Brussels, 24/06/2013 (Agence Europe) -Commissioner for the Internal Market Michel Barnier has proposed excluding the water sector from the proposed directive on concessions.
“Despite all the changes to the legal text, and the contributions from all political parties in the European Parliament and the Council, it is my judgment that the text we now have relating to water is not satisfactory for anyone: it does not provide the reassurances that citizens expect and it creates fragmentation in the single market. That is why the best solution now appears to remove water from the scope of the concessions directive”, the commissioner said in a press release issued on Friday 21 June.
Over at the Council of the EU, this proposal will be discussed on Wednesday morning by the national ambassadors to the EU (Coreper), ahead of a trialogue to be held in the afternoon to put the inter-institutional negotiations on the public procurement package to bed. Ireland, which is keen to conclude the dossier under its presidency of the Council of Ministers, is believed to be prepared to include this clause if the member states agree to it, as the provisions drafted so far have been “clumsy”, a European source told us.
This issue of how water will be dealt with, which is highly controversial in a number of countries, was the subject of a European citizens' initiative signed by 1.5 million people who were against any privatisation being imposed on the management of water in the EU. Germany is absolutely determined to retain a model whereby municipal companies (Stadtwerke), which are partly owned by private capital, are awarded water management contracts by the entities which make them up, without any level of competition. “It is our duty to take into account the concerns expressed by so many citizens”, said Barnier, who went on to reiterate that the European Commission has never proposed to force or even to encourage the privatisation of public services, such as water, as a decision of this kind comes under the exclusive remit of the member states. (MB/transl.fl)