THE Irish presidency of the EU will have to get agreement on the final elements of the Union's consumer legislative programme, according to the European Commission's director of consumer affairs, Mr Peter Prendergast.
Speaking in Dublin yesterday, Mr Prendergast said the EU had almost completed the enactment of a comprehensive set of rules that is increasingly making European consumers more confident.
Mr Prendergast was speaking at a lunch organised by the Irish Council of the European Movement. "But three important directives remain to be dealt with, and Ireland will have to get agreement on them from 15 member states and hundreds of parliamentarians," he said.
The outstanding directives would regulate "teleshopping" would require shops to display prices in such a way as to make comparisons between similar goods easier, and would allow consumer agencies to take cases to EU courts on behalf of consumers.
The need to increase consumer confidence was increasingly identified as a key issue in Europe. In the last year, the EU has established a separate consumer affairs directorate general - the equivalent of a Government department, he said. "No member state has a fully fledged department of consumer affairs, therefore it is unusual for the Commission to give it this role and it may be a sign that they want member states to do likewise.
Mr Prendergast said that in 1992, a Europe wide survey had shown that just 3 per cent of European consumers shopped for anything significant outside their state. By 1995, this figure had risen to 24 per cent. The figure for Ireland is 18 per cent.
"So 90 million EU consumers bought goods in a member state other than their own," he said. "Of those, 40 million spent more than £4,000." This showed that the EU had succeeded in creating consumer friendly conditions throughout Europe.
There were still many changes that needed to be made to reassure sceptical consumers, he went on. In particular, consumer unease about how food was produced could become a problem.
He cited the example of the BSE scare, saying German consumers had stopped eating British beef some time ago and were now not eating German beef.
"They are increasingly unhappy about the way meat is being handled, what is put into food, the way the animals are fed, the use of antibiotics."
The Minister of State for consumer affairs, Mr Pat Rabbitte, agreed with Mr Prendergast that food policy was wrongly dominated by agricultural interests.
I was always bemused as to why food is the responsibility of the Department of Agriculture rather than the Department of Industry. Food is a major industry which has nothing to do with a department for farmers," he said.