Claudia Bauer, Austria’s Europe Minister, has put forward a “Year of Simplification” after eleven EU member states called for a twelve-month pause on new EU laws. “We cannot always submit new legislative proposals if existing rules have not yet been fully implemented,” Bauer said.
The group comprises Austria, Germany, Italy, Poland, Denmark, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Lithuania, Portugal, and Hungary.
Its proposal would have Brussels spend the period reviewing the regulations already in force and concentrating on their implementation instead of bringing forward new laws.
The pause is presented as a temporary exercise to clean up the existing rulebook, rather than a lasting halt to EU lawmaking.
Under the proposed framework, future legislation would face stricter examination before adoption. Officials would consider whether a proposed rule was necessary and whether it would strengthen European economic competitiveness.
New regulations would then be subject to an impact assessment every five years.
The European Commission has already launched omnibus packages intended to simplify existing rules and reduce administrative burdens.
Bauer said the coalition supported those packages, while arguing that simplification should happen before legislation takes effect. “What we're doing now is mostly retroactive simplification. We fully support the Commission's omnibus packages, but it must not become standard for us to have new laws and then a whole series of further acts to simplify them. Simplification should begin before laws are passed.”
The supporters have sought to distinguish their plan from a wider removal of EU regulation. A draft discussion paper describes the effort this way: “Such an effort should not be viewed as deregulation, but as an exercise in legislative deep cleaning”.
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