Riga hosted last 15-16 May the plenary session of the European Committee for Postal Regulation (CERP), preceded by a meeting of the Good Regulatory Practices Committee on 14 May.
In the previous meeting, Germany, Ireland, France and Latvia presented their regulation models. Noteworthy was the German presentation, which covered the last five months, a period in which Germany has now experienced total liberalisation of the postal market. The Irish and French presentations focused on the costing system and the economic impact of application of the new Postal Directive, while the Latvian presentation likewise dealt with the costing model, besides centring on a description of the country's regulatory model, underscoring its short experience in Europe and the innovation the full liberalisation process implies for a new and small market such as the Latvian one.
The CERP plenary session included speeches by UPU Director General Edouard Dayan, UPU Project Director Won-Ja Lee, and Jörg Reinbothe and Robert Pochmarski from the European Commission. It was marked by the presentation of reports on the work of the various working groups (WG) and project teams (PT) and by discussion on the reorganisation of CEPT and the eventual impact on CERP.
There was also a forum on ''Changing Address in an Environment of Competition'', which presented companies that operated in Ireland and Switzerland, basically providing a database management service that facilitates the updating of information on switching addresses between private citizens and various public and private bodies.
Finally, note that the plenary session was also marked by the elections for the committee presidency. The following were elected by acclamation: Ulrich Dammann (Germany) as chairman, replacing Jean-Luc Dutordoit, and Michel Noguet (Switzerland) and John Hearn (Ireland) as vice chairs.
The next CERP plenary meeting will be held on 8-10 October 2008 in Athens, Greece.
