Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-01-16-Speech-3-146"
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"en.20020116.11.3-146"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, we are no doubt of the fundamental opinion that environmental and social security policy matters should actually be governed by environmental and social security law respectively. There are, though, exceptions to every rule. Not, of course, being unacquainted with the ways of the world, we are aware that we cannot carry on this debate on these new proposals by the Commission for a directive on the award of public contracts without taking their social and environmental aspects into account to some degree. It is therefore quite clear to us that social and environmental considerations of course play a part in this decision, but we are making a very clear distinction. We are of the opinion that, in the European internal market, the conditions for all who participate in this Internal Market should be equal. The key phrase ‘level playing field’ was mentioned by an earlier speaker.
Such a ‘level playing field’ is of course guaranteed only when the criteria we are trying to add on alongside the economic criteria are already a component part of the tendering conditions and are not introduced or implemented only later, when the tendering process has been completed and discussion has moved on to the award. This has been the reason why, in the debate so far, the Group of the European People's Party/European Democrats has always taken the view that, in so far as such criteria are also to be taken into account, they should be so under the heading of the tendering conditions and not left to be dealt with when the contract is awarded. I would therefore like to make it clear that Article 53, which was constantly being addressed and represented one of the main points of discussion and dispute, refers to the award. That is why the Group of the European People's Party/European Democrats will take a restrictive approach when the amendments to Article 53 are voted on. We want Article 53, as proposed by the Commission, amended as little as possible. Only then can we guarantee that the possibility of manipulation does not eventually arise, with the authorities that invite the tenders ending up able to use, as it were, criteria introduced into the discussion retrospectively to come to decisions that have quite different backgrounds from those under discussion here and which are informed by objective criteria.
I see this as a quite crucial difference, one that needs to be brought out in the Committee on Legal Affairs and the Internal Market and that has perhaps not yet become completely clear in the Groups.
If I may say just one thing more, we are also opposed to incorporating conditions in the Directive that will in fact end up bringing the internal market to a standstill and causing it to fail, just as we are opposed to leaving those who will later transpose the Directive into national legislation free to include such conditions. For example, in Germany, my homeland, a so-called ‘tariff fidelity law’ is under discussion, which will in fact – and I share Mr Kuhne's view on this – mean that tendering will not be on the basis of the generalised collective agreements – which are like laws that one must obey – but rather on the basis of tariff agreements, ranging from regional down to in-house, a condition that will make it possible to put a contract out to tender in such a way that only one enterprise ends up being able to participate in the process. That smashes the Internal Market to bits. Such a thing is an absurdity, and one we are not prepared to go along with. We will therefore vote against such a possibility’s being opened up by means of amendments. It is, however, very much my view that what Mr Kuhne said on behalf of the Committee on Industry, External Trade, Research and Energy, namely that there should be no going beyond what is generally binding, is something that could certainly meet with support from me or from the Group I belong to.
My Group has not yet come to a final decision on the threshold values. We will be doing that in our group meeting before the vote, as there are differing views among us on the subject. I would, though, like to point out that Mr Zappalà has made a very interesting proposal. I refer to Amendment No 147 which is by way of a compromise in the event of an increase in the threshold values being decided on and is designed to ensure that the fundamental principles of this Directive apply to all contracts awarded under this threshold as well.
One could say at this point that this goes without saying, but the proposal includes a significant innovation, which I think would be a real step forward for the internal market – the justiciability of what we are doing here, and the justiciability of the tendering procedure. That is at present not guaranteed in all the Member States under the threshold. I believe that, if this were to be possible, it would represent real progress. In particular, I ask the Commission to reconsider their attitude towards Amendment No 147 and to inform Parliament tomorrow of whether they might give this Amendment their approval, because I think this could be a genuine compromise on the issue of threshold values.
Finally, I would like to thank most warmly the rapporteurs, principally Mr Zappalà. This is one of this House's most problematic legislative proposals, and you have so far piloted us through its depths and shallows very well. For that you have my gratitude."@en1
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