WRITTEN QUESTION E-3765/02 by Luigi Cocilovo (PPE-DE) to the Commission. States party to international conventions which protect only their own nationals and not all Community citizens.
Date: 2002-12-23
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: EU Member State, EU national, bilateral agreement, case-law (EU), free movement of workers, migrant worker, pension scheme, social security, third country

C 155 E/184

Official Journal of the European Union

EN

3.7.2003

The Commission will assist this process according to its responsibilities. Where evidence of unreported cod
landings comes to the Commission’s attention,
it will review all available information and may issue
requests for administrative enquiries to investigate the extent and importance of such problems in specific
cases. If the evidence so justifies, the Commission will initiate legal procedures against Member States
(possibly resulting in a procedure before the European Court of Justice). Furthermore, the Commission
intends to elaborate specific monitoring programmes to monitor closely certain sensitive fisheries and to
establish benchmarks for inspection procedures.

Experience with seasonal protected areas or closed areas for cod conservation has shown very limited
benefit because as soon as a seasonal area is re-opened, intense fishing activity can restart and many of the
fish from within the area can be caught. The important measure that needs to be introduced is, therefore, a
limitation on effective fishing effort. The Commission does not support seasonal closed areas as an
alternative to reduced fishing effort.

The co-financed measures of the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance (FIFG) are intended to assist
in achieving a better balance between the fishing effort employed and the resources available. This should
happen by a permanent reduction in surplus fishing capacity within national programmes. Such measures
could be combined with social and economic measures such as early retirement schemes and individual
compensatory payments for fishermen. Member States that do not dispose of adequate financial flexibility
because they had not earmarked sufficient financial resources for social and economic measures have the
possibility to reprogramme their expenditures in order to do this if they so decide.

(2003/C 155 E/204)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-3765/02

by Luigi Cocilovo (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(23 December 2002)

Subject: States party to international conventions which protect only their own nationals and not all

Community citizens

In its judgment on the Gottardo v INPS case, the Court of Justice laid down clear principles on bilateral
conventions (virtually all bilateral conventions currently only protect citizens of the contracting states).
Other Community citizens resident in Italy who work in Monaco or San Maríno by virtue of their
citizenship are denied entitlement to social security benefits. Moreover, in implementing the commitments
entered into under international conventions, Member States must abide by their obligations under
Community law.

What action does the Commission intend to take in the light of the above judgment vis-à-vis those states
party to international conventions which protect only their own nationals and not all Community citizens?

Answer given by Mrs Diamantopoulou on behalf of the Commission

(6 February 2003)

In its judgment of 15 January 2002 in Case C-55/00 Gottardo, the Court of Justice ruled:

The competent social security authorities of one Member State are required, pursuant
to their
Community obligations under Article 39 EC, to take account, for purposes of acquiring the right to
old-age benefits, of periods of insurance completed in a non-member country by a national of a
second Member State in circumstances where, under identical conditions of contribution, those
competent authorities will take into account such periods where they have been completed by
nationals of the first Member State pursuant to a bilateral international convention concluded between
that Member State and the non-member country.

3.7.2003

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 155 E/185

According to this judgment, the advantages deriving from a bilateral convention between a Member State
and a non-member country must be granted to workers from other Member States which are not party to
the convention; this is in line with the principle of equal treatment for a State’s own nationals and those of
other Member States, as provided for in Article 39 of the EC Treaty.

Following the judgment of 15 January 2002 in Case C-55/00 Gottardo, the Commission asked all the
Member States to notify it about any practical difficulties in implementing this ruling, and about the
measures they intend to take in order to ensure that the various agreements comply with the Court of
Justice’s ruling.

A discussion of these questions took place on 9/10 December 2002 at the meeting of the Administrative
Commission on Social Security for Migrant Workers. The Commission is currently examining the replies
from the Member States.

(2003/C 155 E/205)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-3768/02

by Erik Meijer (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(23 December 2002)

Subject: Observance of the repeatedly acknowledged language rights of the Slovene-speaking minority in

the Austrian province of Carinthia prior to Slovenia’s accession to the EU

1.
Does the Commission recall that, after World War I, a majority of the inhabitants of the southern
edge of the Austrian province of Carinthia, most of whom were Slovene-speakers, voted in a referendum
to remain part of Austria instead of joining the recently founded Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and
Slovenes, one reason being that they were given an undertaking that in the area where they lived, even
within the Republic of Austria, the Slovene language would play a full role in government, information
provision and education?

2.
Does the Commission also recall that in the 1955 State Treaty, which made full re-emergence of the
Austrian State possible after World War II, the collective language rights of ethnic minorities in the areas
where they live, denied or ignored until then, were again guaranteed?

3.
Is the Commission aware that the hitherto largest party in Carinthia and the present Governor,
Haider, from that party, owe their popularity in part to their propaganda in favour of a monolingual
German Carinthia and to their opposition to the Slovenes’ language rights, but that a court ruling at the
highest level, in 2001, confirmed that the placename signs in Slovene which have been vandalised and
removed by German-speaking opponents of bilingualism since the 1970s must be repaired and put back?

Can the Commission confirm that this conflict is now threatening to escalate because the Carinthian
4.
Government is still thwarting implementation of the court ruling, that the Slovene-speakers in Carinthia
have now rejected a proposal to keep funding the continued existence of their long-established radio
station, Radio Dva, from government monies in return for voluntarily giving up most Slovene-language
placename signs, and that that rejection is to be punished at the start of 2003 by ending subsidies for the
radio station?

5. What is the Commission doing to ensure that, in time for accession by the neighbouring Republic of
Slovenia to the European Union on 1 May 2004, there is complete observance in the Austrian province of
Carinthia of the language rights granted to the Slovene-speaking population in 1919, 1955 and 2001, so
that the disagreement between the two communities does not soon grow into a permanent border conflict
between two EU Member States which is increasingly difficult to resolve?

Source: 2 December 2002 edition of the Dutch newspaper ‘De Volkskrant’