Brussels bureaucrats to get work experience in SMEs.

07 November 2006

Some senior European Commission officials will soon be abandoning their desks to spend a week in small and medium sized companies (SMEs) to learn about the sectors for which they make EU-wide laws.

"A better understanding of the needs of SMEs and a better appreciation of business-specific problems is also part of the better regulation initiative and of our determination to improve the quality of lawmaking," said EU industry commissioner Guenter Verheugen who is backing the "hands-on experience" in SMEs for the commission's administrators.

Commissioner Verheugen will be taking part in the exercise and will be sharing the experience with his staff. The civil servants will be shadowing ordinary personnel in pharmaceuticals, restaurants and hotels, information technology, aerospace, machinery, chemicals and textiles sectors.

A total of 350 civil servants from the commission's enterprise and industry department will be pursuing an internship in 27 different economic sectors over the next two years across the EU.