Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-05-04-Speech-1-219"
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"en.20090504.24.1-219"2
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"Mr President, I thank Arlene McCarthy very much for her words because a lot has really been done on this directive. I would, however, like this directive – which we will continue to work on – not just to be adopted, but also to be embraced, by all the stakeholders. We will not spare our efforts for this to happen. As this is our last session here, may I use the opportunity to thank you all very sincerely, especially Arlene as the chair of our committee, as well as Mr Harbour and especially Mrs Cederschiöld. I expect one way or another to keep in touch with you because it was a real pleasure to work with you and I hope this will continue in another way.
The Commission is committed to maintaining a constructive dialogue – and this is my political commitment to you – with the stakeholders mostly affected by the draft directive during the legislative process. To that effect, I will gather consumer and business stakeholders together at a joint meeting in June 2009 to clarify elements of the proposal and to further discuss the most important aspects of the proposal. Parliament will be kept duly informed.
I would like just to add that last week I met all the consumer organisations under the umbrella of BEUC and we discussed this matter again. Two days later at least 10 representatives from the House of Lords came to discuss this directive in Brussels. This is a very good sign that interest in consumer policy is increasing, as is right for the internal market.
I would now like to concentrate on the next important steps for the directive because I do believe that this directive is very important for all of us. We need this directive for the internal market of the 21st century. Let me make it clear that, before tabling the proposal, the Commission carried out a comparative law analysis, the ‘Compendium’, covering the laws of the Member States transposing the consumer directives under revision. The Commission is now going through the various provisions of the proposal in more detail with the Member States in order to improve its understanding of the practical impact on national law.
My services are preparing a table, which aims to illustrate the impact of the proposal on the existing levels of consumer protection across the EU. The table will cover those provisions (for example the length of the withdrawal period and of the legal guarantee) for which it is possible to assess whether the proposal will bring about an unquestionable increase or decrease in consumer protection in the various Member States. The table will be available by the end of May at the latest.
Under the proposal, Member States will be able to retain general contract law remedies for faulty goods, provided that the legal requirements for the exercise of these remedies differ from the requirements which apply to the remedies regulated in the proposal. I appreciate that this interaction between the proposal and national general contract law remedies could be made clearer in the text. This means that remedies such as the right to reject in the UK or the
in France could be maintained. However, I am also prepared to consider alternatives whereby elements of these national remedies could be incorporated into the proposal, if such a solution were to be preferred by the Council and the Parliament.
The proposal complements the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCP). Whereas UCP protects consumers collectively against questionable business practices by rogue traders, the draft Consumer Rights Directive provides consumers who conclude a contract with a trader with individual contractual rights, which they can enforce before civil courts. As regards the Services Directive and the E-Commerce Directive, the information requirement in these Directives will apply in addition to those of the proposal and will also prevail in case of conflict with the proposal.
Finally, as regards the Rome I Regulation, the preamble to the proposal makes it clear that the proposal is without prejudice to the Regulation. As a consequence, the national law applicable to consumer contracts within the scope of the draft Directive will be determined exclusively by the Regulation.
The Commission, in preparing the proposal, was inspired by the findings of the contract framework of reference (CFR), for example, on the black list of unfair contract terms, the passing-off and delivery rules, as well as the streamlining of the pre-contractual information requirements.
For the future, it will be important to ensure coherence between the CFR and the Consumer Rights Directive. Given that the CFR will be a longer-term project, we will have to make sure that the final definitions and rules of the Consumer Rights Directive are incorporated in the section of the CFR dealing with consumer contracts.
The proposal for a Directive on Consumer Rights was preceded by a thorough impact assessment. The impact assessment also monetised the administrative burden that would accrue as a result of the changes proposed, and compared it with the cost of compliance that traders wishing to sell to other Member States have to incur as a result of the fragmentation of consumer protection rules and Rome I. The assessment showed that full harmonisation of the essential consumer rights would have strong positive effects on internal market integration and consumer confidence. During the initial stages of the legislative process, it appeared that further evidence and more insight might be useful on consumer behaviour and preferences regarding sales remedies. I intend to launch a qualitative study in the near future on this matter, with a view to gathering evidence following in-depth interviews with consumers and traders. The results of the study should be available in the third quarter of 2009."@en1
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