IP/08/687
Brussels, 6 May 2008
Professional qualifications: Commission acts to ensure that Portugal and the United Kingdom implement EU laws
The Commission has decided to refer Portugal and the United Kingdom to the European Court of Justice over their failure to inform the Commission of measures taken to implement Directive 2006/100/EC. This Directive provides for technical adaptations to the Directives on professional qualifications further to the accession of Bulgaria and Romania to the European Union on 1 January 2007. It updates, amongst others, all the lists of qualifications which benefit from automatic recognition by completing them with the corresponding Bulgarian and Romanian qualifications. The deadline for transposing Directive 2006/100/EC expired on 1 January 2007. As is the case with the eight other Member States referred to the Court in April 2008 (IP/08/503), Portugal and the United Kingdom have still not brought into force all the necessary provisions.
As long as the Directive is not implemented into national law, professionals holding Bulgarian or Romanian qualifications risk enduring needlessly bureaucratic and slow procedures before being able to exercise their right to work anywhere in the European Union and the potential users of the services of these professionals may be deprived of the opportunity to benefit from their expertise.
The latest information on infringement proceedings concerning all Member States can be found at:
