Commission Vice-President Günter Verheugen faced questions from member states concerning his plans for reducing the administrative burden on businesses, during discussions in the Competitiveness Council on 4 December.

Many of the questions raised related to the commissioner’s proposed target that this administrative burden should be cut by 25% by 2012. Although most member states which took the floor could support the target in principle, practical details were highlighted by a range of delegations that still need to be resolved - mainly relating to how the level of burden can be calculated, and also whether the target will be the same for every member state.

On this last point, the Irish delegation expressed strong reservations as regards the establishment of a ‘one-size-fits-all’ target across the EU, while French Minister François Loos suggested that perhaps each member state could be allowed to set its own. Similar reservations about a uniform 25% target for every country were expressed by Latvia and Lithuania.

ACROSS THE BOARD

In his intervention, Verheugen made it clear that this 25% figure is “an across the board EU target,” meaning it would not apply uniformly to each country. He also noted that the cut would not apply to the same degree across different business sectors. He reiterated a point he has made previously that, should his target be achieved, it would lead to an increase of 1.5% in the EU’s GDP.

The proposal is contained in a ‘Strategic review of Better Regulation in the European Union,’ adopted by the European Commission on 14 November, which was presented to the Council by the commissioner prior to the exchange of views. In addition to the 25% target, which Verheugen hopes will be adopted by the 2007 Spring European Council, the strategic review also sets out a list of 47 legislative initiatives to be undertaken in 2007 in order to simplify existing EU regulation. The contents of this list generally found support from Council, although there were specific criticisms from France, which identified several which it felt went beyond the scope of simplification. The German delegation noted that it was important, in any case, to recognise that “simplification does mean removing certain rules, creating gaps in legislation,” and as a result “it is something which is not without cost”.

The Council also took note of a progress report on ‘better regulation’ prepared by the Finnish EU Presidency, and gave their views on the question of what steps could be taken to speed up the decision-making process in the EU on simplification proposals. The discussion showed that delegations are divided on how to proceed, with some member states backing the introduction of specific new procedures in Council for the adoption of simplification measures, and others opposed.