Opinion of the Committee of the Regions on: the "Report from the Commission Better Lawmaking 2002", and the "Communication from the Commission Updating and simplifying the Community acquis"
Date: 2003-11-20
Institutions: European Committee of the Regions
Subjects: Community acquis, drafting of EU law, simplification of legislation

C 73/38

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

23.3.2004

Opinion of the Committee of the Regions on:

— the ‘Report from the Commission “Better Lawmaking 2002”’, and

— the ‘Communication from the Commission “Updating and simplifying the Community

acquis”’

(2004/C 73/07)

THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS,

having regard to the decision of its Bureau of 8 April 2003, under the fifth paragraph of Article 265 of
the Treaty establishing the European Community, to instruct its Commission for Constitutional Affairs
and European Governance to draw up an opinion on the Report from the Commission ‘Better Lawmaking
2002’ and the Communication from the Commission ‘Updating and simplifying the Community acquis’
(COM(2002) 715 final and COM(2003) 71 final);

having regard to Article 5 of the EC Treaty and Amsterdam Protocol;

having regard to the draft Constitutional Treaty adopted by the Convention on the future of Europe and
presented to the President of the European Council in Rome on 18 July 2003 (CONV 850);

having regard to the Interinstitutional agreement on better lawmaking reached by the Council, the
Commission and the Parliament, announced by the European Council in Thessalonica on 20 June (see
point 49 of Council conclusions);

having regard to the European Commission Communication on ‘Updating and Simplifying the
Community acquis’ (COM(2003) 71 final and SEC(2003) 165);

having regard to the 10th report from the European Commission on ‘Better Lawmaking 2002’
(COM(2002) 715 final);

having regard to the European Commission ‘Action Plan: Simplifying and improving the regulatory
environment’ (COM(2002) 278 final);

having regard to the European Commission Communication on ‘impact assessment’ (COM(2002) 276
final);

having regard to the European Commission Communication on ‘European Governance: Better lawmaking’
(COM(2002) 275 final);

having regard to the European Parliament draft Report on simplifying and improving the regulatory
environment (A5-0443/2002);

having regard to the European Parliament report on Better Lawmaking 2000, 2001 (A5-0100/2003);

having regard to its opinion of 21 November 2002 on ‘Simplification of the Union’s Instruments’ (CdR
263/2002 fin) (1);

having regard to its opinion of 13 April 2000 on ‘Better lawmaking 1999’ (CdR 18/2000 fin) (2);

(1) OJ C 73, 26.3.2003, p. 73.
(2) OJ C 226, 8.8.2000, p. 60.

23.3.2004

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 73/39

having regard to its opinion of 15 September 1999 on ‘Better lawmaking 1998 — a shared responsibility’
(CdR 50/1999 fin) (1);

having regard to its opinion of 15 September 1999 on ‘Implementation of EU law by the regions and
local authorities’ (CdR 51/1999 fin) (2);

having regard to its opinion of 11 March 1999 on ‘Developing a genuine culture of subsidiarity. An
appeal by the Committee of the Regions’ (CdR 302/98 fin) (3);

having regard to its draft opinion (CdR 62/2003 rev. 2) adopted on 26 September 2003 by its
Commission for Constitutional Affairs and European Governance (rapporteur: Mr Gordon Keymer,
Leader of Tandridge District Council (UK-EPP),

adopted unanimously the following opinion at its 52th plenary session of 19 and 20 November 2003
(meeting of 20 November).

1. Views of the Committee of the Regions

The Committee of the Regions

1.5.
considers that all EU institutions, EU bodies and
national governments have a duty to respect the principles of
in order to ensure that
subsidiarity and proportionality,
decisions are taken as close to the citizen as possible, which in
many cases implies by local and regional authorities, taking as
a basis the European Charter of Local Self-Government;

welcomes the overall objectives of the Commission

1.1.
towards better law-making and simplification;

1.2.
reiterates its view that EU legislation should be clear,
easy to read, understandable and proportionate as to its
objectives. Above all, EU law should be relevant and necessary.
The CoR welcomes the fact that the draft Constitutional
Treaty proposes to significantly reduce the number of legal
instruments and simplifies the legal terms for the benefit of
European citizens;

1.3.
recalls Article 6 of the Protocol to the Treaty of
Amsterdam which states that ‘the Community shall only act
to the extent necessary’. Also Article 9 which requires that
any burden, financial or administrative, falling upon local
authorities, economic operators (etc.) ‘to be minimised and
proportionate as to the objective to be achieve’;

1.4.
considers that the CoR, as the EU body representing
local and regional government, is the natural champion of
subsidiarity, particularly in view of the draft Constitutional
Treaty extending subsidiarity to the local and regional spheres
of governance; as such has a legitimate role in monitoring the
application of subsidiarity and proportionality principles,
including recourse to the Court of Justice to bring actions in
the case of non-compliance with these principles;

welcomes Commission intentions to improve Celex
1.6.
and related information tools in order to make the active
acquis more accessible and so aid active involvement by
interest parties;

regrets that earlier attempts to simplify the regulatory
1.7.
environment (such as the 1996 SLIM initiative) appear to have
foundered, which is particularly unfortunate because the
accession countries are now faced with an unnecessarily
immense acquis of 97 000 pages;

1.8.
considers that deregulation and reduction of the finan-
cial and administrative burden of EU legislation, and a rigorous
cost-benefit analysis of legislation will
lead to direct cost-
saving for public authorities and businesses, and will free
scarce human and financial resources for more productive
activities. In this way, the EU can take a further step towards
its strategic goal of becoming the most competitive and
dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world;

(1) OJ C 374, 23.12.1999, p. 11.
(2) OJ C 374, 23.12.1999, p. 25.
(3) OJ C 198, 14.7.1999, p. 73.

considers that by consulting local and regional govern-
1.9.
ment in the early drafting stage of preparing legislation,
problems of implementation and financial or administrative
burden can be identified and resolved, thereby improving the
general quality, practicability and relevance of EU lawmaking;

C 73/40

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

23.3.2004

welcomes in general terms the piloting of Extended
1.10.
Impact Assessments during 2003. Nevertheless, whereas the
Impact Assessments are intended (inter alia) to assess com-
pliance with principles of subsidiarity and proportionality, the
CoR regrets that the reports published so far make little or no
reference to the impact on local or regional authorities, even
where these are likely to be the bodies ultimately responsible
for delivering or supporting the initiative.

recommends that future Commission reports on Better
2.6.
Lawmaking include an overview of Court of Justice rulings
during the period covered by the report on actions brought
for infringement of the subsidiarity principle;

2.7.
notwithstanding the commitment of the Commission
towards a new culture of impact assessment, the CoR calls for
a much-improved system within the Commission for assessing
the impact of proposed legislation, including the financial and
administrative burden falling on local and regional authorities
and other parties involved in implementing the measure; an
assessment of why non-regulatory action is deemed insuf-
ficient; and consideration of the option ‘not to act’. The impact
assessment should be dynamic — i.e. it should be updated
throughout the decision-making process to reflect changes
introduced by Council and Parliament, as recommended by
the Commission;

2.8.
calls for better consultation earlier in the policy-
making process. The CoR acknowledges recent initiatives by
the Commission in this area. The initial impact assessment
should accompany the consultation document
to inform
interested actors of the options, risks, costs, benefits and
affected parties;

2.9.
recommends that the rolling programme of simplifi-
cation and codification of existing legislation should include
highlighting future possibilities for repeal of obsolete or
excessively burdensome legislation, especially where alterna-
tives to legislation are known to exist. The CoR welcomes the
commitment in the 2002 Action Plan to including review or
‘sunset’ clauses in all new legal acts and calls for its comprehen-
sive application. The CoR undertakes to assist the Commission
in simplification of legislation impacting on local and regional
authorities;

2. Recommendations of the Committee of the Regions

The Committee of the Regions

2.1.
recommends greater use of alternatives to traditional
regulation, and non-regulatory measures should be thoroughly
considered; greater use should be made of mutual recognition
and approximation of national laws, rather than continuing
top-down regulation and harmonisation;

2.2.
recommends there should be benchmarking of regulat-
ory performance between administrations, such as Member
State governments and those of third countries, to maximise
learning from best practice wherever it exists;

2.3.
calls for improvements to the processes of transpo-
sition of European legislation by Member State governments,
including better domestic consultation of key stakeholders
including local and regional authorities and their associations.
Member States are urged to refrain from over-implementation
(‘gold-plating’);

2.4.
reiterates that the CoR should be given the right to
bring actions before the European Court of Justice for breaches
of subsidiarity as regards legislative acts on which it was
consulted, as indicated in the draft Treaty text prepared by the
Convention. However, this will have major implications for
the resources and internal organisation of the CoR itself;

2.5.
recommends that the CoR should be involved in
any subsidiarity ex-ante or ‘early-warning’ process alongside
national parliaments;

2.10.
recommends that a coherent screening system be
developed for checking whether subsidiarity has been applied
in specific cases. The system could also be used as the basis for
checking existing legislation in the context of updating and
simplifying the Community acquis, in order to abolish existing
provisions that violate the subsidiarity principle;

23.3.2004

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 73/41

recommends that ‘subsidiarity’ and ‘continuing rel-
2.11.
evance’ be included in the list of indicators for screening the
acquis for simplification;

recommends that consideration be given to creating
2.12.
an independent expert advisory group to monitor impact
assessments, assure objectivity and encourage good practice.

The group might comprise lawyers and practitioners from
relevant bodies, including the CoR, and would provide expert-
ise for the Commission in its systematic screening of legislative
proposals and assessments of the existing acquis with a view
to repeal, codification or simplification. The group could
include, or work in parallel with, advisors from the business
community, and would complement the political role of the
CoR during later phases of the decision-making process.

Brussels, 20 November 2003.

The President

of the Committee of the Regions

Albert BORE

Opinion of the Committee of the Regions on ‘The local and regional dimension of the Area of
Freedom, Security and Justice’

(2004/C 73/08)

THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS,

having regard to the decision by its Bureau on 1 July 2003 to instruct the Commission for Constitutional
Affairs and European Governance, in accordance with Article 256(5) of the Treaty establishing the
European Community, to draw up an opinion on ‘The local and regional dimension of the Area of
Freedom, Security and Justice’;

having regard to the conclusions of the Tampere, Laeken, Seville and Thessaloniki European Councils;

having regard to the Communication from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament:
Biannual update of the scoreboard to review progress on the creation of an area of ‘freedom, security and
justice’ in the European Union (first half 2003), COM(2003) 291, 22.5.2003;

having regard to the Communication from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament:
Biannual update of the scoreboard to review progress on the creation of an area of ‘freedom, security and
justice’ in the European Union (second half 2002), COM(2002) 738, 16.12.2002;

having regard to the European Parliament resolution on progress in 2002 in implementing an area of
freedom, security and justice (rapporteur: Baroness Sarah Ludford) (B5-0193/2003);