on the exercise of the power to adopt delegated acts conferred on the Commission by Regulation (EU) No 692/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning European statistics on tourism

REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL

REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND

THE COUNCIL

on the exercise of the power to adopt delegated acts conferred on the Commission by Regulation (EU) No 692/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning European statistics on tourism

1. INTRODUCTION

Regulation (EU) No 692/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council established a common framework for the systematic development, production and dissemination of statistics on tourism in the European Union. It reflected the changes in the nature of the tourism economy and of tourist behaviour that had occurred since the entry into force of Council Directive 95/57/EC, and responded to the ensuing changes in user needs.

Regulation (EU) No 692/2011 empowers the Commission to adopt delegated acts:

amending the definitions to reflect changes to international definitions (Article 2(2));

amending the deadlines for data transmission to take account of economic, social and technical developments (Article 9(5)); and

adapting the Annexes to take account of economic, social and technical developments. The Commission may not, however, change provisions in the Annex on the optional nature of the required data and the limitation of the scope (Article 3(2)).

Furthermore, Regulation (EU) No 692/2011 emphasises the importance of the Commission carrying out appropriate consultations during its preparatory work, including at expert level, before exercising the empowerment.

2. LEGAL BASIS

This report is required under Article 11(2) of Regulation (EU) No 692/2011. Under this provision, the Commission is granted the power to adopt delegated acts for a period of five years from 11 August 2011, and is required to prepare a report on the delegation of power not later than nine months before the end of the five-year period.

3. EXERCISE OF THE DELEGATION

Since the entry into force of Regulation (EU) No 692/2011, the Commission has adopted one delegated act, Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) No 253/2013. This amended certain definitions relating to educational attainment, to reflect changes made to the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED).

The exercise of the empowerment was deemed necessary as a result of the revision of the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) adopted by UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) at its 36th General Conference in November 2011. Pursuant to Article 2(2) of Regulation (EU) No 692/2011, the Commission may adopt delegated acts to adapt the definitions used in EU statistics on tourism to changes in international definitions.

Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) No 253/2013 makes the following amendments to Annex II to Regulation (EU) No 692/2011:

all references to the variable or socioeconomic breakdown ‘educational level’ were replaced with ‘educational attainment level’;

all references to the categories ‘lower (ISCED 0, 1 or 2), middle (ISCED 3 or 4), higher (ISCED 5 or 6)’ were replaced with ‘at most lower secondary, upper secondary and post-secondary (non-tertiary), tertiary’.