Brussels, 14/10/2014 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission has enough substance with which to develop its thoughts on reducing the administrative burden. The president of the high level group charged with this specific task, Dr Edmund Stoiber, formulated his recommendations on Tuesday 14 October to Jose Manuel Barroso and suggests continuing to streamline the EU's legislative arsenal. A lot of these recommendations, however, have left a bitter taste in the mouths of representatives from civil society.
Doctor Stoiber's recommendations. The European Commission can now congratulate itself on having reduced administrative costs by 27% in around 10 different areas. This approach will allow for savings of €33.4 billion to be made for European businesses. The Stoiber Report was presented during a European conference on “smart regulation” and provides ways forward to the next European Commission of further continuing this trajectory.
The main recommendation made consist in drawing up a net administrative costs reductions target and annually publishing the costs and benefits generated by any new legislation. Stoiber suggested that they needed to reduce administrative charges by a further 10% over the next two or three years. He stated,“ we need new legislation, obviously, but when this is being adopted, policies should say 'yes' to a little more bureaucracy but also how it can be reduced”. The high level group is effectively recommending to compensate any new charges incurred by businesses due to European laws by getting rid of other charges. The President of the Commission, José Manuel Barroso, explained that European legislation often replaced the 28 other national texts and that the harmonisation “should be appreciated”.
Before introducing new legislation, Stoiber and his team are also recommending that the European institutions keep in mind the political goal of the legislation in question and how the administrative burden can be reduced by it. They are therefore suggesting that an independent body is set up to assess these costs. Barroso is not very supportive of this and believes that “independent” impact assessment systems function well and that a new body would be in danger of being taken over by different interests.
Both Stoiber and Barroso believe that the EU should be open about the main challenges and more discreet about those of less importance. This should stem from joint responsibility and the credibility of the European project, they point out.
Not the right remedy for the environment, consumers, health or workers
Less bureaucracy, yes, more deregulation, no. Four out of the 15 high-level group members (and not non-important ones either): representatives from the T&E, BEUC, EPHA, ETUC, are afraid that if the recommendations from the 'Stoiber' report are applied by the future 'Juncker' Commission, it will mean sacrificing the general interest on the altar of industrial interests.
They are convinced that reducing the total costs of regulation for industry will be done to the disadvantage of public health protection, workers' safety and the environment and they criticised the report for prescribing, “the wrong medicine”. This explains the dissident opinion they immediately put forward.
Foodstuff labelling, instructions on medicines, environmental and ecological labelling, transparency obligation costs for financial services and the obligation of informing workers of their rights are also “administrative charges” but the group recommending them does not refer very much to the benefits of such “charges”, as pointed out by the representatives from consumer defence organisations, environmental activists, patients and trade unions. This is why they oppose setting out a new net regulatory cost reduction target; compensation for “charges” related to new legislative texts by getting rid of existing “charges”; the idea of exempting SMEs from EU requirements. The European Environmental Bureau (EEB) Policy Director Pieter de Pous said that, “by promoting deregulation as a recipe for more jobs and growth, this group has entered the realm of fact-free policy-making. These recommendations would take EUROPE 30 years back in time and would only improve its popularity among yesterday's' business lobbyists, not its citizens and its forward-looking industry”.
Heidi Ronne, the ETUC representative, said that she supported getting rid of worthless regulation but, “To do that you need to identify what is unnecessary. I firmly oppose any general commitment or arbitrary target that puts at risk sensible health, safety and environmental protection”. Monique Goyens, the director general of the European Consumer Bureau (BEUC) stressed that, “Consumer organisations do not oppose efforts to “better regulate” if it leads to efficient laws working to the benefit of all EU citizens”. Peggy Maguire from the European Public Health Alliance stated, “'Soft' voluntary measures do little if anything for public health”. (MD/AN)