Search Results for: European Parliament

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A REVIEW of European safety laws designed to prevent industrial explosions – such as that which recently ripped through the Atofina fertiliser plant in Toulouse, France, killing 29 people and injuring 2,400 – is to be launched by a specialist EU committee.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Parliament has raised concerns about the financial viability of the Galileo global positioning project, passing a critical motion calling on Brussels to “ensure sufficient private sector participation during each step of the project” and guarantee “the financial consequences of a lack of participation by the private sector should not be passed on to the EU or national budgets.”…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EXPENSIVE programmes and legislative initiatives made by the European Union to boost rail, shipping and combined transport, while shrinking the road transport sector, appear to be failing, according to a report TERM 2001, from the European Environment Agency.…

Keith Nuthall
DETAILS of the European Commission’s plans to reduce the contrasts between tax regimes in EU Member States have been released, with Brussels publishing its policy paper “Towards an Internal Market without Tax Obstacles.”

As predicted in Accountancy Age, the Commission is aiming in the long term for the creation of a consolidated tax base for businesses operating across the EU, with the report highlighting the 30 per cent variations in national company tax rates.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE TERRORIST attacks on New York and Washington DC have not just galvanised the developed world into military action, it has encouraged governments and international organisations to pass new anti-terror laws affecting travel, data protection, criminal investigations and money laundering.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
A EUROPEAN Commission report has tried to give local authorities an insight into how environmental policy can impact on the job market, dismissing claims that tighter rules destroy jobs. Instead, says the report, the effect is broadly neutral with expenditure on waste management generating direct employment in specialised waste management firms and other companies.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
REFORMS to the European Union’s general product safety directive have been agreed that will ensure that hotels have a legal responsibility across the EU to ensure that products made available to guests, such as toiletries and electrical goods, are not dangerous.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
Six chemical companies have been fined a total of 57.53 million euros (about pounds 34.5 million) by the European Commission for price-fixing and market-sharing in respect of sodium gluconate, a chemical mainly used to clean metal and glass.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
MOST governments are keenly concerned about the quality of food their people eat, and quite rightly so. They pass laws to ensure food purity and safety and that’s all very commendable – but it can be overdone.

Regulations can, sometimes deliberately, be drawn up so tightly that they effectively bar the sale of food produced in other countries, thus constituting an impediment to free trade.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has cleared a proposed restructuring of Coca-Cola Nestlé Refreshment Company, an existing iced tea and coffee joint venture. The changes will enhance CCNR’s autonomy from its parents and broaden its geographical scope across the European Union.…