Considerations on COM(2001)418 - Labour cost index - Main contents
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| dossier | COM(2001)418 - Labour cost index. |
|---|---|
| document | COM(2001)418  |
| date | February 27, 2003 |
(2) The Community, and particularly its economic, employment and monetary authorities, need to have regular and timely labour cost indices for the purpose of monitoring changes in labour costs.
(3) The Action Plan on Economic and Monetary Union statistical requirements, produced by the European Commission (Eurostat) in close collaboration with the European Central Bank, identifies as a priority the development of a legal basis covering short-term labour cost statistics.
(4) The benefits of collecting, at Community level, complete data on all segments of the economy should be balanced against the reporting possibilities and the response burden on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
(5) The Regulation is in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity as set out in Article 5 of the Treaty. The creation of common statistical standards for labour cost indices can only be achieved on the basis of a Community legal act because only the Commission can coordinate the necessary harmonisation of statistical information at Community level, while the collection of data and compilation of comparable labour cost indices can be organised by the Member States.
(6) Council Regulation (EC) No 322/97 of 17 February 1997 on Community statistics(5) provides the general framework for the production of labour cost indices under this Regulation.
(7) The measures necessary for the implementation of this Regulation should be adopted in accordance with Council Decision 1999/468/EC of 28 June 1999 laying down the procedures for the exercise of implementing powers conferred on the Commission(6).
(8) The Statistical Programme Committee (SPC), established by Council Decision 89/382/EEC, Euratom(7), has been consulted in accordance with Article 3 of that Decision.