Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-12-13-Speech-2-325"
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"en.20051213.60.2-325"2
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".
The honourable Member suggests that there is a connection between a meeting between the President of the Commission and the Spanish Prime Minister and the postponement of the Commission’s decision on whether there was a Community dimension to the proposed merger between Gas Natural and Endesa from the agenda of 9 November.
I can give the House a categorical assurance that there was no such link. In fact, given the highly complex legal, economic and accountancy issues raised by this case, the Commission simply had not finished its analysis of the case in time for its meeting on 9 November. That was the reason, nothing more and nothing less. Indeed, further information from the parties continued to be received by the Commission over the weekend preceding the 9 November meeting of the College.
Honourable Members will recall that the Gas Natural-Endesa case was notified to the Spanish competition authority. On 19 September, Endesa referred the case to the Commission for a decision on whether the case had a Community dimension.
On 15 November, the Commission decided to reject Endesa’s claim in favour of the Community dimension of the proposed takeover bid. Having respected essential due process requirements by allowing the two sides sufficient time to comment on each other’s submissions and having considered all the arguments put forward, the Commission concluded that, under existing EU merger control rules and on the basis of Endesa’s 2004 audited annual accounts, the proposed concentration does not have a Community dimension and therefore falls outside the Commission’s competence.
The Commission considers that its objectivity and its neutrality cannot be questioned by the fact that the Spanish Prime Minister may have touched upon the issue of Gas Natural’s bid for Endesa during a meeting with the President of the Commission. I was not at the meeting. The President of the Commission meets regularly with many EU Heads of Government, including the Spanish Prime Minister, and discusses, as he told me, a wide range of issues with them.
The Commission is entitled and indeed required to listen to any opinion by interested parties from the private or public sector and examine all the aspects of a case before adopting any decision. The existence of different drafts is in no way exceptional or unique to this case. Instead, it can simply be seen as part of the internal discussions carried out within the Commission in order to assess the issues at stake from all relevant perspectives."@en1
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