92003E0555

WRITTEN QUESTION E-0555/03

by Antonio Di Pietro (ELDR) to the Commission

(27 February 2003)

Subject: Integrated waste management in the municipality of Conegliano

By decision of 8 April 2002 (No 127-597), the Conegliano (TV) municipal council decided, without issuing a call for tenders, to give responsibility the integrated management of urban and related waste within the municipal boundaries and the relevant financial management (invoicing and collection) to the Consortium for local hygiene services (CIT), a consortium of which the municipality forms part, no later than 1 July 2002, specifying that these services may be carried out either directly by the CIT or through a third party.

The same decision stipulates that the CIT's tasks comprise the integrated and coordinated management of urban waste and special and related waste, including the collection and transport phases, as well as the invoicing and collection of payments covering the cost of the services, and that this comprehensive management, including collection and transport, will help to optimise the organisation of the service in an optimum territorial context and thus to improve the cost-effectiveness of services and as is also stated fully outsource the area's management of urban and related waste.

Subsequently, households, producers and businesses in Conegliano received a letter signed by the Mayor of the municipality, the chairman of the CIT and the chairman of SAV.NO, informing them of a number of changes in the management and collection of payments for 2002. The letter explained, among other things, that amounts due for the service would be collected by the CIT, via SAV.NO, on the basis of invoices sent to each user. This letter to users was in fact followed by a SAV.NO-headed invoice.

In short, the Conegliano local council directly transferred responsibility for the service to the CIT, which in turn subcontracted part of the work to SAV.NO.

In the light of the above, does the Commission not consider that such measures are unacceptable since they violate Community legislation on subcontracting the management of local public services?

Answer given by Mr Bolkestein on behalf of the Commission

(25 April 2003)

The Commission would like to inform the Honourable Member that it knows there are certain problems with Italian legislation in the field of local public services which is incompatible with Community law on public procurement and concessions. This legislation is currently the subject of an infringement procedure under which the Commission recently sent a supplementary letter of formal notice to the Italian government.

With regard to the award of the waste management service in the municipality of Conegliano, the Commission will ask the Italian authorities for detailed information which will enable it to assess whether the case in question is part of the more general problem addressed by the aforementioned infringement procedure.