On Monday 10 January the rapporteur in the European Parliament for the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), Pascal Durand (Renew Europe, France), summarised the different positions of the groups on his report.
This text aims to modify the reporting obligations of companies in order to have better visibility of their environmental performance.
The rapporteur notes a “general agreement” on the proposal made by the European Commission in April 2021 (see EUROPE 12703/10) despite the 600 or so amendments.
Scope
MEPs are divided primarily on the scope of the directive, i.e. which companies will be covered. The EPP and the ID group believe that SMEs should not be included in the text. “We are very concerned about the administrative and financial burden of this project. This would put a strain on SMEs”, worried Daniel Buda (EPP, Romania).
Pascal Durand supports the approach proposed by the Commission, which only includes certain SMEs, such as those listed on regulated markets (with the exception of micro-enterprises).
For the S&D, The Left and Greens/EFA groups, however, the scope of the Commission’s proposal should be broadened to include SMEs, “especially in certain high-risk sectors”, said Marie Toussaint (Greens/EFA, France).
However, the groups agree on the rapporteur’s proposal to include non-EU companies operating in the internal market in order to avoid unfair competition.
The objectives of the CSRD are similar to those of the forthcoming regulation on corporate due diligence. Some MEPs, such as Lara Wolters (S&D, Netherlands), regretted having to work on this directive without knowledge of the European Commission’s proposal on due diligence. The Commission postponed its publication from December 2021 to February 2022.
See the draft report by Pascal Durand: https://bit.ly/3HVdF4V (Original version in French by Léa Marchal)