§ Mr. HendryTo ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will make a statement on the outcome of the meeting of the EC Industry Council held in Luxembourg on 7 April. [20973]
§ Mr. EggarI represented the United Kingdom at this meeting. The Council adopted three sets of conclusions: on industrial competitiveness, industrial co-operation with central and eastern Europe and high-technology industries. The meeting heard oral reports from the Commission on the implementation of competition policy in 1994 and on the monitoring of the six article 95 steel state aid decisions approved in December 1993. On the latter, I underline the importance of the conditions imposed by the Council being fulfilled and that we would want to look closely at the Commission's written report when it appears. The Commission gave a short oral report on the outcome of the G7 ministerial conference on the information society held in Brussels in February. Finally, there was a Commission presentation of its plans to establish common industry/research task forces within the Commission. No votes were taken on any of the issues on the agenda.