Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-03-13-Speech-4-045"
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"en.20030313.1.4-045"2
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"Mr President, the Commission’s new consumer protection strategy is a highly ambitious strategy which symbolises quality of life of consumers by protecting them against unfair practices and reducing unwarranted price differences between one country and another, as well as giving consumers the confidence to access a market of 350 million people and safeguarding the credibility of consumer organisations.
The Commission deserves our congratulations on its detailed research, as of course do our rapporteurs on their proposed amendments. However, the path is not strewn with roses. The obstacles and technical difficulties are manifold. First and foremost, we need to convince the business world and a number of colleagues that a regulatory framework is not incompatible with the competitive ethos and is one of the basic prerequisites to healthy competition.
Secondly, everyone must realise that just listing business to consumer relations or even business to business relations does not amount to integrated consumer protection, especially if our common objective is a more efficient market and greater consumer protection. For example, the Green Paper proposals also need to address the proposed regulation on sales promotions.
As for the approach, opting as a matter of priority for a coherent framework directive containing a number of principles, such as a ban on immoral practices, the principle of good faith and the principle of fair trading practices, is the right approach. This approach does in fact reduce the need for detailed regulation, allowing a rapid response to be made to the increasing number of unfair practices and devices. Even legislators in central Europe, which are well accustomed to detailed regulation, are relying increasingly on general clauses in order to adapt legislation to changing circumstances. This approach has proven to be valuable and has allowed legislation to be updated.
We shall be unable to avoid specific regulation in the end, but it should play a complementary role. Besides, the flexible approach of a framework directive is also in keeping with the policy of increased self-regulation, to which priority should be given, but on two conditions: first, there must be a general time frame within which interested parties are required to agree and, secondly, there must be a common framework for determining who is responsible for honouring the obligations provided for in self-regulation.
Another problem is choosing between maximum harmonisation and minimum harmonisation. It is a difficult choice because, first, we do not want harmonisation to result in a lower level of protection and, secondly, maximalist proposals usually obstruct attempts to harmonise. I think that we should proceed on the basis of maximum harmonisation and should only take selective recourse to minimum harmonisation in individual instances.
I should like to close with a couple of words about the special attention which needs to be paid to consumer organisations. We need to ensure they are representative and transparent because consumer organisations are currently a consumer protection problem in themselves."@en1
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