PRESS RELEASE
25/01/08
SOCIAL AND HEALTH SERVICES OF GENERAL INTEREST (SSGI)
THE TREATY OF LISBON
RENEWAL OF THE COMMUNITY DEBATE ON SSGIs
ON NEW BASES
On the occasion of the presentation of a study on SSGIs and the Treaty of Lisbon co-published by the Committee of the Regions and the European Economic and Social Committee, the Collectif SSGI, a think tank composed of providers of social and health services of general interest, approved the major advances of the new Treaty of Lisbon in terms of services of general interest.
Contrary to the analysis developed by the European Commission in its last communication of November 2007, the Treaty of Lisbon has helped to renew the debate on SSGIs on new bases and to reposition interinstitutional relations on the question of services of general interest.
The introduction in the new Treaty’s general provisions on the functioning of the Union of a new legal basis in a joint decision between the European Parliament and the Council clearly gives the Community co-legislators a mandate to establish by means of regulation the principles and conditions which make it possible to guarantee the satisfactory performance of missions of general interest in the European Union. A kind of user guide to the principle of primacy of general interest missions over the rules of competition and the internal market defined by article 86§2 of the Treaty, which should be established under the next mandate by ordinary legislative means, that is to say, after a genuine democratic debate and no longer exclusively by random decisions of the European Commission.
The addition of a new protocol on services of general interest also complements this legal basis with an interpretation given to the European Union’s common value concept concerning services of general interest. Here, this protocol affirms the wide-ranging discretionary power of the national, regional and local public authorities but also their diversity by reference to national collective preferences and the perception of the needs to be satisfied. The Collectif SSGI stresses that this new protocol, proposed by the Dutch Prime Minister, forms the Council’s political response to the European Commission’s attempt to impose its residual vision of SSGIs, in this case in terms of social housing, based on a judgement of the manifest error which has pitted it against the Dutch Government since 2005.
Finally, the right of access to services of general interest in order to promote the social and territorial cohesion of the Union, instituted as a fundamental right recognised by the European Union in its Charter of Fundamental Rights, has the same legal value as the Treaties.
All these political advances will contribute to a renewal of the Community debate under the forthcoming presidential term and form a major part of the 2009 European election campaign.
In the meantime, the Collectif SSGI intends to raise awareness among the members of the Council and in particular the Social Protection Committee, as well as the regional and local authorities and SSGI service providers in the European Union, of the issue which the question of the delegation of powers of social services operators will represent in 2008, from a triple perspective:
- The transposition into internal law of the services directive and the exclusion of social services subject to the obligation to delegate to the service providers;
- The national reports which the Member States must send to the European Commission by December 2008 on the conditions of application of the decision on compatibility of State aid in the form of compensation for public service subject to the establishment of official acts of delegation of powers;
- The clarification in Community law of the concept of delegation of powers as regards its meaning in terms of the legal obligation to provide service.
The Collectif SSGI recalls that the legal safety of the methods of regulation of the social services by authorisation systems (approval, funding under a convention, etc.), as well as systems for financing social services by State aid, is based on this key question of delegation of powers and calls on the Member States to carry out those acts of delegation in the field of social services of general interest.
Press contact:
Marie-Laure Onnée, member of the collective, tel: + 331 40 77 87 61
Laurent Ghekiere, member of the collective, tel + 322229 2143
The SSGIs in the internal market of the 21st century: new deal of the Reform Treaty
SSGI Collective Conference – Committee of the Regions – European Economic and Social Committee
With the participationof:
- Michel Delebarre, President of the Committee of the Regions
- Dimitris Dimitriadis, President of the European Economic and Social Committee
- Joël Hasse-Ferreira, Moderator of the European Parliament on SSGIs
- Jean-Louis Destans, Moderator of the Committee of the Regions on SSGIs
- Raymond Hencks, Moderator of the European Economic and Social Committee on SSGIs
Monday 28 January 2008 , 11h00 – 13h30
Jacques Delors Buildings,
Committee of the Regions - European Economic and Social Committee
Rue Belliard, Brussels
Conference information / on-line study FR and EN version: Google > SSIG
AGIR ENSEMBLE POUR DES SERVICES SOCIAUX ET DE SANTE DE QUALITE EN EUROPEAFPA - CEEP France - FAPIL - FEHAP - FHF - FNARS – FNMF – FNSEM - MFP - MGEN - MSA - PACT-ARIM - UNCCAS – UNIOPSS – USH