Respect for private life and protection of personal data in electronic communications

These Briefings are prepared by the Ex-Ante Impact Assessment Unit of the European Parliament for the relavent EP Committee(s) examining the European Commission proposal. The Briefing analyses whether the principal criteria laid down in the Commission’s own Better Regulation Guidelines, as well as additional factors identified by the Parliament in its Impact Assessment Handbook, appear to be met by the IA. It does not attempt to deal with the substance of the proposal. It is drafted for informational and background purposes to assist the relevant parliamentary committee(s) and Members of the European Parliament more widely in their work.Overall the Impact Assessment (IA) report makes a good presentation of theEuropean Commission's impact assessment work for the legislative proposal. The IA draws on a vast amount of research and expertise in elaborating the policy options and linking them to the main problems. Also, the range of policy options appears comprehensive.

However, a more thorough analysis of the social and fundamental rights impacts would have considerably strengthened the report. In particular, as confidentiality remains a sensitive issue in this field, the IA report could have gone into more depth on this issue, especially when comparing the options. In addition, more attention could have been dedicated to developing clearer monitoring and evaluation indicators.

EP: EPRS: Briefing: Implementation Appraisal: Ex-ante Impact Assessment http://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en/search.html?policyAreas=EXIMAS

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