Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee on the 'Proposal for a Council Regulation (EC) amending Regulation (EEC) No. 2377/90 laying down a Community procedure for the establishment of maximum residue limits of veterinary medicinal products in foodstuffs of animal origin'
16. 6. 1999 EN Official Journal of the European Communities C 169/29 Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee on the ‘Proposal for a Council Regulation (EC) amending Regulation (EEC) No. 2377/90 laying down a Community procedure for the establishment of maximum residue limits of veterinary medicinal products in foodstuffs of animal origin’ (1999/C 169/11) On 1 April 1999 the Council decided to consult the Economic and Social Committee, under Articles 43 and 198 of the Treaty establishing the European Community, on the above-mentioned proposal. The Economic and Social Committee decided to appoint Mr Braghin to act as rapporteur-general for this work. At its 363rd plenary session of 28 and 29 April 1999 (meeting of 28 April) the Economic and Social Committee adopted the following opinion with 57 votes in favour and four abstentions. 1. Introduction 2. Specific comments The proposed Council Regulation (EC) is intended to 1. 1. adjust laid down in Regulation (EEC) the procedures No. 2377/90 laying down a Community procedure for the establishment of maximum residue limits of veterinary medicinal products in foodstuffs of animal origin. It aims to make them consistent with the new set of rules resulting from the entry into force of Council Regulation (EEC) No. 2309/93 of 22 July 1993, which established a European Agency for the Evaluation of Medicinal Products and gave it the task of the handling matters concerning the determination of maximum residue limits acceptable. 2. 1. The ESC observes that Article 1 duly sets out the roles of the European Agency for the Evaluation of Medicinal Products, the applicant and the Commission; in particular, the ESC endorses the proposed fixed period (120 days) for the completion of the procedure for establishing the maximum acceptable residue limits. 2. 2. The ESC would stress the importance of respecting the timelimits set in the revised Article 7 of Regulation (EEC) 2377/90 to ensure transparency and legal certainty in a sector which has vital health implications and hopes that all bodies involved make it a priority in their work to meet the specified deadlines. This adjustment, somewhat late in the day, concerns a 1. 2. situation which has already been in existence for four years. The proposal does not relate to changes in the technical/scien- tific aspects and criteria on which the maximum residue limits of veterinary medicinal products considered acceptable in it solely concerns foodstuffs of animal origin are based; procedural changes to preserve the Regulation’s legal consist- ency while at the same time facilitating compliance with the commitments made in connection with the Uruguay Round multilateral negotiations (transparency of health measures via the introduction of reasonable periods of assigning areas of competence). 2. 3. The ESC feels that set deadlines will enhance the system’s credibility and provide the applicant with greater safeguards, bearing in mind the more onerous responsibilities that the EAEMP will be required to shoulder in examining applications extending maximum residue limits. for determining, amending or 2. 4. The new version of the first sentence of Article 9(2) could be improved if the vague phrase ‘shall as soon as possible examine. ’ were replaced by specific, binding dead- lines, possibly spelling out the technical/scientific details in the sections concerning assessment of the justification of such grounds and consultation of the Committee for Veterinary Medicinal Products. The ESC suggests that the procedure should not exceed a set length of 120 days in all, as is provided for in the Agency’s opinion. The Economic and Social Committee welcomes this 1. 3. move to achieve clearer and consistent rules, a matter of particular importance for both human and animal health. 2. 5. The ESC particularly welcomes the proposed publi- cation of a summary of the assessment of the safety of the C 169/30 EN Official Journal of the European Communities 16. 6. 1999 substances concerned, while respecting the confidential nature of any proprietary data, and suggests that such summaries should be included in the annual report of the European Agency for the Evaluation of Medicinal Products. Brussels, 28 April 1999. The President of the Economic and Social Committee Beatrice RANGONI MACHIAVELLI Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee on ‘Public sector information: a key resource for Europe — Green Paper on public sector information in the information society’ (1999/C 169/12) On 22 January 1999 the Commission decided to consult the Economic and Social Committee, under Article 198 of the Treaty establishing the European Community, on ‘Public sector information: a key resource for Europe — Green Paper on public sector information in the information society’. The Section for Transport, Energy, Infrastructure and the Information Society, which was responsible for preparing the Committee’s work on the subject, adopted its opinion on 13 April 1999. The rapporteur was Mr Herna´ndez Bataller. At its 363rd plenary session (meeting of 28 April 1999), the Economic and Social Committee adopted the following opinion, with 71 votes in favour and one abstention. 1. Introduction Transparency in public business is nowadays clearly an 1. 1. inescapable feature of democracy, regardless of the political complexion of the government and the territorial structure of public authorities. Administrative transparency helps to give those authorities greater rigour and effectiveness in their day-to-day work. Encouraging a policy of 1. 2. transparency is regarded throughout the European Union as essential in order to gain public confidence and support in the process of European integration. 1. 3. Declaration No. 17 appended to the Final Act of the Treaty on European Union refers to the right of access to information, with a recommendation to the Commission that it submit to the Council a report on means of improving public access to the information held by the institutions. The European Council meetings in Birmingham and 1. 4. Edinburgh in the course of 1992, again urged the Commission to continue its work on improving access to the information available to the Community institutions. The Commission, for its part, adopted Communication 93/C 156/05 (1) on public access to the institutions’ documents, which contained the results of a study on citizens’ access to documents in the individual Member States and concluded that better access to documents should be developed at Community level; this was followed up by Communication 93/C 166/04 (2) on openness in the Community, setting out the basic principles governing access to documents. 1. 5. On 6 December 1993 the Council and the Commission approved a code of conduct on public access to the documents of both institutions: this was a ‘code of conduct’ in that it laid down the principles which should govern such access. As a result, the Council’s new rules of procedure included certain rules on public access to documents, which were developed by Council Decision d93/731/EC (3) on public access to Council documents. (1) COM(93) 191 final: Public Access to the Institutions’ Documents the Parliament and the — Communication to the Council, Economic and Social Committee (2) OJ C 166, 17. 06. 1993, p. 4: Communication to the Council, the Parliament and the Economic and Social Committee: Openness in the Community. (3) OJ L 340, 31. 12. 1993, p. 43-44: Council Decision of 20 December 1993 on public access to Council documents