Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-04-03-Speech-2-311"
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"en.20010403.13.2-311"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I am not sure Constantine was Byzantine, after all he was borderline between Byzantium and the Roman Empire. Were it Justinian, of course, it would have been a different matter. Anyway the issue we are addressing tonight is the extent to which a Member State is permitted under a treaty to place restrictions upon nationals of other Member States or its own nationals, I suppose, from conducting intra-EU investment within the sphere of its economy.
This matter is particularly relevant to investments in privatisation conducted by Member States. The issue is of fundamental importance for the correct functioning of the European single market and I would like to thank colleagues for raising the subject this time given the number of cases the Commission has referred to the Court of Justice over recent years.
The Treaty establishing the European Communities under Article 43 on right of establishment and Article 56, as mentioned by Commissioner Bolkestein, on free movement of capital, clearly creates a regime whereby nationals of any Member State have the right to invest in other Member States. This is a right that a very large number of individuals and enterprises have availed themselves of as the European Union has developed.
Intra-EU investment has been increasing by staggering proportions over the last few years. In 1998, such investment totalled over EUR 132 billion; in 1999, it had increased by over 80% to over EUR 240 billion. We can reasonably expect that these figures will be easily surpassed and the rate of increase maintained as the establishment of the euro reduces intra-Community transactions, eliminates exchange risk and exchange cost for enterprises whilst at the same time increasing intra-Community investment opportunities. Such is the success of the European economic project and the establishment of the euro.
However, one can always seek improvements. There are still many tasks for the completion of the European single market and one of these is, of course, the gradual dismantling of state involvement in enterprises. This dismantling has only been pursued with great political courage and with grave political risks. Often it has only been achieved through the legal assurances that governments gave about their continued supervision and special interests in the strategic directions of the enterprises being privatised. Such legal assurances came in many forms, such as the golden share, so that there is a case, I suppose, to argue that the golden share has not always been an impediment but may have actually helped politically the privatisation process.
In its 1997 communication, the Commission established its guidelines for the existence of these legal assurances. It did so in a rather non-transparent way through a communication that was not discussed either in Parliament or by the Council. The legal assurances that governments had created, on the other hand, were established in the full glare of publicity and public debate that necessarily exists in the privatisation process. It really is rather an uncomfortable situation that such a dichotomy has been created between the establishment of fundamental Community rules and Member State regulations.
The Commission, using the communication as its operational guide, has since taken legal action against six Member States before the Court of Justice and opened infringement proceedings against the others. None of these cases has, as yet, come to a conclusion. It cannot be justified that the Commission has set up its own framework of rules under which it has been bringing actions against Member States, which have gone through enormous difficulties in bringing forward necessary privatisation programmes.
I agree with the Commission, when it states that the national interest argument used to justify such legal assurances by Member States, as has frequently happened, cannot be accepted as an adequate justification for such measures. The national interest argument is simply not sufficiently transparent since it can cover a particularly wide range of economic and/or non-economic criteria. I can, however, also agree with those of our colleagues who argue that the Commission too has been acting in a particularly non-transparent manner with regard to breaking down the barriers for intra-EU investment. I join with them in requesting that the Commission update its policy in this area with a proposal for a directive, not only for the sake of intra-institutional transparency, but also to provide guidance to Member States so that lengthy procedures before the Court can be avoided."@en1
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