Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-11-11-Speech-3-151"
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"en.20091111.17.3-151"2
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"Madam President, I would like to thank Mr Harbour and the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection for raising this important issue. Just as Mr Harbour said, the free movement of services is one of the cornerstones of the internal market. It accounts for 60-70% of the EU’s economy and employment and it is growing. It will play a very important part in the EU’s economic growth, but as has also been pointed out, the free movement of services has not worked as well as it should have done. There is still much to be done to remove barriers to trade and to facilitate the trade in services, and it is excellent therefore that we now have the Services Directive, which is to be transposed by 28 December.
Finally, Madam President, I would like to thank Parliament for the interest it is showing in the process of implementing the Services Directive. In view of the very important role that the European Parliament played in reaching an agreement, it is good that you remain interested and are checking and ensuring that we are doing what we are supposed to do in the Member States. We agree that it is especially important for the directive to be put in place promptly and in the correct way, and, particularly now during the economic crisis, the Services Directive will be an important tool to take us out of the crisis and allow us once again to concentrate on economic growth and, hopefully, to create jobs.
The Commission is ultimately responsible for the Member States doing what they are supposed to do and I am sure that the Commission will talk about this, but I will nevertheless say a few words on behalf of the Presidency on the basis of the question that has been put to me by the committee. The first thing I would like to say is about the screening of legislation and how it has contributed to the implementation. The purpose of this is to identify and eliminate barriers to the freedom of establishment and the free movement of services. The requirements relating to the provision of services that the Member States retain must comply with the requirements for non-discrimination, necessity and proportionality.
This is a huge task, but when it is finished, the service sector will benefit from a reduction in the administrative burden for companies providing services. The final report to the Commission on this should be ready on 28 December.
The national points of contact are to gather information concerning rights and requirements in the services sector for service providers and the recipients of services. They are to give service providers the opportunity to apply for authorisation online and to communicate with the authorisation authority. Of course, this is quite difficult for the Member States to organise. It is based on the idea of us having a more modern system with a high degree of e-governance. Next week, the Swedish Presidency is holding a ministerial meeting in Malmö on precisely the subject of e-governance. At this meeting, the Member States will receive support from the Commission and a lot of seminars will be held to enable us to learn from one another so that we can make user-friendliness the main focus.
Another important issue is the language used on the web portals and the option of being able to use this facility in a language other than the Member States’ own. This is not a requirement in the directive, but hopefully most Member States will have information in several languages at the points of contact. This will give service providers a better opportunity to compare different markets and obtain the overview needed to be able to expand their operations.
The Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection asks whether the Member States will be able to implement the directive in time, and I hope that they will be able to. The Commission will have to answer this, but in fact, in the Competitiveness Council, all Member States stated that they would be ready in time. Political support for this is, of course, very important.
What are the biggest challenges, then? The directive as a whole is, of course, extremely wide-ranging and it requires a number of measures to be taken by the Member States, not only in terms of legislation, but also various measures to facilitate cooperation. These structures that we will hopefully have in place will make governance more efficient and more up-to-date. However, it will take time to put this in place. Screening the legislation in this huge area and finding legislative solutions cannot be accomplished overnight. Authorities will need to be trained with regard to their new duties, and this will require resources.
So the answer to the question of what the biggest challenges are is, of course, the setting up of the points of single contact and ensuring that they work. Lastly, Parliament asks how the interested stakeholders have been involved. This is an important question, because it is, of course, a fundamental part of the process for the various stakeholder organisations to be involved in creating an understanding of the Services Directive, communicating the advantages to citizens and companies, but also discovering their views and needs.
This dialogue has been a key element. Many interested stakeholders were already involved in reference groups during the negotiation period and in many cases, these networks have continued. In many countries, there has been broad social consultation on the proposals for implementation in order to obtain various pieces of information and views."@en1
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