The FINANCIAL — The U.S. Chamber of Commerce on December 12 welcomed the progress report on U.S.-EU economic and regulatory cooperation released today as part of the third meeting of the Transatlantic Economic Council (TEC).
The Chamber President and CEO Tom Donohue expressed strong support for the continuation of the TEC. He also pledged his support for this worthwhile initiative and called on the new Administration and EU Commission to make it a priority.
“We welcome the good news in the TEC progress report,” said Sean Heather, Executive Director, Global Regulatory Cooperation. “It is clear that the pace of progress has quickened, specifically in areas of import safety, secure trade, and regulatory concerns to the transatlantic insurance market. There is also important progress being made to reduce U.S. and EU differences in regulatory approaches to risk assessment.”
The U.S. Chamber looks forward to working with the Obama Administration on transatlantic trade, investment and regulatory matters, including the TEC. The Chamber encourages President-elect Obama to name the next U.S. co-chair for the TEC and to make transatlantic economic integration an early priority for his Administration.
“The global financial crisis serves as an example for why the TEC is important,” said Heather. “Regulatory cooperation with the EU is essential to resolving the global financial crisis and preventing future disruptions in the transatlantic capital markets.”
U.S. Chamber President and CEO Tom Donohue said earlier today that “ideally it shouldn’t take a global economic crisis to encourage greater regulatory cooperation with Europe. Clearly, there are compelling reasons for our rule makers and legislators to cooperate on many sectors of our economies. We need to encourage these efforts and broaden them to areas where we can quickly achieve bottom-line benefits on both sides of the Atlantic.”
The Chamber and its transatlantic partner BUSINESSEUROPE will review the progress report in the coming days in greater detail and look to issue a report card on the TEC early next week.
