Brussels, 18/12/2014 (Agence Europe) - The Committee of the Regions (CoR) is preparing to adopt an opinion in mid-February on the negotiations for the transatlantic trade and investment partnership agreement (TTIP). The opinion contains very strong demands on the opening of public procurement and on the protection of public services. Developed by Markus Töns (PES, Germany), and adopted by the CoR's commission for economic and social policy on Wednesday 17 December, the draft opinion states concern at the impact of TTIP on the local and regional level.
The draft opinion underlines the potential risks that threaten the balance between the need to foster competition and innovation in the EU and the commitment to ensure social inclusion, local autonomy and public control in services of general interest.
As regards public procurement, the text underlines the need to exclude national exceptions, permitted by the EU's legal framework (for the special treatment of in-house companies, cooperation between local authorities, the water sector and emergency services), from the scope of the TTIP negotiation. Furthermore, the cost-benefit ratio of opening public procurement in TTIP could become unsustainable given the current imbalance: 85% of public procurement in the EU is open to US suppliers but only 32% of US public procurement is open to European suppliers. This imbalance could be further exacerbated by the opt-in system for the US.
Even though services supplied in the exercise of governmental authority are currently excluded from the negotiations, the CoR's draft opinion also demands more clarification to ensure that this exclusion covers services deemed in the case law of the parties to the agreement or of each member to be supplied in the exercise of governmental authority. The draft opinion also argues that the reference to public services as mentioned in the negotiation mandate should cover all services subject to specific regulatory regimes or characterised by specific obligations imposed on the service providers at national, regional or local level in connection with the general interest - such as water and energy provision, waste and sewage disposal, emergency services, public health and social services, public transport, housing, urban planning measures and urban development. For all these services, the draft opinion calls on the European Commission to apply a horizontal exemption from all obligations entailed by the principle of market access and national treatment.
The draft opinion is also opposed to the opening of education services (pre-school, school, higher, adult and continuing education) with mixed public-private financing.
In addition, the draft opinion states that local and regional authorities must still be able to take any regulatory or financial measure necessary to promote the cultural diversity, freedom and pluralism of the media and to preserve or develop audiovisual services. (EH)