Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-04-22-Speech-3-395"
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"en.20090422.56.3-395"2
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"The Commission is fully aware of the difficulties faced by consumers who are denied access to web sites or are discriminated against on a geographical basis when seeking to make on-line purchases. Let me assure you that combating geographical market segmentation, be it the result of state measures or the behaviour of private parties, is a high priority for our policy in the internal market. Practices such as those mentioned by the honourable Member in her question deprive European citizens of the rights and opportunities offered to them by the single market. They are completely at odds with the freedom to receive services across borders, which is a fundamental counterpart of the freedom to provide services enshrined in the EEC Treaty. With the Services Directive we now have a powerful tool to substantially ease problems faced by consumers who face discrimination when they purchase goods and services across borders, including over the Internet.
For the first time in the internal market legislation, the Services Directive explicitly requires Member States to put a stop to discriminatory practices carried out by businesses on the basis of the nationality or the place of residence of consumers. As you know, the Services Directive has to be implemented by the end of December this year, and, once the non-discrimination clause laid down in Article 20 has been reflected in national legislation, practices such as those mentioned by the honourable Member in her question will be unlawful. The only exception to this rule will be those cases where businesses can demonstrate that the different treatment applied to different categories of consumers is directly justified by objective reasons and therefore does not constitute discrimination. The Commission is currently working with Member States to make sure that Article 20 of the Services Directive is implemented on time and is effectively enforced by national authorities and the courts.
In addition, the Commission published a report focusing on the cross-border aspects of e-commerce on 5 March. This staff working document on cross-border e-commerce is an initiative by my colleague, Commissioner Meglena Kuneva. The report shows that, overall, e-commerce is developing rather well in the European Union, while cross-border e-commerce lags behind. There exists a strong potential for cross-border trade in on-line commerce. However, this potential cross-border trade is failing to materialise in the face of practical and regulatory obstacles that effect both consumers and businesses. The result is a fragmented on-line internal market. This has been identified and is being addressed by the market monitoring exercise the Commission has launched to examine the number of supply chains for particular retail markets. This work should allow the Commission to deepen its analysis of the retail sector in order to identify practices that distort relationships between suppliers and retailers and between retailers and consumers and assess the necessity of further reforms of the relevant national or EU regulations. This exercise covers five specific sectors, including recreational goods such as music and books sold on-line and off-line, and will lead to a Commission communication foreseen for autumn 2009. The effective and forceful implementation of Article 20 of the Services Directive, together with the examination of further remaining issues in the context of the market monitoring exercise, should provide us with a comprehensive response to the problems or barriers emerging in the e-commerce context to the detriment of recipients of services in general and consumers in particular."@en1
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