WRITTEN QUESTION E-2178/03 by Christopher Huhne (ELDR) to the Commission. Obstacles to services trade.
Date: 2003-06-30
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: freedom to provide services, intra-EU trade, liberalisation of trade, single market, small and medium-sized enterprises, tertiary sector, trade restriction

6.2.2004

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 33 E/231

In his second question, the Honourable Member queries whether the Commission will take account of
developments in services trade in more integrated areas such as Canada and the United States. The
Commission will, subject to the statistical limitations explained above, compare the performance of Union
service markets with those in North America in its impact assessment.

(2004/C 33 E/236)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-2178/03

by Christopher Huhne (ELDR) to the Commission

(30 June 2003)

Subject: Obstacles to services trade

Will the Commission state what it believes to be the key obstacles to the growth of services trade in the
European Union, particularly affecting small and medium-sized enterprises? What measures is it bringing
forward to tackle these problems? How will it measure its own success in doing so?

Answer given by Mr Bolkestein on behalf of the Commission

(7 August 2003)

The Honourable Member queries about what the Commission considers to be the key obstacles for growth
of trade in services in the Union, in particular affecting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), what
measures it will propose to remove these obstacles and how it will measure the impact of the proposals.

Concerning the first part of the question, the Commission would like to refer the Honourable Member to
the Commission report on the ‘state of Internal Market for services’ (1) of 30 July 2002, which presents an
indicative list of problems that companies encounter at different stages of their business process when
undertaking business across the Internal Market. This concluded that barriers were horizontal in nature
affecting diverse service activities. The accumulation of the numerous barriers that occur throughout the
business process have a profound negative impact on the growth and productivity of service activities in
the Union. It also concluded that SMEs are hit much harder by these barriers than their larger rivals. In
particular micro- and small companies are often not able to cover the required legal search and advice
costs arising from the regulatory fragmentation that currently exists. The few that do are then forced to
adjust their preferred business model to the differing national requirements. These may either dissuade
them to proceed or may result in short-lived entry into other Member States. The fact that SMEs are the
primary victims of
fragmentation is particularly worrisome since service activities are
dominated by micro- and small enterprises.

the current

In response to the Honourable Member’s second question, in line with the Commission publication on ‘an
Internal Market strategy for services’ (2) of 29 December 2000, the Commission is currently examining
how to resolve unjustified and disproportionate barriers that hamper the Internal Market for services. It
intends to present a horizontal legislative instrument before the end of 2003, as called for by both the
Parliament in its report on ‘the 2002 review of the Internal Market strategy (cid:1) delivering the promise’ of
29 January 2003, and the Member States at the Competitiveness Council of November 2002 and the
European Council of March 2003.

This future proposal will be accompanied by an impact assessment,
in line with the Commission
Communication on impact assessment (3) of 5 June 2002, which will propose indicators on which the
future monitoring of the impact of the proposal will be based.

In addition and as a complement
the Commission will present a
Communication on ‘the competitiveness of business-related services and their contribution to the
performance of European enterprises’.

legislative proposal

to this

(1) COM(2002) 441 final.
(2) COM(2000) 888 final.
(3) COM(2002) 276 final.