No EU Member States have strong national legislation, which aims at protecting soil. Without a common European “umbrella”, meaning a directive with specific limits and obligations, each Member State is led to pass “partial” laws which are not enough, and at times even penalize soil. A common European framework was the main aim of the people4soil ECI.
After not reaching the quorum, we were expecting an analysis on behalf of the organizing committee as to why the signature gathering had failed.
It seems that the failure was in actual fact a “joy” in Italy.
Without consulting individual signatories, the Italian signatures were presented to the President of the Italian Senate asking to continue the debate on the soil consumption law, which has been ongoing for some time.
We do not believe that Italian signatories were aware that they were signing something currently being debated at the Italian Parliament. Nor that the Italian law proposal is being debated so much.
The email from the Italian people4soil informing signatories of their encounter with the Senate begins with a ‘Thank you’ which sounds no longer ironic (intending ‘we did not reach a quorum’) but mainly ridiculous (‘we are doing what we want with your signatures’).
Gruppo Suolo Europa 