The Institute for Impact Assessment and Scientific Evaluation of Policy and Legislation
January 20th 2020
Between January 2018 and December 2019, 1,779 implementing directives and regulations have been published, according to the European Commission’s comitology webpage.
The following is a summary of our observations:
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Among these 1,779 implementing acts, 30 contain at least 100 pages and another 63 contain at least 50 pages. Page length is an indication of the extent and complexity of the legislative act, although we do not infer any direct correlation to impact.
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Almost half of the acts (863 out of 1,779) were published since June 2019.
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Through a search of the European Commission’s impact assessment database, twelve implementing regulations out of the 1,779 implementing regulations and directives were accompanied by impact assessments. In each case the impact assessments were published at the same time as the final implementing act itself, therefore preventing full scrutiny of the evidence by stakeholders before adoption.
To inform our analysis further, stakeholders are hence invited to provide expert input and arguments on any implementing acts whose impacts are substantial enough to have required an impact assessment.
What about Impact Assessment for implementing acts?
Regulation subject matter and link
Ecodesign requirements for:
- Washing machines / washer-dryers
- Refrigerating appliances with a direct sales function
- Electric motors and variable speed drives
- Light sources and separate control gears
Trans fat, other than trans fat naturally occurring in fat of animal origin
Ecodesign requirements for servers and data storage products
REACH: nano forms of substances
Comment
All Impact Assessments published on same date as final adoption of act. In some cases, one or more Inception Impact Assessment(s) had been previously published. In other cases they were not, providing as a rationale that “the initiative predates the requirement”. In the latter case, there has been no publication of assessed impacts before the act’s adoption.
Impact Assessment published on same date as final adoption of act.
There was no publication of assessed impacts before the act’s adoption.
Impact Assessment published on same date as final adoption of act.
The Inception Impact Assessment of June 2017 proposed high level regulatory and non-regulatory options, referring to the detailed analysis planned in the full Impact Assessment. The final Impact Assessment itself was not shared before adoption of the act.
Impact Assessment published on same date as final adoption of act. A draft Impact Assessment was published in July 2018, after Committee adoption but before final adoption of the act. It is understood that the Impact Assessment was shared with a stakeholder group well in advance of the Committee adoption.
Committee
adoption
Between 17/12/2018
and
29/01/2019
7/12/2018
17/09/2018
26/04/2018
Final adoption and Impact Assessment
All published on 1/10/2019
24/4/2019
15/03/2019
03/12/2018