The French and Europe

Increased purchasing power and better consumer protection

Thanks to the European Union, everyone has the right to buy anything he or she wants in another country of the Union and bring it home without declaring it or paying customs duties. Thanks to the euro, French citizens can travel in Europe without losing money, because there are no more exchange fees.

  For example, a French person who left his country with 1,000 francs in his pocket and visited the 12 member countries of the euro area had to convert his money into the national currency in each country. In conversion fees alone, at the end of his trip, he had 500 francs less in his wallet without having bought anything. Thanks to the euro, French citizens can compare the prices of goods and services more easily in the euro area countries. This situation stimulates trade and competition and makes it possible to bring prices down. Thanks to the euro, French citizens also enjoy a lower interest rate and, therefore, a lower cost of credit. Thanks to European co-financing, major infrastructure projects benefiting French citizens have been carried out (Thalys: Paris-Brussels-Cologne) or are underway (TGV East, Perpignan- Figaras, studies for the Lyon-Turin tunnel, the new Port 2000 of Le Havre). In terms of consumer protection, the European Union is responsible for banning certain aggressive sales practices, such as:

  Going to consumers’ homes without being invited;

  Creating advertisements directly inciting children to persuade their parents to buy a product;

  Receiving letters that lead the recipient to believe that he has won a prize without compensation, when in fact the prize does not exist or its receipt would require a financial contribution.

Better health for all

With regard to the fight against smoking, the European Union is responsible for putting labels on cigarette packages and informational messages about the dangers of smoking. This Directive, which applies to the entire European Union, makes it possible to effectively relay the actions carried out by the Government against cancer and cardiovascular diseases.

  The European Union is responsible, for example, for the application of “Total Traceability” on all food products. Today, professionals are required to maintain an updated information base on:

  The origin of all ingredients - including those that are imported from other countries - used in the composition of the products that they manufacture;

  The identity of all distributors and recipients of these products, from the little neighbourhood grocery store to the supermarket.

In terms of health protection, the European Union supports, by means of particularly restrictive standards, quality, efficiency and availability standards for medications.

Better protection of the environment

In addition to promoting the adoption of standards such as the Kyoto Protocol at the international level, the European Union has set up a system that is well ahead of its time in terms of environmental protection. Thanks to the European Union, there are, for example, minimum standards for the quality of drinking water in Europe.

  Thanks to the establishment of standards for treatment plants and the strengthening of standards for drinking water, tap water is of better quality everywhere in Europe.

  These standards are complemented by a framework Directive on water, which protects the aquatic environment and guarantees the good quality of all EU water resources between now and 2015.

In addition to the establishment of a strategy promoting biological diversity, many Directives are making it very concretely possible to protect the environment better:

  The “Habitats Directive” protects 800 plant and animal species and 200 types of habitat that are important to the EU;

  The “Birds Directive” protects certain endangered species.

As regards the opening and closing dates of hunting seasons in effect in the Member States, the Constitution is establishing a subsidiarity control, which will make it possible, if necessary, to verify whether or not European legislation is disproportionately precise in terms of objectives sought.

In addition to these three areas, the European Union is improving and simplifying the daily lives of French citizens in many other fields:

  A European driver’s licence will soon come into being, in laminated plastic card format, which will replace the Union’s 110 existing models and reduce fraud.

  The European Union contributes to the promotion of quality education that is accessible to as many people as possible: thanks to the Erasmus programme, each year more than 124,000 students have the opportunity to complement their studies in another EU country.