Search Results for: European Parliament

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Commission today told Accountancy Age that it is “fairly certain” to investigate the proposed merger between Andersen’s non-US operations and KPMG and warned that its competition authority could well insist that the accounting giants sell off some of their European operations as a condition of clearing the deal.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
EUROPEAN environment ministers have reached final agreement with the European Parliament on the 6th Environmental Action Programme, setting out EU environmental objectives for the next 10 years. The compromise provides for the introduction of environment taxes and sets more ambitious targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions after 2012 than ministers had originally accepted.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE NETHERLANDS Shipbuilding Industry Association (VNSI) has welcomed the oncoming agreement of the Euro 16.2 billion EU Sixth Framework Programme for research as giving the European industry a chance to compete effectively against far East suppliers, such as those from South Korea.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has hailed the entry into force of the first set of the European Union’s new so-called farm-to-fork food legislation that will underpin the work of the new European Food Safety Authority. The new laws include the start of the reinforced rapid alert system for feed and food risks, involving obligatory notification of any direct or indirect risk to human health, animal health or the environment to an network linking national authorities, the EFSA and the European Commission;

*New emergency powers for the European Commission to suspend or control sales when a feed or food constitute a serious health risk and where a national government cannot control the situation acting alone or where non-EU food is involved.…

Keith Nuthall
THE BRITISH government is facing a possible order to pay massive recurring fines of maybe Euro 100,000-a-day, because it has not notified the European Commission about how it has implemented a court order to pay VAT on privately operated road and bridge tolls.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN Union ministers and MEP’s are considering changes to the EU’s directive on the supervision of financial conglomerates, which, claim parliamentarians, will make an Enron-style scandal far less likely in Europe. The proposed new law would cover insurance companies, investment firms and credit institutions that are part of such groups, setting rules on the amount of supplementary capital that they should command.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
CLASSICAL swine fever has been detected at three locations in Luxembourg and the export of all live pigs and porcine semen, ova and embryos, as well as the shipment of pigs through the tiny country, has been banned by the European commission.…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKA
THE INDIAN government has announced that it intends to upgrade standards at the country’s international airports at Delhi, Bombay (Mumbai), Madras (Chennai) and Calcutta (Kolkata), raising them to a “world class” level by introducing private sector management and investment through long term leasing systems.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Commission has taken no decision yet on whether to review the possible merger between Arthur Andersen and Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, a spokeswoman for the competition commissioner Mario Monti told Acountancy Age, although its rules suggest that it would almost inevitably do so.…

KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission is taking Ireland to the European Court of Justice because of its alleged failure to adopt anti-pollution programmes designed to prevent pollution in marine areas yielding shellfish. Brussels claims that under the shellfish directive, programmes should prevent pollution in the first place, while Irish legislation only covers clean-ups after problems have arisen.…