ILAC News 38

Regional Cooperationscontinued from previous pageDocument revision within theEA Horizontal HarmonisationCommittee (HHC)Revision of EA-3/09: Surveillance andreassessment of accredited organizations: atits meeting in March 2010, the HHC agreedto recommend to downgrade EA-3/09 statusto that of an advisory document. If agreedby the General Assembly, EA evaluatorswill have to be informed. In addition, theHHC decided to develop a new guidance onISO/IEC 17011 focusing on surveillance andreassessment rules. Feedback on EA workwill be provided to ILAC/IAF and the Chair,Merih Malmqvist-Nilsson, offered to drafta paper on accreditation cycles for furtherdiscussion at the HHC September meeting.Revision of EA-2/11: EA Policy forConformity Assessment schemes: the policyencapsulates a process for dealing withapplications from schemes to be acceptedin EA. It also outlines a proposal for anMoU meant to formalize relations andinteraction between EA and the scheme.Accepted schemes will be published on theEA website. Currently there are 13 HHCreviewedschemes operating in the privateand regulatory areas.The EA Laboratory Committee (LC):a buoyant committeeIn light of the results of a survey launchedin April 2010 to evaluate EA-memberaccreditation bodies’ activity and the needfor accreditation in the field of referencematerial producers, the EA General Assemblyhas recently endorsed the principle thatEA should expand its MLA to cover theaccreditation of RMPs in the future. Theproposed timeframe for when the activityshould be covered by the EA MLA will bedefined in due course.The WG Healthcare of the EA LaboratoryCommittee should elect its new Chair toreplace Andreas Steinhorst on 15 September2010.At the LC meeting held in March 2010,Christian Lehmann (DAkkS), the convenor ofWG ILC Testing, provided a presentation onthe results achieved in recent PT activities.He also presented a Table of Learning Pointsthat should become a very useful tool forEA accreditation bodies’ use in their systemand structure, in particular, but not only, fortraining of assessors.The WG ILC Calibration is about to start aninter-laboratory comparison for calibrationof roughness measurements in line withthe agreed five-year plan for regional ILCs.An invitation to nominate laboratorieswas circulating until 1 July 2010. Formore information, please contact the EASecretariat.EA enters into a formalpartnership with the CommissionThe European Accreditation Co-operation(EA) and the European Commissionsigned a Framework Partnership Agreementin Brussels on June 30, 2010. The signingceremony was attended by Graham Talbot,EA Chairman and Ms Liliana Brykman,Director on behalf of Mr Heinz Zourek,Director General Enterprise and Industry.The agreement formalises the relationshipbetween the two organisations thatstarted with the adoption of the newEuropean legislative package, in particularRegulation (EC) 765/2008 of the EuropeanParliament and of the Council of 9 July2008, and the recognition of EA as theofficial European accreditation infrastructure.Further progress was made with thesigning of the “General Guidelines forthe Cooperation between the Europeanco-operation for Accreditation and theEuropean Commission, the European FreeTrade Association and the competentNational Authorities” on 1 April 2009 inBrussels.The partnership agreement sets out the termsand conditions of the relationship, with aview to achieving the common policy aimsand objectives stated in the CooperationGuidelines. It covers a period of four yearscommencing on 1 January 2010.“This is a significantachievement for EA…”EA also signed a Specific Agreement onan Operating Grant for 2010, which detailsfinancial contributions from the Commissionin the form of operating grants for EA tocarry out elements of its work as the officialaccreditation infrastructure in Europe. Asimilar agreement should be signed with theEFTA countries by the end of the year.There is still work to be completed, notablyestablishing the processes and proceduresnecessary to administer the SpecificAgreement on the Operating Grant. The EAExecutive Committee will therefore pursueits planned work programme and updatestakeholders in due course.On signing the agreements GrahamTalbot commented: “This is a significantachievement for EA and I would like tothank those within EA and the Commissionwho contributed to reaching this importantmilestone. EA will strive to carry outits new role with diligence, impartiality,independence and professionalism to ensurethat the trust that has been placed in EA iswell-founded”.16 Issue 38 | October 2010