Our Ref: MP629699
Sir William Cash MP
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA
23 June 2015
Dear Sir William,
Explanatory Memorandum (EM) 16612/14: Proposal for a REGULATION OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL on harmonised indices of consumer prices and repealing Regulation (EC) No 2494/95
I am writing to you to inform your Committee of the latest developments on the proposal for a regulation on harmonised indices of consumer prices (HICP).
Your Committee considered the EM of 7 January 2015 and in its 29th report, 14-15 of 15 January 2015 retained the matter under scrutiny. Your Committee acknowledged the Government's favourable view of the thrust of this proposal but noted its concern about the Delegated Act aspects of the draft Regulation.
I wrote to you on 9 March 2015 when I informed your Committee that there had been no significant developments to date on this matter and that negotiations were continuing at Council Working Party level.
The Latvian Presidency has now indicated that it considers initial negotiations on the proposal to be concluded and has proposed that the matter be put to Coreper on 29 June to agree a general approach for negotiations with the European Parliament.
The final Presidency proposal for a Council negotiating position, as agreed by Member States at Working Party level, addresses the concerns expressed by the UK and other Member States related to the issue of delegated acts. The UK sought a text that provided adequate safeguards to ensure that when preparing delegated acts the Commission shall be obliged to consult experts from Member States and shall carry out an assessment of the burdens on respondents and on production costs.
The compromise proposal explicitly provides those safeguards and further limits the use of delegated acts to changes to specific non-essential elements and also provides assurance that such acts should not impose significant additional burdens on Member States. The compromise also fully retains those measures which provide for improved efficiencies and quality in price statistics.
I hope that you find this update helpful. I shall write to you again to report any significant progress on the continuing negotiations. I have written in similar terms to the Chair of the House of Lords European Union Committee
I am copying this letter to Lord Boswell, Chair of the House Of Lords European Union Committee; John Pullinger, National Statistician; the clerks of the Scrutiny Committees of both Houses and; Christian Lacey-Brennan and Les Saunders of the Cabinet Office European and Global Issues Secretariat.
Yours Sincerely
ROBWILSON