Mandelson: Enlarged EU preserves its public services model in WTO

The EU has become the first member of the World Trade Organization to use the provisions of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) to enable Members to modify their trade commitments. As a result, public services in sectors such as education, health and audiovisual enjoy the same guarantees across the whole EU.

"The successful conclusion of these negotiations has shown that there is sufficient flexibility under the GATS to preserve public services and cultural diversity in an enlarged EU" said Commissioner Peter Mandelson.

The EU has concluded a series of complex negotiations with 17 other members of the World Trade Organization (WTO)1 on the modification of commitments in services by the Member States that joined the EU since 1995. Following successive enlargements, certain services commitments originally offered by new EU Member States had to be aligned with those of the EC12 to ensure consistency of trade commitments for the whole EU. Under the relevant provisions of the GATS (Article XXI), this required negotiations in order to agree on appropriate compensation with those members of the WTO which might be affected by such modifications. Such compensation offered by the EC contains some new commitments on telecommunications and in certain other sectors such as professional services.

Since the entry into force of the GATS Agreement, this is the first time that a WTO member invoked and completed such procedures to modify existing commitments. By doing so, the EU demonstrated that the GATS strikes the right balance between the sovereign right of WTO members to organise and regulate their public services and the need to maintain the legal value and the predictability of the services commitments made under the agreement.

Following the conclusion of the negotiations, the various services commitments of the EC and its 25 Member States are now presented in a single document, which presents in a transparent and accurate manner the conditions for foreign suppliers to provide services in the EU.

Previously, such commitments were spread in 14 different schedules: one of the EC12 and one for each of the 13 Member States that joined the EU since 1995