Search Results for: European Court of Justice

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union has launched a strong attack on the Council of Europe’s draft convention on cybercrime, a political move that could lead to delays in its adoption and which will almost certainly damage its reputation.

In a paper using unusually strong language for diplomatic circles, the EU’s Working Party of Data Protection accuses the draft of being “too vague and confusing” and of threatening “fundamental rights and freedoms.”…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THIRD generation mobile service providers should be encouraged to share infrastructure whilst they exploit their often expensively won licences, according to the Communication from the European Commission, called The Introduction of Third Generation Mobile Communications in the European Union: State of Play and the Way Forward.…

KEITH NUTHALL
THE EXEMPTION from European working time regulations for self-employed drivers, could last a lot longer than the three years that was agreed in the informal deal struck in the EU Council of Ministers last year.

Looking at the detail of the amended directive that has now been accepted formally by the Council, the three-year deadline only gives the European Commission the right to propose an end to the exemption.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN Commission president Romano Prodi has identified Britain and Spain as the governments holding up progress towards the creation of the so-called single European sky and the resulting accession of the EU to Eurocontrol. In a speech to the European Parliament on the outcome of the recent EU Stockholm summit, Mr Prodi said: “As we all know, a whole series of landmark proposals is now blocked, awaiting a bilateral agreement between Spain and the United Kingdom on Gibraltar.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
THE LOCAL Council – what are the worst images conjured up when thinking of those words?

Let me make it easy for you.

Lazy employees that take forever to process requests, generally unhelpful and bored, unfulfilling positions that can transform a new recruit full of fresh ideas and faith in the system, to the jaded staff that many of us have encountered at our local councils.…

KEITH NUTHALL
Transport ministers of the 15 EU countries have agreed a regulation

that would require road transport companies to pay the same wages and

benefits to drivers from third countries as they do to EU nationals.

The EU Council said the regulation would put an end to “social

dumping” under which EU road companies have taken on drivers from east

European countries, for instance, at significantly lower wages than those

paid to nationals.…

Keith Nuthall
A REPORT on allegations of irregularities and fraud regarding EU subsidies paid for the production of flax in Spain, has been sent to the Spanish authorities by the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF). The report, which is expected to lead to criminal proceedings, has also been sent to Michaele Schreyer, the EU budget commissioner, the European Parliament and to the European Commission’s DG agriculture.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN utilities will be able to apply for grants from budgets of Euro 1.7 billion, which has been earmarked for energy, transport, sustainable development and global change and of Euro 3.6 billion, for information society research – including telecommunications – if proposals from the European Commission for a new framework research programme, are agreed.…

KEITH NUTHALL
DISCUSSIONS are to be held between the European Commission and ACEA, the European car producers’ association, on striking a voluntary agreement on guidelines for car front designs, that will minimise pedestrian casualties in accidents.

A statement from the Commission, following a meeting with manufacturers, said that there were benefits in a voluntary deal over a regulation, in that “a negotiated agreement can be considerably faster to implement and thus more lives could be saved faster.…

KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN Union health and safety laws should be extended by a new EU directive to cover the 90 per cent of fishing boats that are currently exempt from them, a report from Spanish socialist MEP Miguélez Ramos has claimed.…