Brussels, 15/03/2013 (Agence Europe) - The European consumer summit in Brussels on 18 and 19 March 2013, to be attended by Commission Vice-President Viviane Reding and Consumer Commissioner Tonio Borg, will focus on boosting cooperation among EU member states to ensure proper application of EU consumer law at the lowest possible cost. The event will be attended by 14 ministers and secretaries of state responsible for consumer issues and 450 interested parties (consumer and business groups, national regulatory and legal authorities and European consumer centres).
On Friday, describing what is at stake at the conference, Borg said that, in the current economic climate, he wanted to look at cooperation mechanisms to deal with breaches of the rules in many countries as a single issue rather than tackling problems 27 times, which could otherwise happen.
The summit is the first stage of a process of changing the application of consumer law in the EU to give it more teeth. Information collected nationally on consumer complaints and market performance indicators published in consumer scoreboards show that improvement can be made when it comes to application of consumer law.
The best solutions to emerge from the debate will be addressed in an online public consultation, the results of which will feed into review of the EU regulation on consumer policy cooperation (CPC), with any new legislation being unveiled by the summer of 2014.
Ensuring the effective application of consumer protection is one of the main aims of EU consumer policy and the European Consumer Agenda published in May 2012. It is also a key part of the updating of the CPC Regulation, which requires competent national authorities to set up a European network to ensure application of the legislation. The results of the two multiparty dialogues as part of the European Consumer Agenda will be unveiled at the summit. Improvements in transparency and reliability are recommended, along with price comparison websites and online consumer information, together with environmental claims to help consumers make well-informed green choices. (AN/transl.fl)