IP/07/991
Brussels, 2nd July 2007
Internal Market Scoreboard: Member States need to
focus on correctly applying Internal Market rules
According to the European Commission’s latest Internal Market Scoreboard,
on average 1.6% of Internal Market Directives for which the implementation
deadline has passed are not currently written into national law, up from the
best-ever result of 1.2% in January 2007 (IP/07/126). This means that the
average deficit remains above the new 1% interim target agreed by Heads of
State in March 2007. Nevertheless the Commission sees reasons for
optimism as to the next overall result in January 2008, with most Member
States appearing to be on the right track and nine Member States having
already reached the new 1% target. However, Member States too often fail to
apply Internal Market rules correctly: only four Member States have managed
to reduce the number of infringement proceedings against them. The full text
of
the
latest
Internal
Market
Scoreboard
is
available
at:
http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/score/index_en.htm
Internal Market and Services Commissioner Charlie McCreevy said: "This result
might seem disappointing at first sight, given that the recent positive trend was
reversed. For some Member States the result is very disappointing. But overall there
are signs that we will be back on track again in six months' time. I hope this will be
the case. Member States now need to focus on correctly applying Internal Market
rules and on solving infringement cases more quickly than is the case today."
Implementation of Internal Market Directives
- At 1.6%, the average transposition deficit – the percentage of Internal Market
Directives that have not been implemented into national law in time – for the 25
Member States (i.e. not including Bulgaria and Romania) remains above the
new interim target of 1%. This new target, to be reached by end 2009 at the
latest, was set after Member States had reached the previous target of 1.5% at
the end of 2006.
- Figures for Bulgaria and Romania have not been integrated into this
Scoreboard's figures, given the enormous task they faced in transposing the
whole EU acquis in time for accession. If their average deficit (5.2%) were taken
into account, the overall average would be higher at 1.8%.
- Nine Member States – Lithuania, Latvia, Slovakia, Denmark, Germany,
Estonia, Cyprus, Malta and Slovenia – have already reached the new 1%
interim target.
- However, only 16 out of 25 Member States have remained below the ceiling of a
1.5% transposition deficit compared to 21 in December 2006.
- Lithuania is firmly in first position, followed by Latvia.
- Estonia and France have achieved their best result ever.
- Belgium has equalled its May 2002 best performance with a 1.5 % deficit, while
Germany and Malta have equalled their best results from 6 months ago.
- Denmark, although still close to the top position, has seen its performance slip
by 0.6 percentage point, contrary to previous excellent results.
- All other Member States that have remained below 1.5% have nevertheless
seen their performance slip.
- Four Member States that reached the 1.5% target in December 2006 have
failed to do so this time around. These are the Netherlands, Ireland (by a small
margin), Poland and Spain. However, the Netherlands seem to be well on track
to improve on this performance in six months' time.
- Portugal's result is 3 times worse than the old EU target. Last time around,
Portugal was already the worst performer, yet it has increased its deficit further
by a worrying 1.4%.
- Luxembourg and Italy have both have slipped 0.5% or more, but there are
indications that this slippage will be temporary for Luxembourg.
- Poland has doubled its deficit, while the Czech Republic added 0.7% and
seems ill-prepared to meet the target in the near future.
- Greece's deficit, though still above the target, represents its best-ever
performance.
Infringements
- The incorrect transposition and application of Internal Market rules remains a
problem. There is an upward trend in the number of infringement cases, and the
EU-25 average for each Member State is now 53 cases, up from 50 six months
ago.
- Malta, Poland and Ireland, in particular, have each recorded a substantial
increase in the number of infringement cases over the last half year.
- Only four Member States managed to reduce the number of infringement
proceedings: Greece, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain.
- The sectors with most infringements are, in decreasing order, environment,
taxation and customs union, and energy and transport, which account for almost
half of all cases. Taxation and customs union matters have overtaken energy
and transport as the second most important source of infringements over the
past half year.
- In the field of public procurement, good progress has been made: there is a net
decrease of 17 in the number of cases over the past 6 months, whilst the
number of cases in the field of services has remained stable at around 110.
Benefits of the Internal Market and the importance of implementation
The Internal Market plays a key role in achieving the EU's objective of creating more
growth and jobs. It has created millions of jobs and billions of euros in prosperity. It
gives EU citizens a wider choice of quality goods and services and greater freedom
to travel, work, study and live in other EU countries, while making for a more efficient
allocation of resources and offering greater trading opportunities to businesses. But
the Internal Market can only achieve its full potential if legislation agreed at European
level is effectively implemented and applied by all Member States.
2
Annex
Internal Market Scoreboard 16:
Transposition and application of Internal Market rules (details)
Transposition
EU-25 Member State transposition deficit, as at 10/05/2007 – 1628 directives
Ranking
1
2
Member State
LT
LV
Transposition
deficit (%)
Number of
directives
6
10
10
13
14
14
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
SI
FR
HU UK AT
FI
SE BE NL
IE
PL
ES
CZ
EL
IT
LU
PT
EU
0.5 0.7 0.9 0.9 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0
1.2
1.2 1.2 1.4 1.4 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 1.9 2.3 2.4 2.7 3.3
4.4
1.6
19
19
8
11
3
4
5
6
6
6
SK DK DE EE CY MT
14
15
16
17
17
17
17
10
19
22
23
16
23
25
Missing notifications to reach the
1.5% objective
26
27
29
31
38
39
44
53
71
1
2
4
6
13
14
19
28
46
BG + RO transposition deficit, as at 10/05/2007
Member State
BG RO
Transposition
deficit (%)
2.9 7.4
Number of
directives
47 121
Missing notifications to reach the
1.5% objective
22
96
EU-25 Member State performance in meeting 0% target for Directives whose transposition is
over 2 years late, as at 10/05/2007
Member
State
Number of
directives
DK CY EE
0
0
0
IE
LT LV HU MT NL
SI
SK
FI
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
SE UK DE PL
0
0
1
EL FR
IT
2
2
1
2
AT BE PT ES CZ LU
2
3
4
5
6
7
IT
Infringement cases
EU-25 Member State number of open infringement proceedings, as at 1/05/2007
Member State SI LT EE SK LV CZ HU DK CY MT FI
LU NL SE AT
IE
UK PL BE PT DE EL FR ES
Number of
open infringement cases
42
59
59
17 17 18 20 22 27
28
30
30
36
37
47
48
58
59
71
75
82
89
99 108 153