Brussels, 09/10/2002 (Agence Europe) - How can one ensure that the Competitiveness Council, which now includes the former Councils on "internal market", "industry" and "research", is the engine for achieving growth and competitiveness in Europe? How, moreover, can one lighten the regulatory burden that weighs down on companies, especially SMEs? Such are the questions that the Fifteen will seek to answer at the informal Competitiveness Council in Nyborg on 11 and 12 October. Commissioners Frits Bolkestein and Erkki Liikanen will be taking part in the work.
On Friday, ministers will seek to define the role that is to be played by the new formation to which they belong - whose creation was decided at the Seville Summit - with a view to strengthening growth and competitiveness which must be to the benefit of companies and citizens. They will also seek solutions allowing effective organisation of the work of the Competitiveness Council. In a press release, Bendt Bensen, the Danish minister to chair the meeting, declared: "Several new studies indicate that an increasing part of the growth is, among other things, dependent on favourable conditions for entrepreneurs, well-functioning markets and the utilisation of new technology. The EU can improve conditions in these areas, and to a large extent it is up to the Competitiveness Council to be the political forum that promotes growth and competitiveness by creating the right conditions for knowledge-based economic activity in Europe. In general terms, I believe, therefore, that the Competitiveness Council must act as a European growth generator".
Saturday morning will be devoted to improving the Community legislation applicable to companies, the aim being to reach guidelines allowing for it to be simplified, based on the principle that the resources spent by businesses in complying with legislation must be kept to a minimum so that resources can be directed towards production and development directly. In this context, ministers will seek to determine the policy areas where there is most scope for simplification, and answer the question of knowing whether criteria should be defined on the basis of which further policy areas can be selected for simplification. They will, moreover, examine the possibility of exempting small companies from certain obligations without distorting competition or affecting the public interest. Finally, the Council will tackle the question of follow-up to the implementation of the internal market and ask how timely it is to establish clear targets against which progress may be measured. "One of the Competitiveness Council's great challenges will be to modernise and simplify the working procedures and rules within the Council's remits. Shortly before Denmark assumed the EU Presidency, the Commission presented an action plan on better regulation. It contained, among other things, recommendations for simplifying the existing EU legislation and feasibility studies. (…) The Council's and my task will be to implement these recommendations", Bendt Bensen said on Wednesday.