“The members of CEEP are still looking for a good reason why such a detailed and complex legislative initiative on concessions was published”, said today Rainer Plassmann, chair of CEEP SGI committee intervening at the EP Hearing on the award of concessions contracts. “However, they decided to work very closely with Members of the European Parliament to ensure that legislation will finally best respond to the needs of public services providers, which means at the end the needs of citizens”.

The starting point for any legislative initiative on the award of concessions should be the respect of the freedom of authorities when organising and funding the provision of public services in their territories. This requires an adequate framework for the in-house provision of public services. A definition leaving flexibility for contracting authorities and services providers is also necessary. Otherwise, the adequate provision of services in sectors like energy distributions, networks water provision, waste disposal, postal services, SSGIs would be hindered.

“We have started to build an house which is far too big and heavy to best serve citizens’ needs. It is high time to rethink the architectural plans. This is now the mission of the European co-legislators and CEEP is committed to closely cooperate with them”, concluded Rainer Plassmann.

For further information, please contact:

Valeria RONZITTI, Acting General Secretary CEEP - tel. +32 (0) 2 219 27 98

CEEP gathers enterprises and organisations from across Europe, both public and private, at national, regional and local level, which are public employers or providers of services of general interest. CEEP members employ a quarter of the EU workforce; CEEP is one of the three European Social Partners.