcuts that undermine environmental legislation.”
Over to the Commission
While not legally binding, the resolution is now harder for the Commission to ignore after it secured support from Parliament’s largest group, 14 lawmakers from Renew, four from the socialists, as well as right-wing groups.
For the generic medicines sector, the vote “sends a clear message” that Europe cannot put drug supplies at risk based on flawed calculations, Adrian van den Hoven, director general of Medicines for Europe, said. “We support environmental policy that must be evidence-based, proportionate and should not threaten patient access to medicines.”
But for water suppliers, the vote is an unwelcome development. It “contradicts the Polluter Pays Principle, one of the fundamental pillars of EU environmental policy, and sets a dangerous precedent for other pollutants in wastewater,” Gari Vila-Landa, senior water policy adviser at EurEau, said.
The Commission is now under pressure to respond.
EPP lawmaker Tomislav Sokol said he believed all the amendments EPP supported, including those from ECR, “improved the text,” adding: “The Parliament sends a clear message [to the Commission].”
S&D’s Wölken took a different stance. “We would strongly advise the Commission to think long and hard before making any rash decision based on this extremist and fragile majority.”
Environment Commissioner Jessika Roswall told POLITICO after the vote: “We will continue to work closely with Parliament, member states and stakeholders to prepare for smooth and efficient implementation on the ground of the new urban wastewater treatment rules.”
