Greens in the European Parliament are calling on the European
Commission to ban Microsoft from bidding on future EU procurement
contracts.
Their call comes after the firm was
fined for its anti-competitive behaviour in 2004, and its
failure to comply with the judgement since then.
Although the European Commission has so far not offered a
straight yes or no response to the Greens' proposal, the Greens are
pointing to the fact it has not ruled out a ban on Microsoft when
it comes to future procurement.
Caroline Lucas, south east England Green MEP, said, "It is
disappointing that the commission has refused to give clear
guidance on the role that Microsoft can or cannot play in future
procurement processes.
"Yet, although it gives no guarantees, there is a sense in which
it does imply that the company's history of anti-competitive
practices may be considered on a case-by-case basis."
In a written enquiry to the European Commission, green MEPs had
asked whether Microsoft should be excluded from current or future
public procurement procedures, citing Article 93 of the
EU's Financial Regulations.
These regulations stipulate that bidders that are guilty of
serious misconduct and have been convicted by the courts should be
excluded from procurement procedures.
Lucas said, "Article 45 of the EU procurement directive (2)
stipulates that companies which have legal judgments against them
can be excluded from the award of public contracts - whether it
concerns new software for a small town library or the setting up of
a database for a whole regional office.
"Open source software should be made more widely available by EU
institutions in order to help combat the destructive monopoly of
Microsoft and to help reduce the 'digital divide'."