As I've pointed out before, the debate about the type and extent of regulation we need in the EU is an important one - important enough that we should be careful to avoid scoring cheap party-political points, or over-simplifying arguments for rhetorical effect. We can get regulation right or wrong; it can be good or bad, restrictive or liberating. In an attempt to encourage some of my colleagues to recognise the positive side of regulation in our single European market, I recently put this question to the European Commission:

"What are the latest figures available to the Commission on the total economic benefits to European citizens of the existence of the European single market?"

The reply came back today:

"A comprehensive study on the total economic impact of the Internal Market was carried out in 1996 and published in 1998. It concluded that in 1994, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was between 1.1% and 1.5% higher than it would have been if the Internal Market did not exist. For the same year, the employment gain was estimated to have accounted for over 300,000 jobs.

"Since then, there have been partial assessments. Among the latest are:

• "The Communication on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Internal Market included a new round of macroeconomic estimates of the impact of the 1992 programme. According to these estimates, EU GDP in 2002 was 1.8 percentage points, or €164.5 billion, higher thanks to the Internal Market. In addition, about 2.5 million jobs had been created in the EU since 1992 as a result of the opening up of frontiers between Member States;


• "A study by Commission services based on accounting data of EU firms has found evidence of a significant impact of the Internal Market programme on productivity. Efficiency, as measured by the productivity of assets, increased by approximately 25% between 1993 and 2001;


• "In the field of Public Procurement, a study for the Commission estimated the economic benefits from the application of EU Directives. Results show that the application of the transparency procedures required by the Directives could reduce prices of goods, services and works contracts by approximately 30%. The study also showed that the success rates of foreign firms operating in other Member States to win contracts are actually comparable to those of domestic firms bidding in their home countries."