I will tell businesses in my constituency. You get your customers to pay for the advertising to attract them to your product
Elmar Brok MEP
The US administration's $14 a head 'tax' for visa waivered travellers to America has met with universal disapproval from MEPs.
More than 25 MEPs spoke in the afternoon debate in the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Thursday, and not one of them was in favour of the travel fee.
Standing in for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, Belgian European affairs minister, Olivier Chastel, said the high representative was against the fee, but the best defence of it that he could offer was to say that both the US and the EU want easy transatlantic travel. It doesn’t look like it, countered every MEP.
It's an "entry fee" and "one-sided", said Ernst Strasser. It's "discriminatory", added his EPP colleague Simon Busuttil.
The entry fee doesn't apply to Poland, Romania, Bulgaria or Cyprus, states outside the visa waiver deal. "For us it is even worse", grumbled a Polish MEP. "To apply for a visa we pay $100 whether you get it or not."
Since September 8 travellers from 23 EU member states have to register on an electronic system ESTA, giving personal details and paying the travel fee.
Around 900,000 travellers will use it every month, estimated one MEP, paying $4 for administration and $10 to promote tourism to America.
The US is imposing its law on EU citizens, complained the MEPS. It’s another unequal treaty, like SWIFT for financial payments and Open Skies for airline slots. There was no prior consultation and there is no trust, they argued.
"The US doesn’t need the money. It wants the data," said GUE-NGL MEP Alfreds Rubiks.
"It’s a new business model," added senior EPP deputy Elmar Brok ironically. "I will tell businesses in my constituency. You get your customers to pay for the advertising to attract them to your product."
Questions came thick and fast in the many short speeches. What about data protection? Will fingerprinting be next? US citizens travel visa-free inside Schengen, so what about reciprocity?
MEPs urged each other to use their contacts within the US Congress to stop the measure, due for confirmation in November. The US Administration has been "discourteous to its friends," said one deputy.
Interinstitutional relations and administration commissioner Maroš Šefcovic said the Brussels would be considering a range of diplomatic and political reactions in advance of the general affairs council in October and the EU-US ministerial meeting in December.
The US ambassador was in the diplomatic gallery and heard the whole debate. That evening he heard the same arguments again at a reception to which he had generously invited the MEPs to further transatlantic relations.
