Examination of Witnesses (Questions 420
- 422)
THURSDAY 13 DECEMBER 2007
Mr Jorge Pegado Liz, Mr Bryan Cassidy and Mr Jean-Pierre
Faure
Q420 Lord Paul: The Single
Market Review says that they are going to simplify the regulations
and make sure that that happens. You have given us a very nice
document about improving the EU regulatory framework upstream
and downstream of the legislative process, and you have mentioned
that this is being done. Are we going to see a real change and
also that the old regulations which exist and which are of no
more value will not be applied any more?
Mr Cassidy: There is an increasing number of
directives now that are updating existing directives and in the
process of updating them there is a process of consolidation,
with which, of course, you are familiar from the way we do things
"in the country we know best". There is an increasing
number of these examples where simplification is an element of
consolidation. Directives have thus been piled one on top of the
other, making life complicated for the end user. Here in Brussels
something can be done about the upstream process. We have discovered
that a lot of the concern arises from the downstream process,
in other words what happens after a draft directive has gone through
the Parliament and the Council and then goes to the Member States
for implementation. As Roger and I know, going back to the 1990s,
the Prime Minister at that time was very concerned about the process
of "gold-plating". It still goes on and the other day
in Berlin we had a presentation from someone from Sweden who identified
"gold-plating" as one of the problems that the Swedes
have to cope with, so "gold-plating" continues to be
a problem. Associated with that is the fact that both at the European
level and at national level part of the regulatory process is
carried on behind closed doors. The Commission and the Parliament
have now finally come to an agreement with the Council that the
Parliament can have an oversight of something called the "comitology
procedure", the process whereby detailed regulations are
drawn up, not by the Commission itself but by national experts
or national civil servants, to fill in the gaps in a Framework
Directive. I think, Roger, that the same applies with Acts of
Parliament, does it not?
Q421 Chairman: Certainly.
Mr Cassidy: Acts of Parliament establish the
broad principle and the statutory instruments fill in the detail.
In our case the comitology procedure produces Commission regulations
which fill in the detail of the Framework Directive. Until recently
the Parliament has not had much control over that. Downstream,
of course, in Westminster, particularly the House of Commons,
huge amounts of European legislation go through as statutory instruments.
They are never debated on the floor of the House. I have monitored
them quite carefully and I always spot the ones which are supposed
to be based on European directives because in the Stationery Office
daily list it always says "EC note. This regulation relates
to Directive ... " et cetera. That is still going on and
still causing bother, and the final point is that so much regulation
in the United Kingdom and elsewhere is done by agencies, the Health
and Safety Executive, for example. Another example, which I know
politicians complain about is the Electoral Commission, which
is nothing to do with Europe. That produces endless regulations
that cause problems for active politicians. Similar things happen
in other countries, not to do with the Electoral Commission but
the implementation in Member States is a principal source of problems
for business.
Mr Pegado Liz: If I may add another aspect which
is very important, that is impact assessment, not only economic
impact assessments but also social impact assessments. We are
very keen on this and, by the way, I have seen that the United
Kingdom refused to agree to the Consumer Credit Directive on the
basis of it lacking an impact assessment.
Q422 Baroness Eccles of Moulton:
And we have another example with Television Without Frontiers
where the rules changed and it needed to have another impact assessment
and it was not done.
Mr Pegado Liz: Yes, exactly.
Chairman: That seems an appropriate moment
to conclude the formal session by thanking our guests and we hope
very much to see them in the United Kingdom.
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