Brussels, 06/12/2001 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday, the European Commission endorsed a Communication aiming to launch a debate with the other institutions and Member States on simplifying and improving the regulatory environment. It believes it is essential to cut back on the volume of texts in the acquis without, however, deciding whether this cut-back should automatically apply to all policies. The Commission is also proposing to set up an "internal legislative network" to consider whether texts meet subsidiarity and proportionality rules. The consultation document may be presented to the Brussels-Laeken European Council. Based on the reactions of Council and Parliament to the Communication and the broader consultation on the White Paper on European Governance, the Commission will publish a detailed action plan in June 2002 for simplifying and improving the regulatory environment (see EUROPE of 23 November, p.9 on the Kaufmann report to the European Parliament).
The Communication identifies four priority areas:
- Simplifying the Community acquis. Since the exiting methods (consolidation, codification, recasting and simplifying) and activities carried out in recent years (the SLIM initiative) have not been very convincing, the Commission is proposing that together the institutions define an integrated programme to simplify the Community acquis in order to significantly cut (by at least 25% if possible) the volume of existing texts by 2005. In parallel, the Commission will take a decision to withdraw a number of proposals from before 1999 which are still on the drawing board in order to slim down the legislative system by removing obsolete proposals.
- Improving the quality of legislation. To answer criticisms about the preparation and basis of proposals, the Commission wants to step up consultations and prior impact studies and start thinking the best way of using the available instruments (making a better distinction between regulations and directives and a tighter definition of "coregulation").
- New culture within the institutions. The Commission would like to create an internal legislative network to promote good practice and apply the quality legislation arrangements that are decided upon in interinstitutional dialogue. The network would determine initiatives that fail to meet subsidiarity and proportionality criteria at the stage of drawing up draft legislation. The Commission is proposing that the Secretary General be in change of running the network and letting the College know which proposals are believed to potentially violate one of the aforementioned principles.
- Better transposition. The Commission calls on political leaders in the Member States to pledge to "loyally" transpose Community legislation "in the allotted timespan" in order to meet the target set by the Lisbon European Council. In this connection, it is also suggesting that states appoint representatives to manage the transposition and application of Community law.
