MEP labels outcome of vote on recognition of European Authentic Acts as disappointing and un-European

8.59.11am GMT Tue 6th Jan 2009

Moves to investigate the mutual recognition of authentic acts like powers of attorney, family arrangements and other legal deeds have been labelled as exclusive and un-European by Liberal Democrat MEP Diana Wallis.

Speaking after the vote in the European Parliament, Ms Wallis said:

"The report from the Legal Affairs Committee of the Parliament concentrates on a very limited definition of what constitutes such an act, thereby excluding from scope analogous documents prepared by solicitors and notaries in England and Wales and other common law or mixed jurisdictions, like the Scandinavian countries, and also some documents from Hungary or Austria. People try to tell us this initiative will help all European citizens but in truth many will be excluded and still subject to a double system and additional costs in a second system where some notarial profession have a virtual monopoly.'

Diana Wallis, a Vice-President of the European Parliament, continued:

"It is ironic that we have today been talking about protecting vulnerable adults across Europe and the example was given of the many Brits who retire to Spain. Any British powers of attorney or other such documents they have prepared to deal with their affairs will not be recognised: they would have to have a second document prepared by a Spanish notary and yet we may be forced to accept their Spanish documents without more ado in the UK.

"This is not the area of European justice that I and others have been working for and reflects a very exclusive approach suitable for a favoured few main stream civil law jurisdictions!"

Note:

The report on the European Authentic Act was adopted by the European Parliament on 18 December 2008. The report is a non-legislative report that contains recommendations to the European Commission and Council calling for the introduction of mechanisms to enable to recognition of authentic acts between member states.

Amendments by Diana Wallis called for similar documents prepared in other legal systems also to benefit from any such instrument, and deleted the report's request that the European Commission initiate an information campaign promoting the benefits of authentic acts to common-law professionals. These amendments were defeated both at Committee stage and at the final vote in Plenary.

The European Commission has announced plans for a Green Paper on this subject in the near future.

A copy of the report can be found here:

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?type=REPORT&mode=XML&reference=A6-2008-0451&language=EN