The amended Commission proposal included a substantial number of the amendments adopted by
Parliament at first reading. These concerned:
- the role of biological monitoring in health surveillance for exposed workers;
- the need for consistency with other Community acts on the same subject: especially the directives
on health protection of workers and directives on general public health and environmental
protection;
- the advisability of having a uniform method for measuring benzene concentrations in air and for
analysis by setting a standard of CEN 689:1995 for the measuring procedure.
It also included Parliament's amendments on definition of the worker's breathing zone and the
definition of the 'biological limit value'.
The Commission included primary synthesis in fragrance material production among the temporary
derogations for limit values of benzene.
It did not include the amendments setting limit values for a series of other substances (such as
arsenic and its compounds) and did not withdraw the derogations set out in Annex III to the
directive, as Parliament wished.
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