18 Statistics
| Committee's assessment
| Legally and politically important |
| Committee's decision | Cleared from scrutiny (by Resolution of the House of 20 January 2014)
|
| Document details | Draft Regulation to amend the European Statistical Law
|
| Legal base | Article 338 TFEU; co-decision; QMV
|
| Department
Document numbers
| Office for National Statistics
(33844), 9122/12, COM(12) 167
|
Summary and Committee's conclusions
18.1 Regulation (EC) 223/2009 is the framework legislation for
the European Statistical System. All other legislation under which
EU statistics are produced must be made in accordance with that
Regulation. In April 2012, the Commission proposed amendments
to four key features of the framework Regulation — the coordinating
role of the National Statistical Institutes of Member States,
the role and professional independence of the heads of those institutes,
self-assessment of the EU statistics produced by a Member State
and a published statement of confidence in them and enhanced access
to administrative data. The draft Regulation was cleared from
scrutiny after debate in January 2014 in European Committee B.
18.2 The Government has now told us of a new addition
to the text of the draft Regulation which gives cause for concern
and which was being put to COREPER for agreement on 19 December
2014. This addition was about the possibility of inspections by
the Commission to investigate whether or not a Member State should
be subject to sanction for misrepresenting statistical data. The
Government holds that if any relevant sectoral legislation made
on the basis of Article 338 TFEU (governing statistics) seeks
to create a power to impose fines, that power would be unlawful,
and any subsidiary power to investigate which was inseparably
linked to it would also be impermissible under Article 338. Therefore
the Government was going to vote against the draft Regulation
at COREPER and, in the event that the proposal received a qualified
majority in support, would make a Minute statement to the effect
that it considers the provisions of sanctions regimes that are
not foreseen by the Treaty as illegal.
18.3 We note the Government's concern about this
addition to the draft Regulation and await its promised account
of the outcome of the COREPER meeting.
Full details of
the documents: Draft Regulation amending
Regulation (EC) No. 223/2009 on European statistics: (33844),
9122/12, COM(12) 167.
Background
18.4 Regulation (EC) 223/2009, commonly referred
to as the "European Statistical Law", is the framework
legislation for the European Statistical System, comprising the
Commission's statistical office (Eurostat) and producers of official
statistics in Member States. All other legislation under which
EU statistics are produced must be made in accordance with the
European Statistical Law.
18.5 In April 2012, the Commission proposed with
this draft Regulation amendments to four key features of the European
Statistical Law:
· the
coordinating role of the National Statistical Institutes (NSI)
of Member States;
· the
role and professional independence of the head of an NSI;
· self-assessment
of the EU statistics produced by a Member State and a published
statement of confidence in them; and
· enhanced
access to administrative data.
18.6 The draft Regulation was cleared from scrutiny
after debate on 20 January 2014 in European Committee B.[61]
The Minister's letter of 16 December 2014
18.7 The Minister for Civil Society, Cabinet Office
(Mr Rob Wilson) wrote to tell us of a significant development
in the negotiation of the draft Regulation. He said that:
· the
compromise text, which was discussed during the European Committee
debate, was rejected by COREPER in February 2014 because of concerns
by a small number of Member States about the proposed relationship
between the Director General of Eurostat and the European Parliament;
· no further
information on developments had been communicated by either the
Greek or Italian Presidencies until very recently;
· however,
the Italian Presidency informed Member States on 5 December 2014
it had been discussing a new compromise with the European Parliament
and the Commission and this was presented to Member States for
agreement at COREPER on 10 December 2014;
· following
calls from the UK and other Member States, discussion of the new
compromise was postponed until the COREPER meeting on 19 December
2014 to allow Member States to adequately scrutinise the amended
text;
· the
Government had now finished its analysis of the text, after receiving
legal advice from its own and Council legal experts; and
· he apologised
therefore for not being able to inform us, given the recent pace
of events, at an earlier point before the new proposal was due
for adoption by Council at COREPER.
18.8 The Minister reported that the Government did
not consider most of the new amendments to the text as a cause
for concern, particularly with respect to any of its previous
concerns about subsidiarity, which we had shared, regarding the
original Commission proposal. He summarised these recent amendments
as follows:
· relations
between the European Statistical System and the European System
of Central Banks —
Article 5, paragraph 1.2: wording had been tidied-up to ensure
clarity with respect to the principles of institutional autonomy
of the actors involved and the appropriate cooperation between
the two systems, including a clear indication that national arrangements
for cooperation between NSIs and national Central Banks shall
be respected;
· the
head of the NSI — Article 5a: wording has been added that
stipulates that when recruiting him/her Member States will ensure
that there are equal opportunities, notably as regards gender;
and
· Director-General
of Eurostat — Article 6, new paragraph: the Commission has
agreed that the Director General will appear before the European
Parliament immediately after his/her appointment.
18.9 The Minister continued that a new addition to
the text does give cause for concern. He told us that this follows
a proposal from the European Parliament and is about inspection
visits in Member States, in a new Article 12(3b). He explained
that:
· this
refers to on-site inspections by the Commission to investigate
whether or not a Member State should be subject to sanction for
misrepresenting statistical data;
· it provides
that such sanctions and related inspection visits could only be
envisaged when they are subject to, and conditional upon, sectoral
legislation agreed by both the Council and the European Parliament
for specific circumstances;
· advice
from Treasury Solicitor's Department indicates, however, that
if any relevant sectoral legislation made on the basis of Article
338 TFEU (governing statistics) sought to create a power to impose
fines, that power would be unlawful, and any subsidiary power
to investigate which was inseparably linked to it would also be
impermissible under Article 338;
· although
final arbitration of such matters in the future would be for the
European Courts of Justice to decide upon, the Government was
not prepared to accept that the illegality of such sanction regimes
should be brought into question due to badly drafted law made
under an unreasonable timeframe;
· he was
therefore instructing the UK's Permanent Representative to vote
against the regulation at COREPER;
· in the
event that the proposal received a qualified majority in support,
he was instructing the Permanent Representative to make a Minute
statement to the effect that the Government considers the provisions
of sanctions regimes that are not foreseen by the Treaty as illegal;
and
· he would
update us on the outcome as soon as possible.
Previous Committee Reports
Third Report HC 86-iii (2012-13), chapter 10 (23
May 2012), Nineteenth Report HC 86-xix (2012-13), chapter 9 (7
November 2012), Twenty-seventh Report HC 86-xxvii (2012-13), chapter
5 (16 January 2013), Twenty-ninth Report HC 86-xxix (2012-13),
chapter 6 (23 January 2013), Thirty-eighth Report HC 86-xxxvii
(2012-13), chapter 5 (26 March 2013) and Thirteenth Report HC
83-xiii (2013-14), chapter 5 (4 September 2013).
61 Gen Co Debs,
European Committee B, 20 January 2014, cols 3-10. Back
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