EN Official Journal of the European Union CE 78/904

(2004/C 78 E/0956)

WRITTEN QUESTION P-4050/03

by Theresa Villiers (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(7 January 2004)

Subject: Proposal for a directive concerning credit for consumers

1. Could the Commission state its position on the appropriate level of harmonisation? Does the Commission accept that its approach of full harmonisation is not appropriate to the EU context and causes unnecessary problems in some Member States?

2. In his letter of 28 July 2003 to the Committee chairman and rapporteurs, the Director-General of DG Health and Consumer Protection indicated that the Commission recognises that measures must be proportionate. Could the Commission explain how this is consistent with the far-reaching changes proposed, which will affect all domestic consumer credit as well as cross-border credit, particularly in the light of the Director-General's comment that ‘a radical alternative would be to refrain from Community regulation of doorstep selling of credit since the cross-border aspect is absent or extremely limited (border regions)’, the rationale of which might be applied to further areas of the proposal? On what basis has the Commission established a need for the directive in its present form?

3. Could the Commission state what impact assessment was undertaken in relation to: (a) overdrafts, (b) surety agreements, and (c) the right of withdrawal and, if so, what were the results of the Commission's analysis? If no impact assessment was undertaken, could the Commission clarify the basis on which it deemed it necessary to propose the draft in this form?

4. Given the need to promote legal certainty, would the Commission agree that it is preferable to make changes to sectoral legislation, for example on money-laundering, data protection or unfair contract terms, instead of making changes in an unrelated legislative act, which could be interpreted as subsequent amendment of existing legislation? Would the Commission accept, for example, that Article 7 of the proposal would not even allow for identification checks if interpreted literally, contradicting Article 3.6 of the Money Laundering Directive 2001/97/EC (1)?

Answer given by Mr Byrne on behalf of the Commission

(6 February 2004)

Before presenting its proposal, the Commission carried out thorough and comprehensive preparatory work, including a number of studies on consumer credit in general and on over-indebtedness. The proposed Directive was drafted following extensive consultation with all stakeholders, including Member States, the finance industry, and consumer representatives, and all provisions of the Directive are inspired by existing national provisions. Full harmonisation of core areas was already announced in the Commission's Consumer Policy Strategy 2002-2006. In March 2003, this strategy received strong support from the Parliament in its Resolution on the Commission communication to the European Parliament, the Council, the Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions on ‘Consumer Policy Strategy 2002-2006’ (2) and the Council also agreed to the objective in May 2003.

The consumer credit proposal covers both domestic and cross-border transactions. This feature is not disproportionate to the implementation of the EC Treaty objective of consumer protection, as explained by (former) Director General Robert J. Coleman in his letter of 28 July 2003 to the Committee chairpersons and rapporteurs.

The Commission has proposed to include a provision on a number of unfair contract terms more specifically related to consumer credit, taking into account the fact that certain terms relating to financial services are excluded in the framework of Council Directive 93/13/EEC of 5 April 1993 on unfair terms in consumer contracts (3). The Commission is awaiting the views of the Parliament on the proposal. Given the ongoing work in Council and in the absence of a clear Parliament opinion, the Commission has neither taken any position nor drawn any conclusions on how provisions of the proposal could be changed. To do so in the absence of the informed opinion of the Parliament would deprive Parliament of its central role in the co-decision process.

(1) OJ L 344, 28.12.2001, p. 76.

(2) COM(2002) 208 — C5-0329/2002 — 2002/2173(COS).

(3) OJ L 95, 21.4.1993.