Projet de loi adaptant certaines législations à la directive 2006/123/CE du Parlement européen et du Conseil relative aux services dans le marché intérieur.
General information ¶
- Submitted by
- CD&V Leterme Ⅱ
- Submission date
- Nov. 23, 2009
- Official page
- Visit
- Status
- Adopted
- Requirement
- Simple
- Subjects
- EC Directive European Union organisation of professions service industry provision of services single market access to a profession freedom to provide services
Voting ¶
- Voted to adopt
- CD&V LE PS | SP Open Vld MR FN VB
- Abstained from voting
- Groen Vooruit Ecolo N-VA LDD
Party dissidents ¶
- Peter Luykx (CD&V) abstained from voting.
Contact form ¶
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Discussion ¶
Dec. 10, 2009 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)
Full source
President Patrick Dewael ⚙
Ms. Lalieux refers to her written report.
Ronny Balcaen Ecolo ⚙
Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, the text put to the vote today constitutes the third step in the process of transposing the Services Directive. The first step concerned the single checkpoint, while the second, namely the horizontal bill, is still waiting.
Now, the bill we have in front of our eyes is based on this horizontal text that we have not yet examined. Thus, for example, the amendment adopted in a committee concerning the law on the authorisation of commercial settlements is justified by "imperative reasons of general interest", a concept defined by the directive itself and ⁇ by the future horizontal bill.
It must therefore be acknowledged that we are putting the chariot ahead of the cattle in this major transposition of the Services Directive, since this concept of general interest will only be defined in the second stage.
This is Ecolo-Groen! Welcomes, of course, the opening-ups permitted by this concept of "imperative reasons of general interest", which allows for derogations from certain provisions of the Directive. Applied to the Ikea Act, this will allow the opinion of the National Socio-Economic Committee for Distribution to rely further in the future on considerations related to the impact on the urban environment, respect for the rights of workers or consideration of the nearby small trade. This should be obvious, since the Services Directive aims to promote SMEs first.
We, on the other hand, are concerned about the removal of certain provisions, which are now perceived as obstacles to the freedom to provide services. To repeat only an illustration already mentioned in the commission, I will cite the removal of the obligation of prior registration of marital brokerage companies and the replacement of this obligation by a simple registration at the Bank-Carrefour des Entreprises and information by the SPF Economie. This is, however, a sector of activity that is ⁇ sensitive in a consumer protection objective, but also in the context of the fight against human trafficking.
This new, lighter procedure is, in our opinion, in line with certain warnings and recommendations from bodies such as Europol and the International Office for Immigration. We therefore believe that in this present case, “the imperative reasons of general interest” could have been invoked to maintain the current situation. This is the reason why we abstain from voting. The Minister promised – I wanted to recall it – during the debate in the committee to intensify control in this sector and in the time-sharing sector. We will be attentive to this.
I will conclude by returning to the horizontal bill, the important part of the transposition. When Frits Bolkestein presented his proposal for the Services Directive in January 2004, he presented it as “the strongest impulse given to the internal market since its creation in 1993”. Whether you like this text or not, its transposition deserves serious parliamentary work. That is why it would be democratically unacceptable that, due to the approximation of the deadline of December 28 that, more than likely, we will exceed, the parliament be put in a position such that it will only have a few hours to examine this bill, while this text has mobilized the government for seven months, without forgetting the upstream work carried out by the various administrations.