Look before you legislate

In a new leaked document, the Commission expands on its ‘better regulation’ plans.

The European Commission is considering a new proposal to require the major EU institutions to consider the impact of changes they try to make to legislation.

The idea — part of Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker’s campaign to make regulation “smarter and better” — is included in a draft proposal for an agreement among the main EU institutions to do a better job of vetting legislation.

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According to the new document, obtained by POLITICO, the Parliament and the Council would be required to carry out their own impact assessments for any “substantive” amendments to the Commission’s proposals.

The Commission could provide the Council and Parliament with help on the impact assessments — by offering guidelines or research assistance — but some see this as another way for the Commission to muscle its way into the co-decision process.

As previously reported by POLITICO, the new proposal includes a “Regulatory Scrutiny Board,” a seven-member body that would assess any future EU regulation. Legislative proposals could move forward only after getting approval from the board.

The board — which would include three members from outside the EU institutions as well as one member each from the European Parliament and the Council — would publish on-line all of its impact assessments and would take a close look at the environmental and social impacts of any potential legislation.

The proposal builds on ideas put forward in a previous document that spelled out the main objectives of the Commission for the future of the EU decision-making.

“The Commission wants to cover its back,” said Paul de Clerck from Friends of the Earth, an environmental lobbying group. The proposal, he said, was intended to reduce “Commission bashing” by member states on the issue of cutting red tape.

The Commission has made the effort to streamline regulation a top priority.

“You know very well, if the Commission designs a horse, and then it goes through Parliament and the Council and out comes at the end a camel,” said Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans, earlier this spring, in support of the “better regulation” plan.

POLITICO Better Law Making Proposal Commission Leaked version May 2015