The Estonian Presidency of the Council of the EU will seek a revised mandate to continue negotiations with the European Parliament on the regulation on online geographical blocking. On 27 October, it will suggest to the permanent representatives that software and video games be included within the scope of the text, accompanied by a three-year review clause.
The draft regulation requires traders to make their goods and services available to all consumers in the EU, with no discrimination in terms of accessing prices, sales and payment conditions (see EUROPE 11558). The aim is to remove discrimination on the grounds of clients’ nationality, place of residence or place of establishment for goods and services listed in the services directive (Directive 2006/123/EC).
The inter-institutional negotiations are in the doldrums, however. Thus far, three trialogue meetings have taken place without delivering any results (see EUROPE 11818), with the effect that the heads of state and/or government have become involved, calling on the co-legislators to find common ground before the end of the year (see EUROPE 11890).
Non-audiovisual content. The main stumbling block is non-audiovisual content protected by copyright law (Article 4). The European Parliament wants content of this kind to be included in the scope of the new regulation (see EUROPE 11774), whereas the Council is firmly opposed to it (see EUROPE 11677).
According to a document published by Politico, the Estonian Presidency will ask the committee of permanent representatives (Coreper) to grant it a revised mandate giving it greater room for manoeuvre in talks with the Parliament. The document, dated 23 October, explicitly suggests excluding online books and music from the scope of the new regulation, thereby opening the door to the other protected non-audiovisual content. It also suggests a shift closer to the Parliament position on the review clause: thus, as MEPs suggest, the regulation would be reviewed three years after it came into effect (rather than four), and every five years thereafter. However, the Presidency is displaying less flexibility on what is to be covered by the review: while the Parliament takes the view that this exercise should consider extending the scope to other sectors, such as audiovisual, financial, transport, electronic communications and healthcare services, the Presidency believes that it should serve only to examine the ambit of the regulation and the scope of the prohibitions of Article 4(1)
Passive sales. The other bone of contention among the institutions relates to passive sales (Article 6). Broadly, the Commission and the Parliament want the new regulation to prevail over competition rules, while the Council wants the opposite. At the Coreper meeting, the Presidency is expected to put two options to the member states: either remove this Article (so that, indirectly, competition rules continue to have precedence) or move closer to the Parliament position by giving primacy to the new rules.
At this stage, no new trialogue date has been scheduled. Negotiators are expected to come together in the next few weeks in a technical meeting to discuss whether to continue or to suspend the negotiations. Parliament might decide to initiate a second reading should the deadlock continue, a source has told EUROPE. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)