SITPRO has recently been working to raise awareness of the EU Services Directive, which is due to come into force at the end of this year. It seeks to give fresh impetus to the aims of the EU Treaty by breaking down the remaining barriers to make it easier for service providers to set up in another member state, provide services across border or by temporary movement of persons into another member state.
In particular the Directive requires legislation that hinders trade in services between member states to be abolished and greater cooperation between regulatory bodies across the EU. In particular each member state has to set up a point of single contact through which service providers can find the information necessary and complete all the formalities to do business in that member state.
In order to explain the implications of this new legislation, SITPRO has produced two new publications, developed in conjunction with Clifford Chance. The first, The EU Services Directive and its Implementation in the UK (pdf 251KB 
), is comprehensive in its coverage of the provisions of the Directive, while a second summary guide, A Business Guide to the EU Services Directive (pdf 386KB ), covers the salient points and sets out in bullet form what the provisions mean in practice.
The second guide was launched when SITPRO joined forces with Clifford Chance and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) to deliver a workshop in Delhi on the Directive. The aim of the workshop was to increase awareness among Indian service companies of the opportunities for cross-border provision of services across the EU facilitated by the Directive and to deepen the two-way trading links that exist between the UK and India. It was supported by SEEDA, the development agency for the South-East of England, where much of the UK services sector is based.
Copies of both these new guides to the Services Directive are available at www.sitpro.org.uk/policy/services.
Return to SITPRO News: Issue 68, Spring 2009
