WRITTEN QUESTION E-3407/02 by Armando Cossutta (GUE/NGL) to the Commission. Transparency and access to information in the field of public procurement.
Date: 2002-11-29
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: Internet site, access to EU information, administrative transparency, award of contract, public contract, use of languages

C 192 E/110

Official Journal of the European Union

EN

14.8.2003

it is proposed to establish a co-ordinating action
Within the 6th Framework Programme for research,
which will bring together the various stakeholders (researchers, industry, policy makers, non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) and civil society) to consider potentail policy implications of research outcomes (This
activity is subject to a call for proposals published on 17 December 2002).

In the context of the European Research Area, support from the Commission is also being provided to
COST Action 281 which coordinates nationally funded research teams from currently 19 European
countries regarding Electromagnetic Fields and Health.

The opinion of the Commission Scientific Committee on Toxicology-Ecotoxicity and the Environment on
health effects associated to the exposure to electromagnetic fields published on 30 October 2001 has
confirmed for radio frequencies and microwaves the validity of the Council Recommendation limits. This
opinion is in line with other national and international evaluation of the scientific literature in this area.

Therefore one can conclude that, based on the best scientific advice available, GSM antennas, when
installed to meet the safety levels provided in the Council Recommendation, should not give rise to health
problems.

(1) See page 77.
(2) OJ C 110 E, 8.5.2003, p. 121.
(3) OJ C 161 E, 10.7.2003, p. 52.
(4) OJ L 199, 30.7.1999.

(2003/C 192 E/107)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-3407/02

by Armando Cossutta (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(29 November 2002)

Subject: Transparency and access to information in the field of public procurement

Transparency in the workings of the Community institutions and easy and immediate access to EU
information in its sectors of economic activity are two basic components in the development of the
information society envisaged by the Lisbon European Council of March 2000.

Given that this is the case, it is not sufficiently easy in practice to access information in the field of public
procurement in the EU. On the basis of numerous tests conducted, simply accessing the link to the ‘public
procurement’ supplement to the Official Journal of the European Communities takes an average of three
hours, when under ideal conditions it should be possible to obtain the required information in less than
10 minutes.

In the light of these difficulties, and considering that many of the web pages on the EU site, including the
guide on how to use certain links, only exist in English, can the Commission indicate:

1. whether it considers that there is a need for all EU web pages to be available in translation, so that
everyone can benefit from all the telematics services available even if they do not have an excellent
command of English, thereby preventing ‘information exclusion’, which would limit the transparency
of use of the Internet as a means of development;

2. whether it

feels that sectors which present opportunities for the direct

involvement of private
individuals and undertakings should provide for improved access via IT links that are as user-friendly
as possible?

Answer given by Ms Reding on behalf of the Commission

(31 January 2003)

The Commission attaches great importance to transparency and the accessibility of information in the field
of public procurement taken directly from the public procurement Directives (1).

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Public contract notices are available on the Internet to citizens and enterprises via the on-line ‘TED (cid:1)
Tenders Electronic Daily’ information service (http://ted.publications.eu.int). Access to this service has been
free since July 1998. Public contract notices are available on this site simultaneously in the EU’s current
eleven official
languages following the
enlargement of the European Union.

languages, and this service will also offer the future official

The difficulties mentioned by the Honourable Member are totally unacceptable for a public service. The
Commission has spoken to the services involved, particularly the Publications Office, which is responsible
for running the TED service and SIMAP (the information system for public procurement (cid:1) http://
these services have never been contacted by users
simap.eu.int).
complaining about access times as slow as those mentioned by the Honourable Member.

Its inquiries have revealed that

The TED, SIMAP and Europa (http://europa.eu.int) services are, moreover, subject to regular technical
surveillance to ensure that they are always available (24 hours a day, 7 days a week), as are all the
Commission’s key computer applications. Links to the TED and SIMAP services appear on a page dedicated
to public procurement on the Europa site (see Information sources ‘How to find information on Europa’
Public procurement http://europa.eu.int/geninfo/info/guide/index_en.htm#proc).

The problems mentioned in accessing information must therefore be due to external factors which do not
relate to the services themselves and over which the Commission has no control. They may well be caused
by heavy traffic on the Internet and problems experienced by the Internet access providers.

The Commission has set up various mechanisms to provide assistance for citizens and enterprises, such as
‘Europe Direct’ (http://europa.eu.int/europedirect),
‘Dialogue with business’ (http://europa.eu.int/business/),
‘Your voice in Europe’ (http://europa.eu.int/yourvoice) and user helpdesks for all its information systems.
These services should be notified immediately of any access difficulties of the type mentioned by the
Honourable Member.

The answers to the other questions asked by the Honourable Member are as follows:

1. The Commission systematically publishes official documents in all the official

languages of the
European Union, in particular in the Official Journal (Legislation and Communication series and the
Supplement for public contract notices). This principle has been extended to include electronic
publications.

In addition to the official documents, the Europa Internet service (http://europa.eu.int) offers the
general public a vast amount of unofficial
information. It is the Commission’s policy to publish
information documents in all the official languages on the European Union’s achievements. These are
aimed at the general public and disseminated via the ‘inter-institutional pages’ which the Commission
produces under the aegis of the Internet Inter-institutional Editorial Committee on behalf of all the
institutions. Subject to budgetary provisions and technical constraints, this will remain a priority
objective after the next enlargement. In order to avoid any ‘information exclusion’, the Commission is
also striving to increase the number of languages in which specialist information is available on its site
(http://europa.eu.int/comm). The success of these efforts depends to a great extent on personnel and
budgetary constraints and the technology for running multilingual sites.

2. The Commission and the other Institutions have embarked on a huge operation to modernise the
Internet sites open to citizens and enterprises. The purpose of this operation is to improve their
accessibility, layout and user-friendliness, mainly by adopting a thematic approach which is directly
related to the EU’s activities, and increasing the number of interactive services which allow citizens to
become more directly involved in the activities of the European Union.

The Members of the European Commission have, over the past few years, taken part in on-line
discussions with Internet users. These discussions are conducted simultaneously in all the official
languages whenever the topic for discussion is open to the general public.

When the work in question is directly related to national activities, the direct input from citizens and
enterprises is sometimes conveyed only in the languages of the Member States concerned.

(1) Council Directive 92/50/EEC of 18 June 1992 relating to the coordination of procedures for the award of public

service contracts (cid:1) OJ L 209, 24.7.1992, et seq.