On 17th June, the European Parliament Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) hosted a debate on the state of play on the negotiations in the Council of the equal treatment directive, which would cover access to goods and services.
The Latvian Presidency clarified that the Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs (EPSCO) Council in December, showed commitment to continue with the proposed directive and abandoned the idea of enhanced cooperation in the fied of equal treatment in access to goods and services. The work of the EU Presidency focused on trying to reach a consensus in the scope of the directive and the division of competences between the Europan Union and its member states on social protection and education. The debate in the Council Working Group on Social Questions has thus focused on social protection and education. The Presidency also circulated a questionnaire, inviting EU Member States to clarify their current positions with regard to the scope of the Directive, the most important outstanding issues and the calendar for implementing the accessibility provisions.
During the exchange of views, the EP rapporteur, Ulrike Lunacek and other MEPs stressed the need not to stall the adoption of the directive using excuses related to subsidiarity and the division of competences, as equality is a fundamental EU value enshrined in the treaties and the EU already has similar legislation protecting ethnic groups from discrimination in access to goods and services. MEPs also asked the Council to do assessment of the costs of inequality, which is bad for citizens and the EU as whole. The Chair of the LIBE Committee, Claude Moraes, referred to the event hosted by AGE Platform Europe on the World Elder Abuse Awareness Day and urged the Council to make tangible progress in the adoption of the directive which is essential to fight discrimination against older people.
The Latvian Presidency further explained to MEPs in the LIBE Committee that a new exemption for preferential pricing in respect of specific age groups was added in the new Article 2.6c of the Directive. The representative of the Presidency hinted that some Member States felt that the exemption as currently worded was too broad.
While AGE is looking forward to the adoption of the horizontal directive, we are concerned that the proposed new text by the Latvian Presidency, would allow any type of preferential charges, fees or rates in respect of persons in a specific age group not to constitute discrimination. Whereas we agree that it would be sensible to allow for concessions and different pricing to target the specific needs of some age groups like children, young people and older people, an open-ended exception might create ground for abuse by commercial actors. This is why we have sent out a press release, advocating against a broad exemption on age-differentiated pricing.
For AGE a narrower exception would be the best way to allow commercial organisations to continue offering age-differentiated prices, products and concessionary services, without creating a legal avenue for the exclusion of certain age groups.
We suggest that the Council further discusses this suggestion with civil society and the European Parliament, in order to overcome the technical difficulties and advance with the adoption of a meaningful piece of legislation affording equal treatment to all EU citizens.
