C 3. Explanatory Memorandum
1
1. Members of the Assembly will recall
that in the proposals which were adopted in
the form of Recommendations 102 and 143,
we suggested that t he setting up of a Europe an
Conference of Ministers of Posts and Telecommunications would be an important step
for ward in co-operation at the level of the
Fifteen / Seventeen and make a major contri-bution to the development and rationalisation
of the postal and telecommunications system
in Europe.
2. After a number of setbacks , support
for the Assembly's proposals was finally
obtained from the Co mmittee of Ministers, and
in January this year a meeting was held
at St. Moritz, Switzerland, attended by representatives of the postal and telecommunications administrations of the Federal Republic
of Germany, France, the United Kingdom,
Italy, the Netherlands , Switzerland and, for
the northern cou tries , Denmark and Sweden.
A further conference attended by representatives of the posts and telecommunications
administrations of all OEEC countries and
Finland was held at Montreux, Switzerland,
in June.
3. The results of the St. Moritz meeting
were conveyed to the Assembly in t h e Committee of Ministers' Tenth Report (
Doc. 975,
see Appendix I, pp. 25-32). Your Rapporteur
heartily welcomes the progress recorded in
the Ministers' Report and feels that no further
comment at present is called for from the
Assembly on the technical aspects of the
arrangements for co-operation proposed at
St. Moritz a n d finally agreed upon at Montreux.
Members will no doubt agree that , having
obtained the setting up of a system of this
kind , we should wait until there has been
t i m e for concrete res lts to be achieved before
we express a further opinion on what is being
done.
4. On the other hand, there are two
other very important points which your
Committee wishes to bring to the attention
of the Assembly as soon as possible.
5. First , there is the decision adopted
at Montreux and described in paragraph 1 of
Article 2 of the Arrangement
Note establishing
the European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations , where by " t he
Conference shall be independent of a n y political or economic organisation " . This stipulation may have been designed by the sponsoring administrations to ensure that other
countries would be more willing to join the new organisation if they felt that they would
not , in so doing, link themselves with any
other international organisation . But, having
regard to the fact that the European countries,
whose co-operation the Assembly has been
most anxious to secure, in the first place
already belong to , or are associate member of,
such bodies as the 0 . E. E. C. and E. C. M. T.,
i t seems wrong that the advantages of some
common secretariat services and a single
location should not be secured right from the
start . This is a purely practical economic
consideration . But there are other reasons
for such a link.
6. At a time when urgent efforts are
being made to rationalise European institutions — t h e Committee of Ministers has itself
a t last decided to take action in this regard
and some practicalre sults have already been
produced — i t would be wrong if a step were
n ow taken to set up a new European economic
institution, having no links of any kind with
existing European economic bodies, and located
in an entirely new centre. The arrangement
which most logically suggests itself is, in fact,
that originally proposed by us — that there
should be a European Conference of Ministers
of Posts and Telecommunications , independent
in the sense that the E. C. M. T. is independent,
but operated in the most economical way
(general secretariat facilities being provided,
as in the case of the E. C. M. T., by the.
0 . E. E. C.) and, through being located in
the same place and being operated at ministeria
level, like the E. C. M. T. and the 0 . E. E. C.
itself, ensuring that best results are achieved.
7. As to the stipulation that the Conference
should be a ministerial one on the
pattern of the E. C. M. T., and not merely
a Conference of senior civil servants, the
Assembly will no doubt feel, from its experience
with the 0 . E. E. C. and the E. C. M. T., tha
the possibilities of further direct contact
between itself and the Conference will be
c o n s i d e r a b l y greater if the Conference is
headed by Ministers who can appear before
the Assembly and take part in its debates.
Moreover, the future creation of a European
Economic Association should constantly be
borne in mind, and appropriate links between
the proposed E. C. M. P . T. and the existing
institutions of the Fifteen / Seventeen should
be ensured as far as possible in advance.
8. The Assembly may wish, therefore,
to draw the attention of the Ministers, as a matter of urgency, to the need for ensuring
that this new piece of Europe an co-operative
machinery is set up with proper regard to
existing machinery in other fields and to the
efforts which the Ministers themselves are
making to ensure the maximum rationalisation
of Europe an institutions.
9. The second point to which your
Rapporteur draws attention is the fact that
the Article of the Arrangement referred to
above ( entitled " Relations with International
Organisations " ) in saying that the Conference
shall be independent of any political or economic
organisation there by implies, of course,
that there will be no link with the Council
of Europe or the Consultative Assembly. This
is particularly regrettable in view of the
fact that the original proposal emanated from
the Assembly and in view of the most fruitful
co-o peration which the Assembly has established
with 0. E. E. C , E. C. M . T . , and E. C. A .C.
Our Committee of Ministers would probably
be prepared to support an Assembly request
that the new European Conference of Posts and
Telecommunications Administrations be required,
as a first step at least , to submit an Annual
Report to the Assembly in t h e same way as
is done by the 0. E. E. C , E. N. E. A.,
E. C. M. T., etc., and that formal links be
thus established between the Conference and
t h e Council of Europe, in recognition of the
latter' s role as t h e general political framework
for European co-operation. The Assembly
may therefore wish to put this second proposal
also to the Committee of Ministers.
10. It is perhaps unfortunate that there presentati ves of the eighteen member countries
of 0. E. E. C , together with Finland, signed
the final Protocol to the A rrangement setting
up the European Conference of Posts and
Telecommunications Administrations at the
Conference held at Montreux in June , before
the Assembly had had an opportunity of putting before Governments our views on this
matter . It is gratifying, however, that at
least the Austrian Government had fully
accepted the arguments put forward so often
by the Assembly in favour of a ministerial
conference, and has never ceased to press for
acceptance of this principle in the negotiations
which led to the setting up of the Conference
of Administrations . It is not clear how far
the Foreign Offices of our Member Governments
were consulted in the briefing of national
delegations to the Montreux Conference—though i t is clear that , if such consultations did take
place , the views of the Assembly carried little
weight. It is the view of your Rapporteur,
however, that this should not discourage
us and that we should, on the contrary,
press once again the arguments which militat
in favour of a ministerial conference and try
to ensure that the Conference of Administ
rations now established should so function as
to prepare the way for the setting up at an
early date of the ministerial conference originall
y proposed by us.
