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Professional qualifications

Presentation of main components of Commission proposal

IMCO 9 January 2012

Priority under Single Market Act

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Background

• 19 Dec: proposal amending current Directive– Impact Assessment– Green Paper June 2011; first consultation January 2011;

evaluation 2010

• 16 Nov: Resolution European Parliament

• 23 Oct: Conclusions European Council

• End 2012: objective political agreement

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1. A proposal affecting all professions

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European Professional Card (EPC)• Voluntary for professions, mandatory for Member States• Need for implementing acts• How? Electronic certificate created in home MS and

transmitted via Internal Market Information System (IMI) • What does it do in case of permanent establishment?

– Reduce time for recognition by 50% – Validation by host Member State remains but challenge of tacit

authorisation

• What does it do in case of temporary mobility?:– EPC replaces declaration for two years (currently, annual

declaration)– Valid at the same time in all MS requested for

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European Professional Card (EPC)• Data protection safeguards included

• Costs : Funding by the European Union in 2013/2014

– Development within IMI: 124000 EUR– Development online application tool (public interface): 380000 EUR– No costs for current or future EU budgets– Fees in MS charged only on real cost basis

• Incentives for home Member States? – Profession not regulated in home MS: use existing assistance

centres (previously called contact points under current Directive)– Review existing workload for home MS

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Partial access• Principle developed by the Court• Principle applies as a last resort • Principle applies in case where the activity in question

can be carried out in home MS (no artificial activities!) • Principle to be decided in individual Member States on a

case-by-case basis• MS may reject partial access in case of overriding public

interests, such as public health

Practical tool also contributing to the debate on the “number of regulated professions”

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Partially qualified professionals

• Current Directive: fully qualified professionals

• Proposal: extension to partially qualified professionals

• What about the possibility to carry out a remunerated traineeship in another Member State?

• Court: Internal Market freedoms apply!

Home MS should accept such traineeship abroadHost MS should offer safeguards of the Directive

procedure

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Control of language skills

• Host Member State can check in case of a serious doubt

• Special regime for health care professionals:– if the national health care system or representative patient

organisations so request (primary responsibility for an employer!)

– In case of such a request, clause of “serious doubt” does not apply

• Safeguards for the professional– Check only after a recognition of a qualification – Only one official language in host MS– Free of charge and subject to appeals

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Alert mechanism

• Extend mechanism from the Services Directive to other professions (employees, such as teachers)

• Create a specific mechanism for health professionals: – Health professionals who benefit from automatic recognition– Including Veterinary surgeons– Alert necessary towards all Member States – Alert limited to identity a professional no longer allowed to

practice– Specific safeguards for data protection

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• Launch a “national housekeeping exercise”

• Transparency: each MS lists and justifies each regulated profession

• Mutual evaluation of regulated professions between MS

• Commission reports to EP and Council

• Link with policy on partial access

Better understanding and opportunity for reviewing national regulatory frameworks

Costs for each MS in total: from €4000 to €122000

Mutual evaluation exercise

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Number of regulated professions

About 800 in the EU (and not 4700!!)

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Access to information/e-governance

• Access to information:

– “I’d like to find information online”: Points of Single Contact (PSC) – “I’d like to discuss my case” – Assistance centres (former national

contact points under the Directive)

• Possibility to complete online recognition procedures

28% of our citizens consider working abroad!

Costs for the extension of PSC: ~ 100-300 working days per MS in total

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2. A proposal affecting professions which do not

benefit from automatic recognition

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Reform of existing rules of the general system

• Establishment: Make the system easier but no deletion of the educational levels in Article 11

• Temporary mobility: Lighter regime for professionals accompanying consumers (declaration still necessary but no need for two years of professional experience)

• Temporary mobility: Clarify rules on prior check of qualifications for professions with health and safety risks

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Automatic recognition for new professions in the future?

Common training frameworks

Harmonisation of training on the basis of a common set of knowledge, skills

and competences

Common training tests

No harmonisation of training but common aptitude test for access to

the profession

2 modelsQualifications automatically recognised

• Radical approach: Drop concept of common platforms • Two new avenues offered:

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Notaries

• Extension of Directive to notaries

• Court banned discrimination based on nationality (May

2011). How to apply the Directive in practice?

• Establishment: MS decide on the need for a test or a stage. Already applied in some Member States

• Temporary provision of services: in principle yes however no authentic deeds by foreign notaries

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3. A proposal affecting professions which benefit from

automatic recognition

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Professions concerned

• Automatic recognition today: – Doctors, dentists, nurses, midwives, pharmacists,

veterinary surgeons, architects– Craft/trade and industry sector

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Doctors and dentists• Doctors: Clarification of the duration of basic medical

education = 5500 hours within a minimum of 5 years • Doctors: Possibility of partial exemptions for specialist

doctors willing to follow a second specialist training• Doctors and dentists: use of ECTS (European Credit

Transfer and Accumulation System) to express training years

• Doctors and dentists: specialities may be introduced via delegated acts if in 1/3 of MS (instead of 2/5)

• Doctors and dentists: competences may be defined via delegated acts

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Nurses and midwives• Upgrade admission requirements to nurses from 10 to

12 years of general education (or equivalent level!)– General care nurses (not geriatric nurses or other nurses)– Acquired rights regime– Already reality in 24 Member States (25th MS about to follow)

• Same upgrade for midwives– Acquired rights regime – Deletion of additional obstacles related to professional

experience to benefit from automatic recognition

• Competences may be defined via delegated acts for each of the two professions

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Pharmacists

• Six months stage after academic studies

• Extension of list of activities for pharmacists

• Allow not longer MS to ban well-qualified pharmacists from opening up new pharmacies

– 25 Member States do not longer use this derogation

– Such discrimination no longer allowed by recent Court judgments on pharmacists (judgments in 2010)

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Architects

• Increase of minimum training duration from 4 to 6 years• How? Combination of academic training and supervised

remunerated practice in each Member State• How? “4+2” or “5+1” formula for each Member State

– Option 1: Four years of academic training and two years of professional experience

– Option 2: Five years of academic training and one year of professional experience

• Use of ECTS and competences envisaged as well In future, bachelor diploma (4 years of academic

training) no longer sufficient to benefit from automatic recognition

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Craft / trade industry

• No major change

• Need to review list of activities in Annex IV by a delegated act

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3. Institutional questions

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Implementing and delegated acts

• Replacing existing comitology powers by delegated acts (2014 target date under Treaty of Lisbon)

• New: Implementing and delegated acts in case of professional card

• Adoption of implementing acts: support by a Committee

• Adoption of delegated acts: prior involvement of experts

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Budget

• Legislative financial statement

• In total: 725.000 EUR = Development costs in 2013 and 2014 for– European Professional Card– Alert mechanism in IMI– Other functions within IMI linked to the Directive

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Conclusions

• Documents available under:

http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/qualifications/policy_developments/index_en.htm