Brussels, 28/11/2013 (Agence Europe) - The European Parliament has adopted the draft mechanism in committee which aims to encourage the fair opening of third countries' public procurement markets.
On 28 November, the Parliament's international trade committee adopted - by 19 votes to 10 against, with 1 abstention - the amended draft regulation presented by the European Commission in March 2012, which aims to re-establish a situation of competition on the global public procurement market without putting up protectionist measures harmful to trade (see EUROPE 10579). The vote in plenary is planned for January 2014.
Confronted with the reluctance of third countries to open their public procurement to foreign bidders, this mechanism is keenly awaited on the EU side. While the EU has opened 90% of its public procurement, the US, Japan and Canada only open up 32%, 28% and 16% of theirs, and the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China) keep their public procurement completely closed. The mechanism provides for a competent authority to be able to ask the Commission to close a public tender for goods and services to a third country which protects its public procurement. The proposed mechanism would apply to major public tenders (worth €5 million or more) and to tenders in which goods and services coming from third countries exceed 50% of the total value of the goods or services involved.
The international trade committee amended the initial proposal, clarifying that the member states and their competent authorities will only be able to restrict the access of third countries' goods and services by means of measures provided for in the regulation or by European legislation on this, and only after a Commission investigation has revealed a lack of notable reciprocity from the third country concerned.
In addition, the MEPs back the proposal to exclude least developed countries (LDCs) from the scope of the regulation, and also the most vulnerable countries (those whose economy is poorly diversified and insufficiently integrated in world trade). Their bids for public contracts in Europe should be handled as intra-European bids.
Lastly, the MEPs amended the proposal that aims to ensure that restrictions linked to a lack of reciprocity of third countries are also applied when a third country infringes international labour legislation as defined by the recently adopted directive on public procurement. (EH/transl.fl)