Strasbourg, 21/05/2001 (Agence Europe) - Last Thursday evening the European Parliament had a short debate on the liberalisation of the gas market in Europe, following a oral questions made by the European Commission Commissioner for Energy and Industry. Commissioner Gunter Verheugen, when recalling that the Commission filed a complaint against France, which has not yet applied the Directive (entry into force in August 1998), felt that the situation is "serious" and "highly regrettable", but that it does not justify a easing of the efforts aiming to concretise the internal market for gas, on the contrary. We have no indication according to which France has the intention of postponing its transposition of the Directive until 2002, he told the MEPs, while recalling that the French authorities have, as opposed to expectations, withdrawn this issue from the agenda of their spring parliamentary session. As for Germany, the only other Member States that has not yet transposed the Directive, Mr Verheugen recalled that it had partly done so and that it intends to complete the transposition in the coming months, and that the Commission "is examining the situation" in order to check whether "other measures" are needed.
During the debate, Mrs Boudjenah (United Left, French) called on the European Commission to withdraw its complaint against France, while the British Conservative Mr Purvis spoke of his great sorrow to see that a "founding State is prepared to act against the law of the Union, and even take the law into its own hands". I have noted that lesson on Europe given by my colleague, said the French Socialist Mrs Gillig with irony, when asserting that, in fact, the conditions for free competition are also present in France, even if it has not yet transposed the Directive (and this, she said, to clarify the conditions allowing to ensure the maintaining of adequate public services).