"European Amateur Radio Benefiting Society" v Parlamentu EU

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"European Amateur Radio Benefiting Society" v Parlamentu EU

OdgovorNapisal/-a s55o » 21 Jun 2010, 13:14

Written by Thilo Kootz, DL9KCE

Following the Torremolinos conference of 1990 it was decided that IARU Region 1 should adopt the concept of sub-regional working groups who deal with various challenges particular within Region 1.
EUROCOM is the specialist group tasked with maintaining contact with the European Union, especially the European Commission and European Parliament. Following an earlier exhibition in the Parliament building in 2007 an opportunity to exhibit and demonstrate Amateur Radio to the European administration arose. The purpose was to increase contact with members of the European parliament and their assistants and to give them an impression, what Amateur Radio is and how it does benefit society through our activities in Space, Education and Emergency Communications. By providing some background information and making initial contacts we should be able to contact them easier when the needs of amateur radio may be affected by European policy decisions.
This has happened in the past, for example the R&TTE directive and the EMC directive, where the input from EUROCOM was adopted, leaving us legislation we can live with. Making and maintaining these contacts is a continuous process though as MEPs are re-elected or their assistants move on to other jobs within the organization. As we are expecting future directives from the European Community on frequency management and possibly PLT which would have a great impact on our hobby then maintaining good contacts within the European Community and Commission is extremely important at the moment.

Organization
Because of the good working relationship between EUROCOM Chairman Thilo Kootz and MEP Birgit Sippel it was possible to obtain a 105m² display space in the Altiero Spinelli building in a location which is a main route for many MEPs and assistants on their way to meetings and adjacent to a coffee area where many informal meetings also take place. The space was available for one week and power, internet and telephone facilities were there for our use. This allowed EUROCOM to work in conjunction with ARISS Europe and ESA to provide an educational opportunity for local schoolchildren to participate in a telebridge contact with the ISS. An additional theme of Emergency Communications was also chosen for the exhibition so that it could appeal to as many people as possible.
Many teleconferences were held to discuss and decide the content of the posters to be used in the exhibition as well as the manning of the stand. Representatives of EUROCOM, ESA, ARISS Europe and the IARU Region 1 Emergency Communications Co-Ordinator participated in these conferences along with representatives from RSGB who provided valuable support in the production of the display materials.
All European National Societies were asked to invite their MEPs to the exhibition in their own language. This was reinforced by invitation letters in the internal post system to all MEP along with Press releases and posters around the European Parliament buildings.
In the weeks immediately before the exhibition final arrangements for hotel, travel and accommodation was created and circulated, while access to the building and security issues were resolved in cooperation with Ms Katharina Bartsch who is the assistant to MEP Sippel.

Operation
The display was manned by representatives from IARU, ESA, ARISS-Europe and national Societies. On the first day of the exhibition the official opening ceremony with a reception was held to formally open the display. Speeches were made by IARU Region 1 President, Hans Blondeel Timmermann, PB2T, EUROCOM WG Chairman, Thilo Kootz, DL9KCE and MEP Birgit Sippel and approximately 60 people attended this event. Many MEPs and assistants attended and even the Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response, Dr. Kristalina Georgieva was present and highly interested in our work on emergency communication.
On the second day a party of 12 schoolchildren with their teachers attended the display to take part in a telebridge contact with the ISS. Teacher moved to take up Amateur Radio. Remainder of class joined us at 17:30 ready for a second reception, this time hosted by ESA where three astronauts (Frank De Winne, Roman Romaneko and Robert Thirsk) from the European Astronaut Corps would be present to answer more questions from students. This was a very successful session with 70 people present.

Topics
Many people came to the stand who had heard of Amateur Radio before but were surprised to see the range of activities that we were involved in.
MEPs were interested in the number of natural disasters, where amateur radio was used to replace or supplement public safety communication systems that had been temporarily affected by the incident.
The ARISS contact highlighted the possibilities for amateurs to directly contact astronauts on the ISS, together with the way that this can be used to spark interest in students to then use other amateur radio satellites for educational purposes. The teachers from the two schools invited to the ARISS contact and the ´Meet the Astronauts´ on the second day of the exhibition thought, that using amateur radio in this way could be a real alternative to the competing attractions of computing and internet. Both wanted to continue their and their students involvement into this topic after the exhibition, now they have learned about the possibilities.
Educational activities were also highlighted through the posters in the exhibition and the presence of a model satellite from the University of Liege showing the power of amateur radio in taking theory and turning it into a practical outcome.
No topic was over-emphasized, the exhibition was used to try and show how Amateur Radio could be used to appeal to people of all backgrounds and develop technical and engineering competence which would be of benefit to the European Community. All the topics displayed allowed us to tell a story of Amateur Radio as in inclusive hobby which benefits the communities we live in.
Because the first two days had special activities planned the arrangement of posters on the display was fixed, to maintain interest the display was changed on the third day to change the view that people may have had walking by and let them see posters ( for example on Education ) which they may not have noticed otherwise.

Networking opportunities
Because of the location of the exhibition, many visitors looked at the displays and took leaflets. Some visitors were reluctant to get into conversations, possibly due to a fear of language difficulties. In some cases it was possible to make closer contact with individuals and log/collect their name and or business card for later use.
On at least four occasions visitors raised problems that amateur radio has at the moment ( such as PLT ) and were able to be told about the work of EUROCOM and IARU in trying to reduce these problems. Our sponsor, Ms Birgit Sippel, has already raised a parliamentary question to the European Commission and three other MEPs, have indicated that they will also provide support if it is necessary and required. These MEP have asked to be contacted after the event in case we need any further help in legislation.
Other topics discussed included problems in constructing aerials where communities are making increasing demands for construction permits and in some cases requiring an annual payment to keep an aerial. The problem of increasing pollution of the RF spectrum due to an exponentially increasing quantity of cheap electronic equipment which does not meet EC standards was also addressed.
The opening ceremony was visited by Dr. Kristalina Georgieva, a European Commissioner, who was highly impressed on Amateur Radio activities in disaster relief. She put us in her official blog on http://blogs.ec.europa.eu/georgieva/the-wave-heroes/ and titled us “Wave Heroes”. The quick response in posting such a blog entry was appreciated and an email thanking her office for the support was sent. This, along with all the other contacts made needs to be followed up in coming weeks and months.
Possibly more importantly, follow-up emails may need to be sent to MEP to see how effective the invitation process through National Societies had been and whether there was anything they though would have made the exhibition better. What was obvious though was that any activity like this is affected by events outside our control. For example, at the time of the exhibition the UK was going through a National Election and this had taken a number of MEP and their assistants away from Brussels back to their own country to help with the election process.

Personal
Many Amateurs and others were involved in the preparations of the exhibition and during the manning of the station. My special thanks go to MEP Birgit Sippel for sponsoring the exhibition, to her assistant Katharina Bartsch for all the help, to the UBA for all the help in Brussels, to RSGB for a fantastic job in designing and printing posters and panels, to everyone in the planning group who provided ideas, texts and material.

Future Activities
This exhibition has opened the doors for future activities. The contact with the commissioner for Crisis Response will be used to further raise the profile of Amateur Radio in disaster response and will highlight existing and future projects funded by the European Community where Amateur Radio can be involved.
Those MEPs that have offered their support for our service will be contacted in the near future and ask to pose parliamentary questions by the EUROCOM WG. Topics will range from PLT in general to modifications of the EMC and R&TTE directive as they are updated in the future. This will give us an opportunity to improve them from an amateur radio point of view. The role of European market surveillance needs to be strengthened in the R&TTE directive to prevent access of faulty or incompliant electronic equipment to enter the common market and cause disturbance. One big flaw in the EMC directive is, that the protection of the individuals against harmful interference is not mandatory to the member states. Therefore it is only very reluctantly realized in many members states. A more direct suggestion to member states, on how to handle rare cases of harmful interference to users of the Short Wave spectrum without discrimination or bias for commercial reasons, would be very helpful.
However I would like to emphasize at this point, that a much higher interest of members societies is need to intensify the work in the EUROCOM WG. Basically there is no mentionable contribution, with the exception of one or two national societies. I would ask the EC to keep a close eye on that.

Conclusion
The amount of personal contacts made exceeded the expected number by far. What could not be measured were the number of people walking by who did not have the time to look into the exhibition in more detail, but who might have caught the main ideas from the very large panels and posters on display. If we have successfully linked amateur radio with Emergency communication, Education and Space exploration in their minds, they may remember, when policies crossing their desk involve our service. I would conclude, from now on amateur radio is not an unknown term in the parliament any longer.
Ex.S56WTT,S57WTT; All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
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