What happened to the Bolkestein directive?

The subject of lively discussions in the European Parliament and of controversy during the referendum on the constitution, the Bolkestein directive and its avatar, the Polish plumber, have disappeared from the radar of the news. And for good reason... The Bolkestein directive, seriously reviewed and corrected in February 2006, was adopted by the European Parliament at the end of 2006. And the Member States have until the end of this year to implement it – the transpose - into their national law.

In fact, no one is really in a hurry. No State has thus seen fit to notify Brussels that it has completed the transposition, including the States most relentless in defending this directive. And the European Commission is determined to allow a little more time than necessary. Because a specialist in the file explains it: The services directive is a very ambitious text, which requires changing a number of administrative practices and laws. (…) It's a very heavy transposition. (…) We must review all the administrative authorizations that govern each service activity, each trade, examine whether or not they can be maintained. It is necessary to set up one-stop shops, able to work in several languages. ". Which is far from obvious! The result is work that is both administrative and legislative, which no State will have really finished on time.

Paradoxically, France is rather ahead on this subject. Part of the directive has already been transposed within the framework of the law on the modernization of the economy. And most of the preliminary work has already been done. As for the Polish plumber, who has remained more of a myth than a danger, he is beginning to return to the country or to become a business manager, having a storefront, and to be… missed. Because, contrary to what we might have feared, its main asset was not its price, but its availability and rigor, qualities that some French craftsmen seem to have forgotten.

(published in Ouest-France, May 2009)