Commission Decision of 5 September 2008 setting up an advisory structure of Scientific Committees and experts in the field of consumer safety, public health and the environment and repealing Decision 2004/210/EC (Text with EEA relevance) (2008/721/EC)

CHAPTER 4 U.K. PRINCIPLES

Article 15 U.K. Independence

1. The Members of the Scientific Committees, associated members, other scientific advisors of the Pool and the external experts shall be nominated in a personal capacity. They shall not delegate their responsibilities to any other person.

2. Members of the Scientific Committees and, scientific advisors of the Pool, and the external experts participating in working groups shall undertake to act independently of any external influence.

For that purpose they shall make a declaration of commitment to act in the public interest and a declaration of interests indicating either the absence or existence of any direct or indirect interest which might be considered prejudicial to their independence.

These declarations shall be made in writing. Members of the Scientific Committees and scientific advisors from the Pool shall make annual declarations.

3. Members of the Scientific Committees, associated members and other scientific advisors, and the external experts participating in working groups shall declare at each meeting any specific interest which might be considered as prejudicial to their independence in relation to the items on the agenda.

Article 16 U.K. Transparency

1. The activities of the Scientific Committees shall be carried out with a high level of transparency. The Commission shall in particular make available to the public on its website, without undue delay:

(a) the request for opinions addressed to the Scientific Committees;

(b) agendas and minutes of the meetings of the Scientific Committees, Inter-Committee Coordination Group and working groups;

(c) the scientific opinions, and rapid advice adopted by the Scientific Committees, including the minority opinions and the names of the participants in the working groups that contributed to the opinion concerned; minority opinions shall be attributed to the members or advisors concerned;

(d) the common rules of procedures of the Scientific Committees;

(e) the names of the members of the Scientific Committees as well as of the scientific advisors from the Pool, together with a brief curriculum vitae of each member and advisor;

(f) the declarations of interests of the members of the Scientific Committees, of the scientific advisors from the Pool and of the external experts that participated in a working group.

2. The transparency rules referred to in paragraph 1 shall be applied in accordance with the requirements of Regulation (EC) No 45/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 December 2000 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data by the Community institutions and bodies and on the free movement of such data(1) (EC), and of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents(2), especially with regard to commercial confidentiality.

Article 17 U.K. Confidentiality

The members of the Scientific Committees, scientific advisors, external experts and trainees shall not divulge information acquired as a result of the work of the Scientific Committees, thematic workshops, working groups or other activities related to the application of this Decision, when they are informed that it is confidential.

(1)

OJ L 8, 12.1.2001, p. 1.

(2)

OJ L 145, 31.5.2001, p. 43.