"Are EU Being Served?": The EU Services Directive

The draft EU Services Directive promises to deliver a genuine EU single market for service providers, from management consultants to plumbers to hairdressers.

Services account for around 70% of European GDP and employment, but only 20% of intra-EU trade, and so the European Commission has identified a large potential for growth, competitiveness and job creation in this area. The idea of a single market for services is not new but, in practice, numerous obstacles prevent service providers from reaching potential recipients in countries other than the country in which they are established.

The Commission identifies the main obstacles to the genuine free movement of services as over-burdensome authorisation schemes, excessive red tape, rules preventing the posting of workers and requirements which discriminate on the basis of nationality.