MONDAY 23 JULY 2007

Ms Fernanda Ferreira Dias

  Q260  Lord Powell of Bayswater: Even the political report from the Commission, the main report, to get serious consideration of that in the two weeks, let us say, between the end of November and the beginning of December looks a bit ambitious.

  Ms Dias: It will be in the December European Council, that is for sure. Professor Rodrigues' idea, who is the person I told you is co-ordinating for the Presidency, is to put it in the December European Council Conclusions. As regards the negotiation of the Treaty, there is an informal Council meeting mid-October and the goal is that point.

  Lord Powell of Bayswater: I recognise the goal is that.

  Q261  Chairman: Could you tell us a bit more about the workshops? Who will be invited to participate and will there be any minutes taken or document produced?

  Ms Dias: Yes, of course. This workshop will have three sessions and one round table at the end. The majority of speakers will be academics, so economists mainly. They will come from different European Member States. They will present works that they have been doing in their universities and the themes essentially deal with the European Monetary Union, the Single Market in a globalised context, so the external dimension, and the problems of governance in the internal market. It will have a wide participation so participants will cover all areas of interest. The institutions are going to be invited, members of the Economic Policy Committee—EPC—are going to be present of course, Permanent Representations will be there, businessmen and other people. I think they envisage including some participants from the consumer side.

  Q262  Chairman: The purpose of my question is that we will be in recess, the UK Parliament returns on 8 October, and then we will start our hearings and deliberations again. It would be helpful to receive at least a summary of some of the discussions and presentations. Would you recommend that we go through UKREP, the UK Representation?

  Ms Dias: Yes, of course.

  Q263  Chairman: I think that would be very helpful.

  Ms Dias: We will forward all the papers. Mrs Clelia Uhart from the UK Permanent Representation will probably participate in the workshop as well.

  Chairman: Thank you.

  Q264  Lord Whitty: You talked about the horizontal issues, but from the point of view of the Presidency do you have a view which may or may not be the same as the Commission as to what the most important horizontal things to tackle are in this strategic review of the internal market?

  Ms Dias: I prepared some notes. We do perceive that there are common points. There was a public consultation that began the whole process of the Single Market Review and in that public consultation it was clear what sectors should be tackled and what were the most urgent sectors. Those were the services sector, specifically retail financial services, insurance, transport, energy, taxation and free movement of workers as well as intellectual property rights. Those are the sectors where more needs to be done in the internal market for the 21st century. The challenge now is not to complete the internal market because the internal market will never be completed, it is an ongoing process. The opening of this market and the opportunities that it will allow for Europeans, both firms and citizens, is the real challenge for the 21st century. In the context of these sectors I have just mentioned, the Commission will present proposals for these sectors in detail, so communications, other initiatives, legislative and non-legislative, will be presented in almost all of these areas.

  Q265  Lord Whitty: When you talk about "sectors", some of those are sectors in the sense of industrial provider sectors and some of them, like the free movement of labour and intellectual property, can cross several sectors. I thought by horizontal issues you meant more the issues which cover several sectors. If you take intellectual property, what priorities would you have within that area? Intellectual property covers a whole range of different things from music or whatever through to a whole range of innovation and so forth. Within that intellectual property portfolio have you some particular areas of interest?

  Ms Dias: Yes. As the Portuguese Presidency we have a colleague dealing with intellectual property rights, so he could tell you in more detail what are foreseen to be the main issues to be tackled. When I said horizontally the internal market will have to be adapted to this reality of the 21st century, I told you the sectors in which work needs to be done and, you are right, I should have finished by saying the horizontal part of the internal market which is underneath all this is that we should keep better articulating internal market policies with other sectoral ones, like the ones I referred to, and we should improve the mechanisms of assistance and co-operation between Member States because they have proven to be a very good impetus for the internal market, mechanisms like the SOLVIT network for example. I do not know if you are acquainted with that.

  Q266  Lord Whitty: We have seen the big sign on the side of the Berlaymont.

  Ms Dias: Exactly, celebrating five years. The SOLVIT network has been a success. It solves problems of businesses and citizens in an informal way. These kinds of proceedings should be developed. Of course, better regulation principles, which are so dear to the UK, should be underneath all the initiatives that the European Union does and also at Member State level. For all of this we have an action plan, which is the Lisbon Strategy. We have had it since 2000. The Lisbon Strategy should be the horizontal plan covering everything that the Union has for its economic development, also covering social and environmental aspects. That is the whole picture.

  Q267  Lord Whitty: That is pretty broad.

  Ms Dias: Exactly. It is broad but then you go into the detail. The Lisbon Strategy sets the framework but it goes into detail.

  Q268  Lord Haskel: Of course the difference that the Presidency can make is the determination with which you can drive a project forward. I was trying to assess from what you were saying how determined the Presidency is to drive this forward. Do you think that what we need is more of the same to achieve the Lisbon agenda, to drive the Lisbon agenda forward, or does the Presidency think that it needs a whole new vision and that we have come to an end of what the Single Market was originally and now we need to perceive it in a different way?

  Ms Dias: I am glad you mentioned one word there, which was "vision". We are working on more of a vision paper. We need a vision paper, we do not need a mere communication, and that is the expression the Portuguese Presidency, my authorities use when they talk to the Commission. As you may be aware, in 2008 a new cycle is going to be launched within the context of the Lisbon Strategy and it will cover the period between 2008 and 2010. We are also working in parallel with the Commission on the launching of this new cycle and with Slovenia which will have the Presidency in March 2008. The three of us are working together. This shows how involved Portugal is in this context because the Lisbon Strategy, as I told you, is the global context and the Single Market Review is a piece of it, although there are other parts. It is included in the launching of this new cycle. I can guarantee that our Prime Minister is very concerned with this. We are working very closely not to dramatically change it because the Lisbon Strategy has proved to be the right action plan, but what it needs is some adjustment. It was drawn up in 2000, reviewed in 2005, so midway between 2000 and 2010, and it was decided in 2005 to make a cycle of three years which will end in 2008 to take stock of what has been done and if it needs adjustment or not. It will not change in essence because Member States realise that this is the action plan we need. We are on the right track. You put this into practice but you do not expect the following year to have all of the results. 2007 is the first year since 2000 when all of the instruments will be working for the first time, so it is really the first year when we can see some results. From now on we hope to improve it, of course.

  Q269  Lord Haskel: So what is the point of a vision paper if you feel that we will achieve it through more of the same, so to speak?

  Ms Dias: It is not more of the same because, as I told you, it needs some adjustment. It was drawn up in 2000, we are in 2007 and all Member States realise that it needs adjustment mainly in two areas. The external dimension has to be different, the Lisbon Strategy did not take that into account much in 2000, and also the macroeconomic policies have to be drawn and adjusted for the functioning of the whole plan. These two areas will have to be better involved, let us say. These are the adjustments that we are proposing in this vision paper for the new cycle.

  Q270  Baroness Eccles of Moulton: I want to come on to undistorted competition. The word "undistorted" was taken away as an adjunct to competition at the eleventh and a half hour just as the Treaty was being agreed. I wonder to what extent the Presidency is concerned about that or whether they see the replacement of it in the protocol is going to give sufficient legal backing to the Single Market being able to exist within an atmosphere of undistorted competition.

  Ms Dias: That was something that came up at the last minute at the request of one Member State. When our Prime Minister addressed the press the following day he was quite clear that from the European Council in June he has a very clear mandate and Member States made clear their intentions for a new Treaty, so that cannot be changed. As regards this detail you are speaking about, how can it influence this? The internal market is the core of the European Union and it will stay like that, it is not because there is one word missing that that makes a difference. For Portugal, for example, the internal market means a lot. We are good defenders of harmonisation. We defend harmonisation because we feel the way forward has to continue to be like that. You cannot pass harmonisation totally to other kinds of regulation in this regard. You can build on the internal market in non-legislative ways but you cannot forget about harmonising. This will continue to play a very important role and I do not think this detail will make a difference to the internal market in the context of the new Treaty.

  Q271  Baroness Eccles of Moulton: You do not think it gives greater opportunities for protectionism where a government might want to be protective towards certain markets?

  Ms Dias: Not really. We have built a lot already and achieved a lot. This year we celebrated 50 years of the Treaty of Rome, as you are aware, so we had very big celebrations during the German Presidency. Do you imagine that Minister Schuman 50 years ago would have imagined that 50 years afterwards there would have been a single currency for most of the Member States or such dense policies and people travelling, living and working in other places in Europe? I do not think so because this was achieved step-by-step. I do not think that this detail will destroy what we have achieved in 50 years.

  Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Good. Thank you.

  Chairman: Thank you very much, that concludes the formal session.