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EU Competition Commissioner backs open standards in eGovernment

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The EU Competition Commissioner, Neelie Kroes, publicly supported the use of open source software in eGovernment, in a public speech at a seminar hosted by OpenForum Europe in Brussels on 10 June 2008. Kroes encouraged the public institutions to use open standards, underlining the positive example of Munich that have implemented open standards in their local eGovernment projects. She suggested a much more active role of the European Commission in promoting open standards in eGovernment applications, by adopting an internal policy not to buy proprietary software: "The Commission must do its part. It must not rely on one vendor, it must not accept closed standards and it must refuse to become locked into a particular technology."

The EU Commissioner's speech shows an indirect support to the Open Parliament petition initiated in March 2008 by OpenForum Europe, The European Software Market Association and the Free Software Foundation Europe asking the European Parliament to change its ICT system in order to allow the adoption of open standards.

Also Kroes praised the benefits of open standards: "No citizen or company should be forced or encouraged to choose a closed technology over an open one, through a government having made that choice first." She also encouraged the business customers to make a difference by promoting open standards: "I know a smart business decision when I see one. Choosing open standards is a very smart business decision indeed."

Kroes mentioned a number of competition cases in ICT that are investigated by the Commission in relation with ICT standards, giving as examples Apple, the mobile phone company Qualcomm and chip maker Rambus. Also she clearly referred to Microsoft when she mentioned the problems with the well-known fines against the US software producer: "The Commission has never before had to issue two periodic penalty payments in a competition case."

Some MEPs wanted to go further and asked the European Commission if Microsoft could not be banned from the European public procurements, since it has been fined by the Commission. Heide Rühle, internal market policy spokeswoman for the Greens in the European Parliament, explained that there were provisions of the public procurement EU Directive that allow the exclusion of applicants from public procurement procedures if "they have been convicted of an offence concerning their professional conduct by a judgement which has the force of res judicata or they have been guilty of grave professional misconduct proven by any means which the contracting authority can justify".

But the European Commission rejected these arguments in its answer explaining that, according to the directive, the exclusion was not obligatory. EC claimed that the fine did not count as an "criminal conviction of a criminal offence by a final judgement from a Court". Also the second provision should "require a case-by-case assessment which can only be done in the framework of an on-going procurement procedure."

Kroes calls for open standards in eGovernment (10.06.2008)

EU's Kroes: open standards are smart business move (10.06.2008)

European Commission won't exclude Microsoft from procurement procedures (13.06.2008)

Written Question: Microsoft - Implementation of Article 93 of the Financial Regulation (21.04.2008)

EDRi-gram: European Parliament criticized for not using open standards (12.03.2008)

Source: EDRi-gram - "EU Competition Commissioner backs open standards in eGovernment" Number 6.12, 18 June 2008

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