Search Results for: Italy

BY KEITH NUTHALL
BRITAIN’S health authorities provide fewer drug addicts with substitution treatment than do a majority of other European Union Member States, a statistical review by an EU drug-use agency has claimed.

The proportion of “problem drug users” given alternative medicines to wean them off their addiction ranges between six and 22 per cent in the UK, taking into account available data, estimates the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction.…

KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission is piling political pressure onto industries, especially fossil fuel electricity generators, which pour greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, to force them to clean up their processes, adding costs to their bottom line.

In a move that will only serve to make CHP and renewable plants more competitive by comparison, the Commission is preparing a raft of legal cases against eight European Union Member States, to force them to monitor and restrict their production of key greenhouse pollutants.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
LITHUANIA has imposed safeguard duties on imports of non-dried pastry yeast. Special tariffs of 22 per cent will be imposed from March to December, and 16 per cent from next January to December. Lithuania has been particularly concerned about increased imports from Germany, France, Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Belarus, Turkey, Italy and the Czech Republic.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
FOLLOWING the publication by the European Commission on February 5th of its proposed far-reaching reforms to the current block exemption scheme for new car sales in the European Union, the continent’s motor industry is in ferment. Nobody can be quite sure whether the reforms will go through as they have been planned – or when.…

KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Court of Justice has declared illegal on grounds of national discrimination the imposition of tougher penalties by the Italian authorities on erring foreign drivers than on Italians. Local drivers may appeal against a penalty within 60 days, but foreigners must appeal immediately and then post security of twice the minimum fine to avoid the immediate confiscation of their licence or vehicle.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A TAX break approved by the European Commission in 1995 benefiting Italy-based insurance companies operating in eastern Europe is likely to be withdrawn, following the launch of a state aid inquiry by Brussels which is expected to criticise the scheme.…

KEITH NUTHALL
A BID by a group of district heating companies to overturn massive fines levied by the European Commission, which found they had been participating in an illegal cartel, has been thrown out by the European Court of Justice’ Court of First Instance.…

KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN consumers still lack the confidence to buy in countries other than their own, in spite of all the efforts made to open up the internal market, the European Commission reports. A special survey by the Commission shows that only 31 per cent of consumers think their rights are well protected when they shop cross-border in the EU, against 56 per cent who feel well protected in their own country.…

BY MATTHEW BRACE
WHILE BSE and Foot and Mount Disease ravaged Britain, Australia remained disease-free making it an attractive alternative meat source, even for cuts that are traditionally eaten in the Outback as so-called “bush tucker”.

Australian market reports claimed demand from British meat buyers for kangaroo increased by 30 per cent in 2000 and 2001.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
“SERIOUS concern” has been expressed by the European Commission over the failure of a number of Member States to set up telecommunications and IT networks to establish a New Computerised Transit System, which should seal an administrative loophole bleeding millions of Euro’s in defrauded revenue.…