Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-04-13-Speech-4-011"
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".
Mr President, this debate confirms the Commission’s opinion that we need to provide for the most comparable and transparent statistics possible, since they are essential for the definition of certain basic lines for our actions, and particularly that we need finance to be clarified with regard to its legal formula. By proposing these amendments, the Commission intended for the recording of taxes and social contributions within the ESA to be carried out according to equivalent methods and, therefore, that there be no differences in approach between the different national public administrations.
This proposal is basically of a technical nature and is intended to fill the current legislative vacuum which allows for differing interpretations depending on the position adopted by each Member State.
The Commission is very happy that our proposal has received broad support and is happy with the report adopted by the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, which I will comment on shortly. However, I firstly wish to thank especially the rapporteur, Mr Knörr Borràs, for his work, which, on this complex and technical issue, has offered us great support. The rapporteur stresses in his report that the objective of the proposal is to arrive at the same figure, regardless of the statistical sources used, and in reality this is our objective.
The Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs has approved eight amendments and the Commission can accept Amendments Nos 1, 2, 3, 7 and 8 without any difficulty. There is a ninth amendment, presented later, which I will also comment on. The Commission would prefer not to maintain Amendments Nos 4, 5 and 6. The aim of these amendments differs from that of the regulation. I understand that, insofar as certain elements of the regulation are amended, we could also discuss the model for calculation of VAT used to determine own resources, but we are talking about a radically different problem.
In response to the concerns of the PPE, I would say that, when asking for the withdrawal of these amendments, logically the Commission must commit itself to presenting a proposal at some point to introduce that amendment, which is absolutely coherent, providing for more correct figures, which we hope will be used in the future to calculate the basis of the contribution to own resources. We hope that this approach will lead to a resolution of the problem raised.
With regard to Amendment No 9, the issue has been studied by the directorate-general of ECOFIN and by Eurostat and, having analysed the problem in detail, I can tell you, Mr García-Margallo, that, in principle, exceptions, in statistical terms, must only be allowed where a Member State is not technically capable of providing data. This has been the case, for example, with the exceptions allowed for certain Member States within the ESA 95 regulations. We are therefore talking about a technical problem, of not having the capacity to provide data. In the case in question, there are no technical difficulties to justify that exception, and the regulation has been substantially amended throughout its negotiation to give it more flexibility, in such a way that, in our opinion, all the difficulties raised by the different Member States can be resolved within the margins of flexibility which the regulation allows. This is the reason why the Commission does not consider Amendment No 9 to be acceptable.
If everything that has been said here can facilitate a convergence of the positions of both Parliament and the Commission, and if Mr Knörr Borràs and the PPE can withdraw the amendments I have mentioned, we believe that this would allow us to make progress with the adoption of the text which will, without doubt, be positive in terms of clarifying future accounts."@en1
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