Ursula von der Leyen, Act 2. Would we have changed the president of the European Commission? The one that is said to be locked up in its Brussels bubble would have finally found the user manual of a less disconnected Europe and more attentive to its states and its companies? On February 26, the German leader is preparing to present legislation – baptized Omnibus – which will undo what she had patiently built during her first mandate. Namely, getting rid of part of the environmental texts adopted by the European Parliament of their batch of absurdia and bureaucratic tinters. Ecolos, who have still not understood how companies work, are already in PLS. And yet, this new legislation, claimed in Cor and Cri by all European employers, but also by a majority of governments, is welcome: there was an emergency! Europe dies slowly smothered by its regulatory machine, which costs it, according to Mario Draghi, almost 10 % of the potential of its GDP.
The CSRS (extra-financial reporting) or the CS3D (duty of vigilance of companies) will finally be purged by part of their constraints. The president of a French industrial group recently explained that they were so high that it had been necessary to mobilize part of the research and development team to provide the 1,200 indicators required in the document. The administrator of another tricolor flag tells that he had to claim a summary of ten pages of the famous CSRD report, as it was thick and indigestible. And for those who doubt the good faith of business leaders, we must listen to the recent hearing of Florent Menegaux, the president of Michelin, before the senators: with calm and method, the industrialist does not mise his words to describe Europe’s “administrative nightmare”.
Less stinging directives
In Paris, Brussels or Berlin, the message has passed, and if Ursula von der Leyen 1 was the first to defend the Green Pact, Ursula von der Leyen 2 now has only one word to the mouth: competitiveness. Even the European compass has become that of competitiveness. But beware, there is no question of deregulating (a term that is reserved for the Trumpian administration): it is a question of simplifying.
France, no doubt to make us forget that it too has worked a lot to support the Green Pact and its administrative artillery, is now the first to claim a “massive regulatory break”. Between simplification and suspension, green guidelines should seem less utinatic user, even if, swear the supporters of this new policy, there is no question of questioning their objectives. “Each revolution evaporates by leaving only behind the deposit of a new bureaucracy,” wrote Franz Kafka. Europe is now busy cleaning it.