Omobrond, but for… the wrong reasons, he takes it. Ministry of the Environment for the electoral lottery bill. Criticism is focused almost exclusively on the subordination of water management functions to the RAE, while the bulk of the bill consists of a number of problematic and sometimes “photographic” regulations that further worsen environmental protection and increase urban chaos. The discussion and adoption of the bill has been postponed until next week.

Yesterday, the production and trade commission of the Jogorku Kenesh held the second reading of the bill with a discussion of the articles. As announced, the adoption of the bill (which was scheduled for tomorrow) was decided to take place next week after two days of discussion. Obviously, such a decision was made in order to give time to make some changes to the bill, which are already being developed.

Also yesterday the Minister of the Environment Kostas Skrekas met with KEDE President (and Mayor of Trikkai) Dimitris Papastergiou, President of the Union of Municipal Water and Sewerage Enterprises (EDEA) and Mayor of Rethymno Giorgos Marinakis and Vice President, Mayor of Larisa Apostolos Kalogiannis. Representatives of the two agencies received assurances that there would be clarifications to make it “clear” that the privatization of DEYA was not the end goal. According to “K”, in previous days the Foreign Ministry applied to the General Directorate for Economic and Financial Affairs of the EU. (DG ECFIN) and this one on the RAE issue. According to the ministry, the Recovery Fund requested separate waste and water authorities, rather than their inclusion in the existing one.

On the contrary, the environmental and town-planning part of the bill did not concern self-government bodies. On Friday, seven environmental organizations (Hellenic Society for Environment and Culture, Hellenic Society for the Protection of Nature, Callisto, Ecological Society for Recycling, Greenpeace, Medasset, WWF) expressed their disappointment with the legislation in a joint statement. “The rules address critical environmental issues such as, among others, burdening all protected areas of Natura 2000 sites, deforestation, excessive provision of incentives for tourism facilities and renewable energy sources, and a number of disparate urban planning regulations,” they report, naming bill “catastrophic.”

As the organizations rightly point out, the bill is full of problematic provisions: from changing (for the umpteenth time) the legislation on special environmental studies and preferential treatment for tourism investments (special regime for opening roads and building development, building 30 meters of the sea, etc.), “ regulation” of deforestation (an effort that has been “cut back” by the Council of Europe in the past), further easing of pollution fines. As well as various photo regulations, such as the abolition of a ban specifically for organized tourist development areas (ROTA) that applied to the construction of port facilities in protected areas, changing the boundaries of traditional settlements at the discretion of the minister, and further enrichment (already dozens) of exemptions from the legislation on investments in Greece .

Similar statements were made yesterday in the parliament, where the party’s special buyers accused the government of making pre-election concessions to the “unknown”. It should be noted that the approval of the bill was supported only by MPs from the ND, MPs from KINAL, MeRA25, KKE and Hellenic Solution opposed it, while SYRIZA abstained.

views

Incomprehensible study

Giannis Michael* and Miltiadis Lazoglou**

In any constitutional state, any legislative intervention must be the result of extensive and substantial consultation. The four days (over three weekends!), during which the bill was submitted for discussion, as well as the addition of more than 120 articles (more than 260 in total), cause reflection and disappointment. The complexity of the various provisions of the said prefecture plan requires their extensive and substantial consultation. On the contrary, the hasty introduction of the controversial bill by the government in Parliament, despite the strong reaction, caused surprise.

The bill provides excessive incentives for the location and operation of tourism and renewable energy facilities, burdens forests and woodlands, as well as Natura 2000 network areas. For example, some, among many, egregious cases:

• Allowing the Minister of the Environment to “correct” (usually by expanding) the boundaries of settlements, contrary to the current jurisprudence of the Council of Ministers, which provides for the issuance of a relevant presidential decree.

• Possibility of “legitimizing” illegal roads or opening new ones through special urban plans so that the territory of a private person who will carry out a strategic investment becomes suitable for construction, while the jurisprudence of the Council of Europe requires comprehensive road planning. net.

• Possibility to include additional categories of tourist sites in addition to those that can be located as little as 30 meters from the waterfront, a provision that in any case bypasses the unstructured nature and blatantly ignores the expected impacts of climate change.

• Possibility of building tourist villages in addition to public and private forest land.

Since 2020, our country has been condemned by the European Court of Justice for failing to institutionalize the necessary conservation goals and management measures for Natura 2000 network areas. The proposed changes will cause further delays. It is noted that many of the provisions included in the bill are checked for their constitutionality and compliance with the relevant European legislation. The criticality and importance of the nature and culture of our country require a calm and sober discussion of the issue on the day after the upcoming elections.

* Dr. Yiannis Michael is an urban architect and Vice President of the Hellenic Society for the Environment and Culture.
* Dr. Miltiadis Lazoglou is an urban planner responsible for the environmental policy of the Hellenic Society for the Environment and Culture.

Deviations in two critical areas

Stathis Potamitis*

From what we read, this is ahead of the plenary session of Parliament, and a comprehensive bill is expected to be passed in the coming days, affecting the environment, spatial planning and renewable energy. It has raised serious concerns due to its scope, scope, technical complexity and provisions that appear to be aimed at regulating special cases. However, consultation time is very limited. To date, at least in the perception of most of those involved in the protection of our natural heritage, the legislator has often miscalculated.

Another source of concern is the dominance of tourism as the country’s export product. Our tourism is based on the natural beauty of the country and its natural and cultural heritage. However, there are extremely many examples where the rapid and uncontrolled development of tourism destroys the environment on which it depends.

It is significant that the draft law makes derogations in two important areas – the permitted use of land in specially protected natural areas and the definition of the boundaries of settlements. In the first case, the nature of areas of recognized special beauty or ecological value is affected. Section 179 of the bill amends (once again) section 21 of Law 1650/1986. Paragraph 10 of the amended provision provides legislative authority to regulate, by presidential decree, not only the continued operation of legitimate projects and activities in the protected area, but also their modernization and expansion, even if they are in the high category of harmful environmental impact. , only with the proviso that “their presence does not jeopardize the achievement of the environmental objectives of the respective territory.” Obviously, the ambiguity of the criterion creates significant risks of weakening the protection, i.e. territories of Natura. Accordingly, although it is legally established that the boundaries of a settlement are determined only by presidential decree, Article 253 gives the Minister of the Environment the right to correct errors in the boundaries of a settlement. What is the extent of this transitional device (nothing more permanent than temporary), what does “boundary error” mean, and how will their “correction” be controlled?

Protecting the environment affects all of us. After all, we still have a long way to go to achieve adequate standards and their effective implementation. Of course, there is no room to go back, especially if it is done in a non-transparent way and without sufficient consideration of all points of view.

* Mr. Stathis Potamitis is a lawyer from Athens.

A pile of disparate topics

Martinus Gatelich*

The Ministry of Ecology and Energy, in the midst of the pre-election period, decided to submit to Parliament a comprehensive bill, which is a conglomeration of many disparate and unrelated issues. The reactions of ornithologists and other conservation organizations to the sham consultation were not heard. With the bill under consideration, attempts are being made to cancel the ongoing work of Special Environmental Studies. In particular, attempts are being made to make changes in research work that will lead to the necessary protected area management plans, and in particular it appears that the use of the urban land use tool is being disconnected from the protection zone system. introduced by Law 4685/2020. In addition, these provisions state that the preparation and publication of Management Plans and Presidential Decrees on national parks and biodiversity reserves take into account “economic, social and cultural needs, as well as regional and local features.” consideration, at a time when the dominant criterion for the work of the EPM and based on the Habitats Directive should be the environmental needs and needs of protected sites and the achievement of conservation objectives. The same provisions speak of “subzones”, while it is completely unclear what these “subzones” consist of and how they are defined in relation to the proposed protection zones.

With regard to energy production, the bill introduces the concept of a RES First Choice Zone as a spatial subset of land and sea. The proposed provision overlooks the undeniable need for central planning in the siting of RES projects, thereby making the situation worse for the country, especially if we take into account the recent well-reasoned opinion about non-compliance with Directive 92/43/EEC when planning wind farms. .

Finally, it is indicated that an “obligation to restore the environment within a specified period if the damage is reversible” is added, when the obligation to restore the environment in the event of environmental damage applies in full and does not depend on conditions or conditions. The slovenliness and antiquated understanding that governs many parts of this text is also unpleasantly surprising. For example, let’s mention the use of completely obsolete terms, such as the reference to the “noble game”. And the penalties for illegal hunting, although tougher than in the past, are still very lenient.

* Mr. Martinos Geitlich is responsible for the environmental issues and policy of the Hellenic Ornithological Society.