The EU’s internal market ministers meet again on Thursday 7 March to discuss the EU’s competitiveness. With this in mind, they will examine the Commission’s annual report on the internal market and competitiveness, published in February (see EUROPE 13350/5). Current legislative dossiers relating to the internal market and industry will also be discussed, but no decisions will be adopted at this session.
In March 2023, European leaders expressed the wish to have a report on the consolidated internal market at the beginning of each year, which could be discussed by ministers at the March Competitiveness Council. This year, the Commission’s report on the internal market includes new indicators, which the ministers will be able to examine and comment on.
The Belgian Presidency of the EU Council put three questions to the ministers for this meeting: - What are the main competitive factors and ways of improving the annual report?; - How can we strengthen our strategic autonomy without distorting the single market?; - What new areas should the Single Market Enforcement Taskforce (SMET) focus on?
In the public session, ministers will discuss the proposed regulation on late payments. If they fail to adopt a position, they will debate several specific points suggested by the Belgian Presidency: the choice of instrument (regulation or directive), the 30-day period for payments proposed by the Commission, and control mechanisms.
In the European Parliament, the Committee on Internal Market has delayed its vote on this text due to last-minute disagreements (see EUROPE 13356/2).
Thursday’s meeting will also be an opportunity to take stock of three recent provisional agreements reached between the European Parliament and the Council: on the regulation banning products derived from forced labour (see EUROPE 13364/7), on the directive introducing corporate due diligence obligations (see EUROPE 13360/19) and on the internal market emergency and resilience act (‘IMERA’) (see EUROPE 13341/10).
Discussions are particularly eagerly awaited on the corporate due diligence directive, after the Member States rejected the text on 28 February (see EUROPE 13360/19). Since then, the Belgian Presidency has stepped up its contacts with the Member States, as well as the European Parliament, to see what changes could be made to the text, but “there are pressures and wishes in both directions”, according to a European source. On Wednesday 6 March, several NGOs demonstrated outside the permanent representations of France, Luxembourg and Finland to call on these countries to vote in favour of the provisional agreement.
According to two sources, the Belgian Presidency wants to put the text back on the agenda of Member States’ representatives to the EU on Friday 8 March.
Other issues on the ministers’ agenda include the European Agenda for Tourism 2030, the strategy for the maritime sector, state aid rules and medicine shortages.
To close their meeting, ministers will have lunch on the theme of the future of industrial policy. The discussion should feed into the future conclusions on the subject, which are due to be adopted in May.
Ministers are also expected to adopt the Commission’s proposal for a coordinated withdrawal from the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT) (see other news). (Original version in French by Léa Marchal)