Prouza: Business associations have no room at the authorities to comment on EU legislation

Prague – While business associations are a mandatory commenting body for Czech laws, they have no opportunity to express their comments and opinions to Czech authorities during negotiations on European legislation. This was stated by the president of the Confederation of Trade and Tourism of the Czech Republic Tomáš Prouza at today’s conference of the Association for International Affairs, which focused on the excessive bureaucratic burden arising when adopting European regulations.

According to him, officials’ unwillingness to discuss national positions is in complete contradiction to how it works in most EU countries. “Apart from a few rare exceptions, Czech politicians are not interested in Europe. During negotiations on European legislation, the Czech official has no interest in opinions and information from Czech business, which significantly weakens the negotiating ability of Czechia,” Prouza said, among other things. According to him, the Chamber of Commerce of the Czech Republic (HK) internally compiled 441 obligations that could be scrapped and sent them to the ministries. “In four years, less than a quarter of them have been pushed through, and that only against brutal resistance from officials,” he noted.

So-called gold plating is, according to MEP Jan Farský (STAN), a situation where the state, when transposing European rules, adds its own additional obligations, bans or bureaucracy that the EU does not require at all. “Gold plating is problematic for entrepreneurs, citizens and for our relationship with the EU. It distorts it in that many of the regulations we invent at home we blame on Europe, claiming it ordered them,” Farský told ČTK. Most EU countries have already adopted measures to curb gold plating, Farský said in reference to the association’s study.

Prouza is convinced that debureaucratization must be initiated by the state from the top, that is, by an instruction from the prime minister to the ministers, who must then have the courage to push through changes and the easing of the entire system with their officials. However, according to him, most ministers have not found this courage in the past. Not only Prouza, but also other participants in today’s panel discussion believe that Czech officials want to ingratiate themselves with Brussels and stubbornly transpose European regulations into the Czech system far more than is necessary. “For a Czech official, praise from his Brussels colleague is more important than a sensible setting of rules in favor of Czech business,” Prouza added. (5 December)