24. Calls on the Commission to reassess the appropriate level of thresholds for supply and services contracts, and if necessary raise them, so as facilitate access to public procurement by, amongst others, not-for-profit and social-economy operators and SMEs; asks that very careful consideration be given to the legally binding requirements of the WTO Agreement on Government Procurement; emphasises that, given the difficulties which already exist in negotiations on the issue of access to public procurement, it should also be borne in mind that raising thresholds in Europe could easily lead to further complications for EU trade policy;

(a) any outstanding remuneration to the illegally employed third-country national; where the agreed level of remuneration cannot be established, it shall be deemed to be the minimum wage as established by national law.

The Action Plan recognises the need for shareholders to be able to appreciate fully the relationship between the past and future performance of companies and directors' pay and to make decisions on aspects of remuneration linked to the share price such as share options for directors.

The Council has reduced the thresholds proposed by the Commission and accepted by Parliament (a port’s annual maritime traffic volume of at least 3 million tonnes or 500 000 passengers) to the thresholds for seaports of international importance used in the guidelines for trans-European transport networks (1.5 million tonnes or 200 000 passengers) and allowed Member States to exempt ports with a high seasonal character from the scope of this directive (50% of the average total annual maritime traffic volume reached in three months of the year).

Just off the top of my head, from looking at other departments and other agencies, my proposal on the pay structure would be that the base pay in the Canadian Armed Forces be $32,000 a year, which is the average corporal's wages, for privates that are starting out and that the scale go from $32,000 to $42,000 from private to master corporal, and $42,000 to $52,000 from sergeant to chief warrant officer, which I think is an equitable level of pay incentive pay increases over time and promotion, and comparable for position and leadership to officers ranks where you have basically a chief warrant officer making the equivalent to a captain where, in the scheme of things, they're basically equivalent on the food chain for leadership, seniority and ...[+++]the whole nine yards.

Indeed, the survey carried out by Mr. Van Miert's services has shown that an important number of operations with cross-border effects do not fall within the scope of the Regulation, given the present thresholds which are set at 5 billion Ecu for worldwide level and 250 million Ecu for Community level.