The meeting was chaired by Prof. Wennig

1. Approval of the draft agenda

The draft agenda was adopted. However point 3 could only be finished after point 4 given the limited time available for Mr Carsin, acting Director of Directorate B of DG XXIV, to make his presentation under point 4.

2. Apologies for absence (if any)

The same as in the meetings of the sections with the exception of Prof. Wennig who could now attend.

3. Information on the subjects in the agendas of both sections of the Committee

Members of the Toxicity section were told about the discussion that took place in the Ecotoxicity section meeting and in particular their attention was drawn to the draft opinion which that section provisionally agreed.

After a brief discussion it was decided to add the following new sentence at the end of the draft opinion:

'Finally, the Committee did not consider the case to have been made by the Netherlands at this stage'.

With this new sentence the Committee endorsed the full opinion (Annex I).

The CSTE took note of the developments during the Toxicology section meeting. On the agenda item 'Nickel in Euro coins', given that more data is likely to become available before the end of September, it was agreed that issuing an opinion at this stage might be premature since the wording that was being chosen was much too cautious to be of any real value.

The European Environmental and Contact Dermatitis Research Group is going to be contacted in order to obtain more data. Concomitantly the CSTE members will try and see whether it will be possible for them to obtain more literature references that can help in shedding light on the problem.

As regards the Toxicology section agenda item Tri and Tetrachloroethylene the chairman of the Toxicology section, Prof. Dayan, is going to prepare a paper on it for further consideration by the CSTE with a view to allow it to issue an opinion in September (first week).

It was noted that the service of the Commission that made the request (Unit XI/D/1) needs an opinion by the first week of September because of the particular calendar before them (submission of their position to the European Parliament scheduled for the following week).

4. Information on the ongoing restructuring of the scientific committees

Members of the Committee were invited to consider applying and/or to bring this call for expression of interest to the attention of potential candidates known to them. However it was reminded that candidates cannot keep simultaneously posts both as members of the SSC and as members of any of the other scientific committees to be created.

The Committee was then informed that a similar exercise of call for expression of interest for all the other scientific committees would be published soon in the Official Journal. However this would have to wait till the respective mandates were adopted, something expected for the second half of July. It is expected that the deadline for the calls for the expression of interest to serve as members of the new committees be set at mid September. The selection process will start immediately after to be finished by early October and will involve the participation of the SSC. The objective is to have operational committees with elected chair and vice-chairpersons by the end of October. All these deadlines have to be met because of the obligation that the European Commission has before the European Parliament to have this task finished in November.

The CSTE was informed of the intention to change the structure of the present committees. The example given was precisely that of the CSTE. Its Ecotoxicology section is likely to become a scientific committee on its own, to be called Scientific Committee on the Environment. On the other hand the tasks that used to be those of the Toxicology section will likely merge with the Cosmetology committee and become the new committee on Toxicity of consumer products. It is foreseen that each committee will be made up of 21 members. One important aspect to bear in mind, and which proves the 'transparency point' made before, is that its composition is not exclusively limited to EU citizens.

The final format of the committees, as well as their new tasks, final names, etc. have not yet been adopted however.

5. Date of next meeting(s)

The dates of the next meetings were set at:

- Meeting of the Toxicology section: 3 September 1997

- Meeting of the CSTE Plenary: 4 September 1997

No date was fixed for a meeting of the Ecotoxicology section as it was not foreseeable that subjects would be available for the section to be consulted. Should this not be the case the Secretary of the CSTE will take the necessary action.

6. Any other business

Without any other business the meeting was closed at 17H00.

LIST OF PARTICIPANTS

CSTE:

Prof. Bro-Rasmussen

Prof. Calow

Prof. Chambers

Prof. Dayan

Prof. De Mik

Prof. Jouany

Prof. Klein

Prof. Kyrtopoulos

Prof. Ladefoged

Dr. Lison

Prof. Oskarsson

Prof. Pelkonen

Prof. Persoone

Dr. Pugh

Dr. Schümann

Prof. Turnheim

Prof. Vighi

Prof. Wennig (chairman)

European Commission:

DG XXIV:

Mr. Carsin

Mrs. Brunko

Mr. Costa-David

Mr. Lainas