Strasbourg, 05/04/2001 (Agence Europe) - The European Parliament, by adopting on Thursday a resolution from the EPP-ED, Socialist, Liberal and Greens/ALE on the use of "golden share" in the context of privatisation, called on the European Commission to immediately present a draft Directive on this issue, to replace its 1997 Communication on which it has based itself until now to begin infringement proceedings against the Member States that do not respect the provisions in the Treaty concerning investments within the EU. We do not need a Directive. We have a Treaty. The Commission interprets the Treaty and the Court of Justice decides (…) That said, the Commission must soon have a debate on the whole of this problem, replied the Commissioner for the Internal Market, Frits Bolkestein, during the debate, in night session, over questions presented on this issue by two Spanish MEPs, Mr Galeote Quecedo (EPP-ED group) and Mr Gasoliba I Bohm (Liberal group).
The resolution;- notes that the Commission has instituted proceedings before the Court of Justice against Belgium, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal and the United Kingdom, while the infringement proceedings against Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands are at a less advanced stage; - notes that the Member States opening their markets to competition at different speeds, measures are required to ensure that companies, which still enjoy a monopoly position in their national markets, do not benefit unfairly from this situation when they operate in liberalised market in other Member States (the Stockholm European Council considered it useful to refer to this problem in its conclusions. Following its inability to agree over a target date for the liberalisation of the energy sector: see point 17 of the conclusions in our Special edition on 25 March concerning the Stockholm Summit); - recognises that it is for the European Commission to initiate proceedings before the Court against the Member States that do not respect the Treaty; - nevertheless feels that the Commission must not act unilaterally, and that provisions governing investments within the EU must be adopted by the Parliament and Council, on the basis of a Commission proposal.
During the debate, Gerardo Galeote Quecedo (Partido Popular) reproached the European Commission for having unilaterally set the rules of the game, through an explanatory memorandum. interpretative Communication, in such an important field. I suppose, he said, that Mr Bolkestein remembers the previous annulments by the Court of a similar explanatory statement, on the pension funds, precisely because the Commission overstepped its competences. As for Carlos Affreil Gasoliba I Bohm (CDC), he spoke of his discomfort in the face of the unbalanced situation in which companies that benefit from their nature as a State company, with the resulting monopoly in a Member State, and which benefit from the opening of the market (..) exercise unfair competition. Commissioner Bolkestein, when repeating that the Commission will soon have a debate over the restrictions to intracommunity investments, noted that, according to the 1997 Communication, nationals from other Member States should be free to acquire control of a company from a Member State determined under the same conditions as the latter's nationals. The Treaty, he added, is neutral as to the private or public nature of the companies concerned. The CDU member, Karl von Wogau also reproached the European Commission for intervening as a sole legislator, as, in Byzance, at the time of Emperor Constantine, while for the Greek Socialist Giorgio Katiforis the true problem presented by this debate is that of knowing up to what point the Treaty authorises a Member States to impose restrictions on nationals of other Member States or on its own nationals. The Pasok member, he to, felt that it is not justified that the Commission is given its own rules to open infringement proceedings against the Member States, which have had to overcome enormous difficulties in completing the necessary privatisation programmes. The Commission acts in a particularly non-transparent manner, he felt. As for Benedetto Della Vedova, member of the Bonino List, he asserted that the Parliament must raise its voice against the golden share, and recalled that, during the referendum, which took place in 1997, on the initiative of the Radicals against the 1995 law that instituted special powers, the golden share, 80% of Italians had called for the abolition of instruments preventing the creation of a true internal market in the sectors traditionally occupied by the State. Mr Della Vedova also recalled an infringement procedure initiated by Commissioner Monti against the former Prodi government, and stated: the fact that ENEL in Italy or the Deutsche Post or France Telecom take advantage of their monopoly position to occupy liberalised areas in the market of other countries must be fought as a dominant position.
Mr Bolkestein replied that the Commission had adopted its 1997 Communication to clarify certain misunderstandings over certain articles of the Treaty. It did not do so without reason, he added, when citing two cases: - in 1991, the United Kingdom had tried to use golden shares to oppose the buying of certain privatised British companies by State entities and State companies from other Member States, which was known as the "Lilly Doctrine" (Minister at the time). The Commission had intervened with force, and the United Kingdom had changed its policy, recalled the Commissioner, more recently, Commissioner Lamy had to oppose a similar American initiative taken against certain European State companies in the telecommunications sector.