Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-12-18-Speech-4-007"
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"en.20081218.2.4-007"2
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".
Mr President, I apologise for the delay. These are difficult times for small and medium-size enterprises. The crisis has not just hit banks and listed companies, but is affecting the entire economy, and is also resulting in job losses in the SMEs. We, in our European work, would do well, therefore, to give that sector a shot in the arm.
This is where a set of measures that were presented last summer under the header of Small Business Act come in; I am working hard on a number of proposals from that set, including the statute for a European PLC, more scope for micro-credit and fleshing out the option for a low VAT rate for service providers who serve private persons within the local market.
A very important point of concern for smaller enterprises is the administrative burden, most of which is brought to bear by national and decentralised governments. Where European legislation is playing a role in this, though, we have pro-actively started to clean up and lighten this load. In fact, this also applies to this dossier. The duties of information, and both directives to this effect, which are 25 and 30 years old and have been amended many times, are now being cleaned up and simplified in what is known as a fast-track procedure.
These measures are only a small step in the direction of lightening the burden, though. Much more needs to be done. In this respect, we have expressly aired our impatience in Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs. In this light, we submitted, along with this legislative dossier, a resolution to urge the Committee to fast-track a much more thorough review of legislation for small and medium-size enterprises. As it happens, the Committee was already on the case. The intention is to reach greater harmonisation where the European rules for small and medium-size enterprises are concerned.
Earlier, when we discussed this topic and a report by Mr Radwan in the Committee on Economic and Legal Affairs, we specifically said that it is not the international accounting standards board, which was involved in drawing up International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) for small and medium-size enterprises, that should be the way forward, but that we should reach further harmonisation within Europe on the basis of existing legislation.
During that discussion, it was particularly Mr Lehne, who was shadow rapporteur for this report, who suggested that Member States should already be given the option of excluding micro-entities, the really small companies, from this European legislation at this stage. This is, to my mind, an emergency measure which, even though it has been put forward by the Stoiber group, will not lead to fundamental simplification in the long term, because, as a non-compulsory measure, it will lead to major discrepancies between the Member States.
The ultimate objective and option should, therefore, be to achieve far-reaching harmonisation to the extent that companies that do not qualify as micro-entities, benefit from a similar, very simple, system. With regard to this simple system, I myself should like to remind you of the possibilities offered by the ‘XBRL’ (eXtensible Business Reporting Language), which is a system enabling various bodies to input data very easily and allowing various bodies to make use of those data. It would, consequently, become much easier and simpler for companies to supply this type of data, and these data could also be used in a great many ways.
In short, we need to have a proper debate soon on the resistance that is prevalent in the world of accountancy towards exempting these micro-entities. The Committee should come up with proposals. We should then examine the best method for medium-size enterprises, but also for these tiny enterprises, so as to guarantee transparency and a good bookkeeping system, which will help them do certain things, without lumbering them with an enormous administrative burden."@en1
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