Single market: report 1995

The Economic and Monetary Committee followed the recommendation of its rapporteur, Mr Secchi (PPE, I), and unanimously adopted the proposal for a resolution on the Commission's third annual report on the single market. While subscribing to the Commission's view that the single market has been operating since the accession of three new Member States in 1995, the text adopted refers again to problems which were raised in the resolution for the 1994 financial year, especially with regard to delays in the free movement of persons, an area in which the application of the right of residence and mutual recognition of diplomas and professional qualifications left a lot to be desired despite recent initiatives by the Commission ("Monti package"); other crucial sectors, viz. public procurement and insurance, were proving slow to adapt, while in other cases it was the Council which opposed integral regulation of intellectual property and company law. In addition, there was still a long way to go towards de facto integration of environmental policies into the single market and before a transparent policy which kept pace with the uninterrupted development of the information society in general and of telecommunications in particular was defined and implemented. Other comments related to the modest progress in the harmonization of the Member States' fiscal policies, the need to extend the citizens' information policy to SMEs and the increasing importance of the non-monetary aspects of economic management which should inform the debate on institutional implications and on the most urgent fields of action, on which the Commission was called on to draft a summary document.�