This week, a public hearing on the planned new rules for credit rating agencies took place in the European Parliament. Whilst the agencies are free to put their thumbs up and down as they please and in the process plunge already ailing countries even deeper into the abyss, some MEPs were surprisingly lenient towards them.

The attempts to solve the so-called “government debt crisis“ continue to be the focus of the debate between the political factions. This is the conclusion for the public hearing on evaluating the instruments to deal with the government debt crisis, which took place in the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs of the European Parliament on Monday and Tuesday.

The Commission intends to review the 4th and 7th Directive. The objectives referred to concern a reduction of the administrative burden for small companies, the increase of clarity and the improvement of the comparability of companies, the protection of essential user needs - in particular the provision of the necessary accounting information - and finally the increased transparency on payments to governments by the extractive industry and loggers of primary forests.

Just in time for the mid-term arrival of the legislative period in the European Parliament, there are a number of new appointments to be made in the Parliamentary committees. Apart from the election of Martin Schulz (Socialists & Democrats) as new President of the European Parliament, there are also significant changes from an Austrian point of view.

This week, the EU Commission launched a public consultation on corporate restructuring and its social consequences. The aim is to identify successful practices and strategies in the field of restructuring and the adoption to change, so that lessons can be learned from the economic crisis. The results of the Consultation will also be integrated into the planned and revived flexicurity agenda.

Interference in the freedom of the media, threatening the independence of justice and the National Bank, and worrying developments concerning the minority rights in Hungary are only some of the issues that triggered an unusually heated discussion in the European Parliament this week.

From the point of view of the AK, the review of the MiFID Directive is one of the top priorities in order to achieve a reorganisation of the financial markets in accordance with the G20 decisions. Unfortunately, the European Commission has submitted little more than a compromise paper that represents the smallest common denominator derived from the overly powerful wishes of financial institutions and poorly represented small shareholders.

The AK would like to convey the following statement on the proposal of the Commission for a Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on the access to the activity of credit institutions and the prudential supervision of credit institutions and investment firms and amending Directive 2002/87/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the supplementary supervision of credit institutions, insurance undertakings and investment firms in a financial conglomerate (CRD IV; COM(2011) 453 final) and on the proposal of the Commission for the Regulation of the European Parliament a

Public services have proven to be both a social buffer and shock absorber for the effects of the economic and financial crisis, in particular for those people, who have been hit hardest. The recent events should also have strengthened the belief of the Commission and the European decision-makers in a welfare model furnished with adequate financial resources.

The Austrian Association of Cities and Towns (ÖSTB), The Austrian Association for Public and Social Economy (VÖWG) and the Austrian Federal Chamber of Labour (BAK) are vehemently opposed to the intention of the Commission to hastily adopt the new State aid package for services of general economic interest (“Almunia Package”) without engaging in a comprehensive discussion process.