Cracks start showing in services coalition

Ahead of the crucial vote on 16 February 2006, Conservative MEPs from the new member states and socialists from France and other countries, say they will not vote for the compromise amendments on the Services Directive agreed between senior MEPs of both groups.

The compromise was a “bitter pill” to swallow for MEPs from the countries that joined the EU in 2004, most of which are net exporters of services. Addressing journalists in Brussels on 8 February 2006, Hungarian socialist MEP Edit Herczog said that she was ready to vote for the compromise for the sole reason that without it, an agreement on the whole directive would have become impossible, and she thought saving the directive was a priority. 

At least some conservative MEPs from new member states seem to be even less positive about the compromise. In a letter to the Financial Times, Hungarian conservative MEP József Szájer says the compromise makes the directive “almost worthless.” Accusing fellow MEPs of having abused the talks between the two political groups for stabbing the planned directive in the back, he said, “Certain politicians have not enough courage to admit their opposition to the directive so they choose a different way to kill it: compromise beyond acceptable limits.”

While MEPs like Mr. Szájer say the directive risks to be watered down too much, socialist Parliamentarians from France, where the services directive has been blamed for general uneasiness about the EU and for ‘no’ votes in constitution referenda say too much of the country of origin principle’s essence is preserved even in the compromise. 

French socialist MEP Benoît Hamon said he will vote for the rejection of the directive in spite of the compromise amendments. He said, “This text serves to dismantle national legislation on service activities without replacing it by new European rules. The latter could serve to create a common foundation of rights, protections and guarantees and could, throughout the EU, protect public interest, worker’s and consumer’s rights. The threats to protections in national legislation persist, while public services deivered against a “material reward” remain within the scope of the directive. New measures harming employment in particular by favouring the status of independent worker at the risk of creating competition between statuses are part of the compromise. The country of origin principle is not explicitly excluded and the country of destination principle is not clearly reaffirmed.”

While the EPP-DE and the PSE together dispose of a comfortable majority in the Parliament, it remains to be seen whether the rebels could actually put the compromise at risk. Their possible ‘no’ votes on the compromise amendments may be outbalanced by votes from the liberal ALDE group, which may vote for a number of the compromise amendments. MEPs from the Green and GUE (left-wing) group are not expected to vote in favour of the amendments, nor are members of the Parlaiment’s eurosceptic and right-wing groups.

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