Brussels, 19/12/2008 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 18 December 2008, the European Parliament adopted a report by Ieke van den Burg (PES, the Netherlands) on the draft directive to simplify Directive 78/660/EEC and Directive 83/349/EEC (the fourth and seventh accounting directives) on annual and consolidated accounts (see EUROPE 9645).
The report backs the European Commission's efforts to cut red tape for small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) by: a) scrapping the advertising obligations on establishment costs; exemption from the rule to breakdown turnover in annual accounts according to geographical area and nature of business; scrapping the obligation for a parent company to prepare consolidated accounts if it only has subsidiaries of negligible value. Along with endorsing virtually all the amendments tabled by the legal affairs committee, the plenary adopted an amendment tabled jointly by the EPP-ED and PES groups for the application of the new rules to come into force by December 2010 at the latest.
The new legislation is part of a broader plan to simplify EU company law, “Better Regulation”. At the end of November 2008, the EP adopted the Kauppi Report amending Directives 68/151/EEC and 98/666/EEC in order to cut the publication and translation costs associated with various rules for companies (see EUROPE 9788). (M.B./transl.fl)