PFUE 2022 - Jean-Baptiste Djebbari's speech for the Informal Meeting of Transport Ministers

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Ministers,
Commissioner,
President of the Commission,
Directors-General,
Ladies and gentlemen,

It is a great honour and pleasure to welcome you to this informal meeting, held under the French Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

No videoconference can replace human contact. I am therefore delighted that the public health situation has allowed us to come together face to face. I would like to thank you all for being here today, especially as we are not meeting just anywhere. Within these walls, we are surrounded by over two centuries of aviation history. Only a few metres away, 95 years ago, Charles Lindbergh was met with a hero’s welcome by 200,000 people, on the runway of one of the first airports in the world after crossing the Atlantic.

Le Bourget is home to a museum, an airport, and a famous air show. But most of all, it is a symbol. A symbol that reminds us of all the progress that transport has brought, all that humankind is capable of inventing, all of the feats that can be accomplished through sheer will. It is a symbol that calls us to be ambitious, and we will need ambition to build the future of transport!

You know as well as I do: COVID has not been easy on us. Where travel is concerned, our habits and means have profoundly changed. Remote work and videoconferences have become a part of daily life. There has been an increase in walking and cycling – which is pleasing to see. The economic model of public transport has been affected. In the air sector, business travel has sharply declined. In the maritime sector, the shortage of container vessels has sent freight rates soaring.

In this uncertain and shifting situation in which we find ourselves, we must nevertheless continue to move forward. We must move in three directions, towards the three major challenges and the three priorities of the French Presidency in terms of transport. Three key words, which will be the guiding themes over these two days:

Decarbonise Regulate Innovate

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Our first priority is decarbonisation.

The European Union set itself goals for 2030. Ambitious goals. We must give ourselves the means to achieve them, because it’s Europe’s credibility that’s at stake. We will not have credibility for 2050 if we do not meet our objectives for 2030.

We must hold to them, without ever losing sight of certain considerations.

• The first is that this transition must be reasonable

It must be attainable for our businesses, and must not place undue burden on our fellow citizens. We must encourage rather than impose; convince rather than coerce. We must incentivise and support the change, rather than imposing abrupt changes.

Let’s be realistic: electric and hydrogen vehicles are a source of concern for many. They represent a cost. And beyond the cost, there is a 2nd stumbling block: the fear of not being able to recharge them. We must respond to these concerns.

We can lessen them by offering financial incentives for the purchase of such vehicles, which is for that matter already the case in many countries. We must find the means to extend, and perhaps improve, these mechanisms.

We can allay these fears by creating a sufficiently dense recharging network. In the future we must be able to travel comfortably throughout Europe in electric and hydrogen cars. In other words, we must ensure that electricity and hydrogen are as reliable and widely available as fossil fuels are currently.

In a few minutes we will hold a working lunch during which we can begin our discussions on this matter.

Another example concerning maritime transport: regarding onshore power supply, we must hold ourselves to higher standards in major ports while taking care not to create an insurmountable burden for secondary ports.

The same logic applies to aerospace: we want to see ambitious uptake of sustainable fuels that does not increase the risk of carbon leakage.

It is this logic of balance and equity that we must always have in mind.

• The second element to consider is closely linked to the first, namely, that the competitiveness and robustness of our operators must be preserved.

The ecological transition cannot be achieved at their expense, nor should it weaken our maritime and air transport hubs for the sake of those on Europe’s doorstep. The goal is not to relocate pollution but to reduce it and it is up to us to ensure this happens.

• The third consideration is that decarbonising transport is not simply a question of transforming the modes of transport that pollute the most. It is also about strengthening those that pollute the least: waterway and rail transport

The modal shift will be at the heart of our working lunch tomorrow. There are actions that we need to identify together to drive forward this shift.

Here, I am referring to the development of the Trans-European Transport Network for example. This development will come at a cost and we will have the chance to discuss this.

I am referring also to relaunching night trains and rail freight. Together with a number of you, we called for European support for freight operators. We need to examine the possibilities of this together with the Commission.

These are our priorities for decarbonisation.

Our second priority is better regulation of the transport sector.

Let us not delude ourselves: liberalising this sector has of course generated many benefits, but we have not taken sufficient care to regulate it.

We have allowed abusive practices that are incompatible with European values to develop, for example: social dumping, false self-employment, pay-to-fly schemes and choosing vessels’ flag state based on the least strict social regulations.

The Europe we strive for is not this one. It is not unfair competition. It is not the division of nations. The Europe we strive for is an inclusive Europe built on shared progress.

As you know, the transport sector is experiencing a labour shortage. If we want to reverse the trend, to make it more attractive and create jobs for our young people then first we need to get back on course. We have to offer people decent working conditions that provide them with better protection.

We must ensure that our open skies agreements are applied fully, meaning they take account of social and environmental provisions.

Making the sector more attractive will be the subject of our working session tomorrow morning.

And lastly, our third priority is innovation.

Innovation means refusing to remain immobile. It means forging new paths, not being afraid to start afresh, and constantly moving forward.

Innovation is an inextricable part of Europe, as it perpetually creates. So let us be faithful to it.

Innovation is not a choice, it is an obligation. It is the key to inventing tomorrow’s transport. And I do mean “inventing”. Not “benefitting from” or “taking advantage of”. Europe must not settle for the import of new technologies or new services. It needs to create them, to produce autonomous vehicles, connected transportation systems and decarbonised aviation. It is a matter of sovereignty.

Let us not allow others to make the choice for us. Let us not have technology, standards and services thrust upon us. Let us make them ourselves. Let us come together to build European champions. This will be beneficial to all of Europe, to all EU Member States. And it is the only way to assert our values, our conception of the right to privacy and of environmental protection.

There are levers that we can mobilise to encourage innovation in transport. And it is up to us to identify them.

This will be the focus of our working session this afternoon.

And outside of this session, we will be surrounded by innovation for these next two days, but I won’t reveal any more now.

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Dear Ministers and dear colleagues,

The mobility of the future cannot be built without us.

We are lucky to have two strengths: our numbers and our unity.

Thanks to our sheer numbers and our unity we can change the course of events.
We can lead the way for the rest of the world.

We have already begun to do so. Just a few weeks ago, with the Toulouse Declaration, we made progress towards the international goal of decarbonising aviation. And last week, at the One Ocean Summit in Brest, we got ahead of the curve in maritime decarbonisation.

I am counting on you to build on this momentum today and tomorrow, in this place that I hope inspires you. To reflect, discuss, share our respective experiences and identify the points we have in common. And most of all, to take action.

Thank you.