The Council of the EU is set to adopt its position on the revision of the Directive on the availability of common chargers, in particular for mobile phones, on the radio equipment market (Universal Charger Directive) on Wednesday 26 January, while the European Parliament begins legislative work this week for a vote in committee on 20 April.
In the EU Council, the negotiation work progressed rapidly following the presentation of the initiative by the European Commission (see EUROPE 12797/1) and was concluded by the French Presidency of the EU Council after eight working group meetings, seven of which were held under the Slovenian Presidency of the EU Council.
Member States have therefore strengthened the information provided to consumers by adding visual elements, but they also wished to provide a better framework for the delegation of power to adapt technical specifications.
On the issue of visual elements, delegations stressed the importance of linguistic neutrality, in this case in part III of the annex dedicated to the pictogram indicating whether or not a battery is sold with the electronic device and in part IV dedicated to the label indicating the specifications relating to charging capacities and compatible chargers in order to best guide consumers.
The delegation of power to the European Commission (Recital 9 and Article 1) was also the subject of negotiations, as several Member States wanted clearer specification of the framework within which the European institution may make technical adaptations, particularly in the absence of a European or international standard.
On the European Parliament side, slower work, but greater ambition
Legislative work has been slower on the side of the European Parliament. The report by Alex Saliba (S&D, Malta) was published on Thursday 20 January. Negotiations with the shadow rapporteurs start this week. The vote in the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection (IMCO) is scheduled for 20 April.
The negotiation work could go quickly, thanks to a fairly high degree of convergence between the main political groups on the key issues (scope, wireless charging, consumer information).
As anticipated (see EUROPE 12845/7), the rapporteur suggests extending the scope to small and medium-sized electronic devices (such as e-books, mice, smartwatches, etc.), but also introducing minimum requirements for wireless charging to avoid market fragmentation by 31 December 2025.
Furthermore, the rapporteur wants to make the decoupling of the sale of an electronic device from the charger the default, by strengthening consumer communication (he also proposes a pictogram). He also introduced enhanced market surveillance and reduced transposition deadlines.
To read the EU Council’s draft mandate: https://bit.ly/33GF0cG
For the report by Mr Saliba: https://bit.ly/32reH9y (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)