WRITTEN QUESTION E-0226/03 by Guido Podestà (PPE-DE)and Amalia Sartori (PPE-DE) to the Commission. Regulatory obstacles to intra-Community trade in gold products — breach of Article 28 of the EC Treaty.
Date: 2003-02-03
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: France, Ireland, Italy, United Kingdom, competence of the Member States, complaint to the Commission, free movement of goods, gold, intra-EU trade, trade restriction

8.4.2004

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 88 E/319

The Commission is funding and plans to fund activities in the coca-producing areas of Chapare and Los
Yungas which will create sustainable agricultural and other income-generating activities to encourage coca
producers to give up growing coca. It is also providing local infrastructure such as health centres and
schools. The Commission is also seeking to improve living conditions and support economic development
in the labour-expulsion zones of the Highlands to reduce the pressures of extreme poverty which stimulate
the migration of workers to the coca-producing areas. The Commission works with local authorities and
has a dialogue with coca farmers, and its projects seen well received by the population.

The Commission is an active Permanent Observer of the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs
(CND), where it has defended a balanced approach between prevention and treatment and the fight against
production and trafficking. Alternative development projects are an illustration of the latter by providing
alternative livelihoods, they seek to decrease the dependence of farmers on drug cultivation.

There are no plans for the next session of the CND to engage in a process of revising the three United
Nations Conventions. This matter has not been raised by Member States nor by the Commission in the
periodic discussions of Union drug policy.

(2004/C 88 E/0324)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-0226/03

by Guido Podestà (PPE-DE)
and Amalia Sartori (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(3 February 2003)

Subject: Regulatory obstacles to intra-Community trade in gold products (cid:1) breach of Article 28 of the EC

Treaty

It is now almost 50 years since the entry into force of the EC Treaty and the related provisions establishing
a common market and yet many regulatory obstacles still exist and are preventing the free movement
within the EU of gold products legally hallmarked and marketed in a Member State.

This applies, in particular, to Italian gold products which, although manufactured, legally hallmarked and
marketed in Italy, find it difficult to move from Italy to some other Member State of the EU because of the
legislation and regulatory obstacles in force, particularly in France, Ireland and the United Kingdom.

It is now consistently established by Community case law that any trade regulations enacted by Member
States which may actually or potentially impede intra-Community trade directly or indirectly are regarded
as measures with an effect equivalent to quantitative restrictions and hence a breach of Article 28 of the EC
Treaty.

Despite recent complaints (cid:1) some of which are still pending (cid:1) and despite the seriousness of the
violations established, which erode a freedom, that of the free movement of goods, which is crucial for the
Community, the Commission does not appear to have paid the necessary attention to this issue so far.

1.
In the light of the situation described above, can the Commission say how it intends finally to put an
end to any impediments or obstacles to free movement between Member States, within the common
market, of gold products legally manufactured, hallmarked and marketed in a Member State?

Can the Commission explain why, despite repeated reports, it has so far failed to intervene with

2.
sufficient rigour to put an end to the breaches described above?

C 88 E/320

Official Journal of the European Union

EN

8.4.2004

Answer given by Mr Bolkestein on behalf of the Commission

(5 March 2003)

The Commission is asked how it intends to remove obstacles to the free movement of gold products
legally manufactured, hallmarked and marketed in a Member State and what steps have been taken to
bring an end to breaches of article 28 of the EC Treaty in this area.

The first point to make is that, in the past, harmonising legislation in this area was proposed by the
Commission but never came to fruition. Pending any harmonisation of the rules relating to hallmarking,
obstacles to the free movement of gold products within the Union fall to be examined under articles 28 to
30 of the EC Treaty.

In the early 1990s, several
infringement cases concerning obstacles to trade in precious metals were
brought against various Member States including France, Ireland and the United Kingdom. However, in the
light of the ruling of the European Court in the Houtwipper case (Case-293/93) delivered on 15 September
1994, these cases were closed. In Houtwipper, the Court expressly rejected the argument of the German
government that:

a Member State may not prohibit the marketing in its territory of articles of precious metal hallmarked
by the producers themselves in the Member State of exportation, where compliance with the law, and
consequently, consumer protection and the safeguarding of fair trading are assured by a range of
measures capable of ensuring that the hall mark functions as a guarantee.

Instead the Court said that, in the absence of Community rules, the Member States had a wide discretion,
and it was for them to choose the appropriate measures to deal with the risk of fraud. The choice between
prior control by an independent body and a scheme permitting hallmarking by manufacturers, backed up
by training, quality rules and sanctions was a matter for the legislative policy of the Member States; the
Court would review that choice only where there had been ‘a manifest error of assessment’.

In its judgement in Commission v. Ireland (case C-30/99), delivered on 21 June 2001, the Court chose not
to revisit ‘the question whether a hallmark struck by a manufacturer or his laboratory offers sufficient
guarantees of independence to be considered equivalent to a hallmark struck by an independent body’.

The Commission recently received new complaints against the three Member States referred to in the
question, alleging that their policy of failing to recognise hallmarks struck by the manufacturer in the
context of a scheme of accreditation, monitoring and surveillance is contrary to article 28 of the EC Treaty.
The Commission is currently examining whether the refusal to recognise such marks might constitute ‘a
manifest error of assessment’ by the authorities of these Member States.

(2004/C 88 E/0325)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-0230/03

by Helle Thorning-Schmidt (PSE) to the Commission

(4 February 2003)

Subject: Implications of enlargement for jobs of customs agents

Analyses show that almost 22 000 customs agents stand to lose their jobs in 2004; 20 000 of those lost
jobs will be in the Central and Eastern European countries as a result of enlargement. Some customs agents
are therefore already looking for other employment because they know that most of them will lose their
jobs as of May 2004. This situation may give rise to a number of practical problems as customs agents are
responsible for ensuring that both the EU’s and the applicant countries’ customs regulations are complied
with as a condition of goods crossing the EU’s external borders.