Bid to simplify EU laws falls foul of legal pitfalls

Date: 22/02/1996

By Ole Ryborg

THE drive to simplify EU legislation and make it more accessible to citizens and businesses alike has run into a legal minefield.

The recent battle waged over the 'codification' of EU directives on textiles may appear, at first glance, to be a highly-technical subject unlikely to attract the interest of the general public. But so sensitive was this issue that it sparked a fierce debate within Coreper, the EU's Committee of permanent representatives, and resulted in negotiations which involved senior Danish politicians as well as diplomats.

Since the Edinburgh summit in December 1992, the Union has been working on a number of schemes to make complex EU laws easier to understand.

The simplifiers have been reasonably successful in achieving their objectives, according to a status report drawn up by the Commission for last December's EU summit in Madrid. But the report also indicated that the task was not easy and sometimes presented the drafters with difficult legal problems.

The simplification of EU law is carried out in different ways, depending on the type of legislation involved. The least controversial method is known as 'consolidation'. Under this process, the Commission groups all the legal acts that are linked together - such as all VAT texts - into one 'family'. The Commission has divided large sections of EU law into about 140 'families', covering a total of around 1,500 legal texts.

The other methods used to simplify EU laws - the so-called 'codification' and the real simplification processes - are more legally complex, as both require the adoption of new legislation to replace existing EU laws. Codification combines several acts into one, while simplification involves rewriting one single act which is considered difficult to read.

The recent dispute over textiles highlights the problems involved. In this case, the legal base of the directives was changed during the codification procedure from Article 100 to 100a. But this contravened the basic principle that the simplification process must not alter the legal situation. To resolve this dilemma, the Council of Ministers had to adopt a declaration stating explicitly that codification of the directives would not affect the legal position.

It was the declaration's wording which prompted protests from Copenhagen, amid fears it would undermine the 'environmental guarantee' contained in the Single European Act, which was instrumental in persuading Danish voters to support the act in a referendum in February 1986. The problem was eventually resolved after complex negotiations, but it highlighted the legal tightrope simplifiers walk.

By the end of last year, the Commission had adopted ten proposals for codification of EU laws covering almost 250 legal acts in areas ranging from dairy products, animal health and plants to telecommunications. These proposals all have to be discussed by the Council of Ministers.

In other areas, the Commission can act alone and has already done so by, for example, combining the 26 regulations on arable land into one single text.

A programme of the first EU laws to be simplified was presented at the Brussels summit in December 1993 and work has been proceeding ever since.

However, there is more to be done. Simplification has been carried out in one language, and must now be translated into all official languages. The Commission's programme for 1996 also identifies several new initiatives which are currently under way, with rules on fertilisers, machines, technical standards, dangerous substances and CAP financing due for simplification this year.