Postal services: open to competition by 2011, but subject to safeguards

During the debate on Tuesday 10 July Markus Ferber said: "We've had monopolies for more than 200 years. Monopolies are not capable of solving the problems the postal services are facing. Those problems can only be solved if there is a fair competition, that takes into consideration working and workers' conditions".

 

 

Full market opening implies that national operators will no longer have a monopoly on mail below the maximum weight of 50 grams, known as the reserved area. It was also decided that for new Member States and those with a particularly difficult topography or with numerous islands as well as Member States with a small population and a limited geographical size, the deadline for the opening up of the market will be two years later, i.e. 31 December 2012, to allow extra time to find ways to maintain a universal service.

 

Although there was no definition of "Member States with a small population", MEPs had referred to Luxembourg (among others) during the debate.  These states should have specific characteristics that are particular to postal services.

 

 

Parliament also said that the universal service or territorial coverage should be retained.  This means that also in a liberalised postal sector letters should continue to be delivered and collected at an affordable cost everywhere in the EU.  A uniform tariff between rural and urban areas will be applied. MEPs also decided that Member States should ensure that sufficient access and contact points are established that take account of the needs of users in rural and sparsely populated areas. The Member States should determine the minimum number of access and contact points in order to guarantee the universal service.

 

One key issue in the compromise by EPP-ED, PES and ALDE groups is the funding for the universal service. MEPs say that if market players prove to be unable to provide such services profitably, Member States may set up compensation funds, financed by service providers and/or user fees, to cover universal service costs. Providers of these services could also be compensated by the state. Member States may themselves decide what financing mechanisms are used.  Any Member State which concludes that meeting a universal service obligation would entail a net cost will have to draw up national plans for meeting this cost and notify them to the Commission.

 

 

It was also stressed that the directive must not affect terms and conditions of employment.  Social dumping should by all means be avoided. Maximum work periods and minimum paid annual holidays, minimum rates of pays as well as relations between social partners including the right to negotiate and conclude collective agreements or the right to strike should not be under the scope of the directive.

 

To prevent any distortion of competition until markets are opened up to competition, Parliament says that postal service providers from countries with a reserved area must not meanwhile be granted an authorisations to operate in countries such as Sweden, Finland and the UK, where postal markets have been fully opened. This means that liberalising Member States may refuse authorisation to operators which are granted a reserved area in another Member State (reciprocity clause).

 

 

After the vote, it is unlikely that a first reading agreement under the co-decision procedure will be reached. So far, no political agreement has been reached in Council. If there is no agreement, then the existing directive including its universal services measures would lapse at the end of 2008 under the so-called sunset clause, leaving no postal services legislation at all.  This would have serious consequences for the sector, a scenario that all parties concerned are doubtless keen to avoid.

 

 

Speaking for the Employment and Social Affairs Committee, Stephen Hughes, PES, UK, Labour North East said "We  would have preferred to make the full accomplishment of the postal internal market subject to a new prospective study, showing that universal service could be maintained in each Member State, and looking at how to maintain or improve the employment situation in the postal sector. However, sometimes politics is about the art of the possible, and I know my good friend Brian Simpson negotiated the best possible deal he could with the rapporteur and the other shadows in the Committee on Transport and Tourism.