The European Union is contemplating strengthening its legislative scrutiny for more robust tech regulations. This move addresses concerns about the lack of transparency and consistency during the amendment phase of legislative proposals, aiming to ensure high-quality and durable regulation.
The EU is exploring ways to improve legislative scrutiny, particularly in the phase in which the European Parliament and the Council amend proposals from the European Commission. The focus is on enhancing transparency, preserving consistent objectives, and respecting core regulatory principles to ensure robust and enforceable tech regulations.
The legislative process within the EU is under scrutiny, especially due to transparency issues during the amendment stage. EU institutions and related stakeholders lack critical insights into significant changes made to legislative proposals. Proposals aim to open critical documents to public scrutiny, leverage external expertise, and mandate reviews for new concepts deviating from original initiatives. This enhanced scrutiny is expected to help balance information among stakeholders, avoid untested solutions, and prevent detrimental last-minute changes.
Consistency in objectives across various EU laws is crucial for effective legislation. The EU aims to listen to a broad range of stakeholders, including experts, academia, regulators, and industry participants, to align legislative goals. Conducting additional impact assessments for substantial changes and applying proportionality tests to proposed amendments are among the best practices being considered to maintain consistency. Such measures are vital to ensure that political agendas do not overshadow consumer interests and sound legislation goals.
Respecting core “better regulation” principles and horizontal goals is paramount for coherent laws. The EU emphasizes adhering to principles established by horizontal regulations like the Digital Services Act, which includes general monitoring bans. The focus is on creating sector-wide general rules, avoiding asymmetric regulations, and ensuring that legislation does not unfairly benefit specific companies or countries. This approach helps maintain the integrity and balance of the regulatory framework.
Concrete examples, such as the AI Act negotiations and the Digital Services Act, illustrate the consequences of poor legislative scrutiny and lack of transparency. Issues arose due to last-minute concept introductions without proper impact assessments. Similarly, inconsistent principles across the Digital Services Act and other product safety regulations demonstrated the need for maintaining consistent legislative objectives and principles.
Moving forward, the focus will be not just on legislative scrutiny but also on effective implementation and enforcement of new laws. Robust implementation mechanisms will ensure that even well-crafted legislation achieves its intended goals in practice, fostering innovation and digital competitiveness in Europe.
In summary, the EU’s exploration into enhancing legislative scrutiny aims to increase transparency, preserve consistent objectives, and respect better regulation principles. These efforts are expected to significantly improve the quality and longevity of EU tech regulations, supporting a more innovative and competitive digital landscape in Europe.
