Investigating the Volkswagen scandal

European Parliament member Mark Demesmaeker has been chosen vice-president of the special Dieselgate committee. That investigation committee has one year to investigate the Volkswagen scandal. “Transparency and public health are my most important concern in that investigation,” says Mark Demesmaeker.

The N-VA delegation has been a proponent of an investigation committee for a long time. “The European Parliament has an important monitoring and investigatory task to fulfil here,” says Mark Demesmaeker. “This investigation committee must bring full clarity about what went wrong in applying the European emission norms for cars and must also provide solutions for the future.”

Paper tigers

The special committee consists of 45 MEPs. Mark Demesmaeker was proposed by his ECR The N-VA is a member of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), a conservative, eurorealistic parliamentary group in the European Parliament. The N-VA shares their realistic view of the European project and also advocates for the correct and intensive application of the subsidiarity principle. For example, we must not be afraid to ask ourselves if it would be better to leave certain European initiatives to the Member States. The N-VA also identifies with the emphases that the ECR places on the social-economic issues. Since the 2014 elections, the ECR has become the third largest parliamentary group in the European Parliament. ECR group to get to the bottom of this case. “Not only did Dieselgate damage consumer confidence, it also put a bomb so to speak under European environment policy. After all, strict environment norms are nothing more than paper tigers if robust and stringent enforcement is not applied,” Mark Demesmaeker concludes.