Strasbourg, 16/12/2014 (Agence Europe) - Just a little cloud over the coalition which brought Jean-Claude Juncker to the head of the Commission, or a deeper disagreement over the way forward? Several political groups from the European Parliament were unable to hide their disappointment, or even their concern, at the 2015 working programme of the European Commission, which was presented on Tuesday 16 December.
This programme will comprise 23 new initiatives (see EUROPE 11217) and will strive to make radical changes to the existing working methods and to focus only on vital texts which are liable to be adopted at the Council without complications. “There was a time when the Commission made 100 proposals a year”, said Jean-Claude Juncker. “For the whole of the settling-in process of the Commission, we have agreed to stick to the most essential matters”. By abiding rigidly to this principle, 452 legislative initiatives have been reviewed and 83 legislative acts are to be pulled, President Juncker and Vice-President Frans Timmermans announced. Some of these have stirred up a certain amount of passion in recent days, such as the package on the circular economy and on waste, which is to be withdrawn, but to be improved and “re-proposed more ambitiously in 2015”, Timmermans stressed. The initiatives on air quality, “which did not respond to our fuel taxation objectives”, will also be removed and amended in the framework of the Energy-Climate package 2030.
A further clarification: the maternity leave directive has been shelved for six months to allow the Parliament and Council to reach a solution, but “if the directive still doesn't work after this time, it will be withdrawn”, Timmermans warned. There were other important announcements, such as those made by Juncker who, in the wake of the LuxLeaks scandal, was eager to demonstrate his determination to tackle tax fraud and tax evasion. As well as a directive on automatic exchanges of information on tax rulings, which was announced for 2015 a few weeks ago, Juncker referred to an action plan which will adopt the principle that the country of the profit must be the country of the taxation. This action plan will be drawn up in 2015 and will draw its inspiration from the work of the OECD and the G20 on the subject. It will be accompanied by a communication on tax harmonisation.
Although certain members of the Parliament applauded this declaration by Juncker, the announcements for 2015 left some of his allies, particularly from the S&D and ALDE Groups, sceptical. According to Gianni Pittella (S&D), there are a number of questions over the texts related to environmental sustainability and trust in Juncker “will depend” on new ideas emerging. The S&D called on Monday for this working programme to be the subject of a Parliament resolution in January of next year, because “the Parliament cannot give up its right to make proposals”. Although he continues to have confidence in Juncker and his team, Pittella explained that it was not the group's intention to “remain silent in the face of anything that happens”. There were reservations over the fate of the new proposals on the circular economy, air quality and the maternity leave directive.
The Liberals, for their part, pulled no punches. Although the vast majority of them support the principle of better regulation, they would have liked, firstly, the Commission to go a lot further than 83 texts and, secondly, for it to de-legislate smartly and “not just because they can't get a text through the Council”, Guy Verhofstadt said. On that basis, “initiatives such as the patent and banking union would never have seen the light of day, because they were at deadlock at the Council”. The Liberals also regretted the lack of transparency in the presentation of this programme, Sophie in't Veld lamenting the fact that the Parliament had found out about it “through leaks in the press”.
The Greens/EFA had higher hopes for this new Commission, said Philippe Lamberts, who sees the Juncker Commission as just the succession to and “continuation of Barroso, just a bit more professional”. Amongst other things, the group is concerned for the texts on air quality and the circular economy.
The key proposals withdrawn or modified include the taxation of energy products and a series of initiatives related to agriculture, health and security, as well as proposals on reciprocity in public procurement, which will be amended in 2015. The proposal on European sales law will be revised in 2015. The Commission, on the other hand, seems to have backed off from a number of texts relating to bank restructuring, and has kept them in its corpus. EUROPE will return to this. (SP)