Hungary has failed to adopt promised rule of law reforms, the European Commission decided on Wednesday, putting billions of EU dollars for the country at risk.

The determination comes as Brussels tussles with Viktor Orbán’s government over the release of €7.5 billion in regular EU payments and €5.8 billion in recovery grants in the event of a pandemic – money the EU has temporarily frozen due to democratic backsliding issues in Hungary.

As the Commission on Wednesday recommended approving Hungary’s plan to spend its stimulus funds, it was clear the country wouldn’t get the money until it implemented 27 upgrades. specific to the rule of law.

In the meantime, the Commission has also concluded that Hungary has failed to deliver on its earlier commitment to adopt 17 rule of law reforms needed to access the €7.5 billion in EU funds, which are blocked under a mechanism allowing the EU to freeze funds at risk of corruption.

EU countries will decide whether to adopt, modify or reject the Commission ruling by December 19.

The move is something of a surprise. As recently as last week, Brussels and Budapest were expected to reach an agreement on releasing the money. But Wednesday’s decision appears to be a little more nuanced – giving the go-ahead for a spending plan but not the money, blaming Hungary for failing to deliver on earlier promises and essentially pushing it on EU countries to make one last call.

Commission President Ursula von der Leyen met with key commissioners on Wednesday to finalize this way forward. Their recommendation will have to be formalized next week by the entire College of Commissioners.

On Wednesday, the Commission was particularly critical of Hungary’s new “integrity authority”, questioning its power and independence, as well as Budapest’s progress on commitments on asset declaration rules and the ability to review the decision of a prosecutor on whether to pursue a case.

Brussels also presented a new list of 27 reforms, or “super milestones”, that Hungary must adopt to receive its 5.8 billion euros in pandemic recovery funds. The 27 reforms include the 17 previous commitments agreed by the two parties during their discussions on the preservation of the 7.5 billion euros. Other conditions include the realization of the judicial reforms promised by Hungary, as well as the adoption of rules for auditing and reporting on EU funds.

Once the Commission formally adopts its decisions next week, it will be up to the Council of the EU to support or reject them by qualified majority – comprising 55% of EU countries and 65% of the population – what should happen at a conference of finance ministers. Meet.

The exact date of this meeting is still unclear, as the one initially scheduled for December 6 may be too early for countries to go through national parliamentary procedures. Thus, the Czech Presidency of the Council could schedule another ministerial meeting later in December.

Approval of Hungary’s plan and corresponding liquidity is crucial for a number of top EU priorities, including an €18 billion aid package for Ukraine and a global agreement on a minimum rate corporate tax, all of which Hungary has blocked.

Beverage sectors fear that the European Commission’s new proposal on packaging legislation is misguided by focusing their sectors almost exclusively on reusable packaging at the expense of recycling systems, rather than adopting a holistic approach combining the two .

Pierre-Olivier Bergeron is the general secretary of Brasseurs d’Europe. Milica Jevtic is the General Secretary of the European Association of Cider and Fruit Wines (AICV). Wouter Lox is the Secretary General of the European Fruit Juice Association (AIJN). Patricia Fosselard, General Secretary of Natural Mineral Waters Europe. Nicholas Hodac is the Managing Director of UNESDA Soft Drinks Europe.

Our sectors (beers, ciders, fruit juices, natural mineral waters and soft drinks) have been pioneers in the progress towards environmental sustainability. We are strongly committed to creating a circular economy for our beverage packaging, by reducing, recycling and reusing it. This is a complex task for almost every business.

We support ambitions to increase reuse. It should be part of the EU’s strategy to reduce packaging waste, but it should complement the efforts already made – and still to be continued – to reduce and recycle packaging, and it should make it possible to adapt to changing local contexts and emerging evidence.

We are therefore deeply concerned that the European Commission’s proposed revision of the European Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive (PPWD) could open a dramatic and discriminatory new path for our beverages, singling out our sectors and defining reusable packaging as essentially our only path to packaging.

Unintended consequences for recycling

This approach will be disastrous not only for companies in our sectors, but also for all existing recycling systems that work well. The huge investments made in recent years will have to be reduced or reversed to achieve circularity in our packaging. Ultimately, it will make our journey towards greater environmental sustainability longer and more complex, with no guarantee of success.

Recycling and reusing are different routes to the same goal. Both can contribute to the circularity of packaging, reduced use of virgin materials and a lower environmental footprint compared to the status quo. We should not, a priori, favor reuse over recycling, especially when the relative environmental impact varies depending on multiple factors. Although there are situations and conditions where reuse is preferable and already works well, it is not necessarily better than recycling. Impact assessments have not established that high reuse targets at all levels will have a positive impact on the environment in all cases and for all packaging. Context is key.

When assessing the environmental impact of reusable beverage packaging, many factors come into play, such as the resources needed to produce reusable packaging, the extent to which consumer behavior will change to ensure that the containers are actually reused, the carbon footprint related to the transport of returnable bottles and crates, and the energy required to wash the packaging before reusing it. Impacts will differ between categories – for example, legislation requires natural mineral water to be bottled at source, which limits flexibility in production and logistics.

Let’s ensure a level playing field for our drinks

If the European Commission’s proposals only proposed reuse targets within the beverage industry, this would also be discriminatory and show a complete disregard for all the pioneering circularity efforts that our sectors are already relying on.

When it comes to setting reuse targets and obligations for beverages, it would also be incomprehensible and unacceptable to the beer and cider sectors if exemptions were a priori granted for the other sectors of alcoholic beverages.

Prevent the use of more virgin materials

Overambitious reuse targets can also, in some cases, increase the amount of virgin material on the market, especially in the transition phase. Much heavier, reusable beverage containers, durable enough to survive multiple trips along the reuse chain, will be needed to store the sector.

Reuse systems can also lead to logistical bottlenecks because they depend on the efficient return of packaging by consumers and retailers. As producers wait for the containers to return, more packaging is needed to fill the gap, necessarily requiring more raw materials for their production.

As for metal cans, the preferred packaging for many small producers and nomadic consumers, they are infinitely recyclable but do not currently exist in a reusable form. Other materials would be needed to replace them if too high reuse targets were to be met for all types of beverage packaging.

A heavy economic blow for thousands of businesses

Policy makers should recognize that overambitious reuse targets could be economically ruinous for thousands of businesses in our sectors. Achieving new reuse targets is not a minor adjustment, but a complete change in business model and production processes for many producers, especially SMEs. For example, a PwC report commissioned by UNESDA found that moving towards a 20% market share of reusable PET bottles by 2030 would cost EU soft drink manufacturers €19 billion. euros.

SMEs, already squeezed by inflation and high energy costs, simply do not have the resources to commit to such massive investments in such a short time. There are thousands of SMEs in our supply chains that sell locally, often in rural areas, with a single packaging line. Thousands of jobs in local communities are at stake.

This discriminatory, disproportionate and misplaced targeting of our channels would be a bitter pill to swallow even if it were the only path to sustainable packaging. But it’s not. The Commission’s draft plan is currently to require our sectors to get involved in a single policy measure while ignoring the progress made in recycling and the effectiveness of many systems already in place to collect and recycle our packaging. It does not mean anything.

Necessary ambition but the right ambition

We do not advocate the absence of ambition. In fact, the opposite is true. We are leaders in sustainability packaging and advocating for the core vision of the EU Green Deal to be delivered: ambitious, evidence-based policy measures that support sustainable, meaningful growth and jobs for our environment.

We know that a combined approach including reduce, reuse and recycle works. Reusable drink wrappers aren’t the only way.

There is a better way, based on the combination of all available solutions, which is already leading to the circularity of our beverage packaging. It must not be mined. We therefore look forward to a favorable and reasonable proposal from the European Commission.

This press release was issued by APO. Content is not vetted by the African Business editorial team and none of the content has been checked or validated by our editorial teams, proofreaders or fact checkers. The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this announcement.

While the basic principles of the Opinion “stay healthy“, the Commission proposed several important revisions to the opinion of “adapt it to the evolution of the practice of the Commission, to the case law of the courts of the EU as well as to the new realities of the market.” Overall, therefore, the update aims to codify the Commission’s existing practice and recent judgments of the Court, rather than bringing about a profound change in the way the Commission will assess future cases. Nonetheless, this is a very important development that will spark heated debate within the competition law bar in Brussels and beyond.

The updated notice includes a litany of proposed developments, but the most important categories relate to digital markets and global trade, and have featured prominently in a slew of major cases in recent years.

First, with regard to digital markets, in the 25 years since the Opinion was first published, the proliferation of e-commerce has led to significant challenges for product market definition purposes, including with respect to zero-cost services and “multi-sided” services. platforms. The updated opinion reflects how the Commission has developed its practice in these respects, particularly in the following way:

• The opinion highlights the importance of two issues that have been particularly important in this area: (1) forward-looking assessments and the role of potential competition, which frequently generate debate in rapidly changing markets; and (2) non-price competition, particularly in innovation and product quality.
• The opinion acknowledges the difficulty of using the “SSNIP” test (which assesses the propensity of customers to switch companies in response to a small but significant and non-transitory price increase) for zero-priced services. He notes that the Commission can use a wider range of evidence, including a new “SSNDQ” test (which assesses customer behavior in response to a small but significant and non-transitory drop in quality), which has been confirmed by the General Court of the European Union in its recent judgment android judgement. (Google v CommissionCase T‑604/18, paragraphs 174-181.)
• The Communication sets out the Commission’s approach to market definition with regard to multi-sided platforms. This aims, where appropriate, to take into account the indirect interactions between the different facets of the platform, allowing the assessment of each facet of the platform in isolation or a holistic assessment of the products offered by the platform as a whole.

Second, with regard to global trade, an increasing number of competition cases have focused on the extent to which importers constrain EU companies. Despite protests from many merging companies in Europe, the Commission has shown resilience in distinguishing between EU and ex-EU players for the purpose of defining geographic markets in many sectors. The updated advisory continues this trend: “the mere existence or possibility of imports in a given geographical area does not necessarily lead to widening the scope of the geographical market to the area of ​​origin of the imports”. This does not mean that the Commission will disregard the presence of the imports concerned, but it regularly distinguishes between the nature of the constraint imposed between EU and ex-EU producers.

As indicated, many of these proposals in the draft communication reflect the current practice of the Council. Nevertheless, the update is an important moment in the evolution of EU competition law, and we anticipate a lively debate in the months to come. Companies wishing to comment on the Commission’s proposals can do so by clicking here; and we are more than happy to discuss any aspect of the review that interests you.

The deadline for public comment is January 13, 2023. We will continue to follow developments with great interest and provide further updates.

The European Commission’s reputation for using gibberish is second to none – and now the data confirms that perception.

The verdict is in from an analysis of 45,000 press releases: The Commission keeps things complicated, even compared to other governments.

This not only makes life more difficult for journalists, argues the author of the article, Christian Rauh of the WZB Center for Social Sciences in Berlin. It is also a political problem. The incomprehensible communications leave plenty of room for Eurosceptics and national politicians who want to blame Brussels for providing their own translations.

“Technocratic communication thus too easily plays into the hands of those who want to build the image of a Brussels elite detached from the European citizen,” writes Rauh in the Journal of European Integration.

Rauh analyzed data from 35 years of English press releases from the Commission, examining factors such as grammatical complexity and jargon.

For comparison, he also consulted newspapers, political science summaries and communications from the Irish and British governments. While it’s no surprise that the Commission has been more technical than the tabloids, national governments have also scored better on accessible language using normal words (eliminating the excuse that the Commission has to have looks geeky because it deals with technical policy issues).

On a measure of ease of reading texts, only political scientists scored lower than the Commission (as shown in the graph above). And when it comes to jargon, the Commission’s communicators have even outstripped the academics.

Some of this is intentional, Rauh notes. Messages on ‘…flexibility in state aid rules…’ for example, are about thorny talks with capitals, and ‘trilogues’, of course, are about talking to the European Parliament and the Council of the EU (or, to put it bluntly, national politicians), and the Commission often finds it difficult not to irritate capitals publicly while contentious issues are dealt with in private.

Looking at the amount of communications between 1985 and 2020, Rauh found that the volume of press releases per month had reached around 150 in the early 2000s, under Commission President Romano Prodi, with similar levels during both terms. by Jose Manuel Barroso.

However, the head of the first “Political Commission”, Jean-Claude Juncker, oversaw a sharp drop, down to around 50 press releases per month during his five-year term ending in 2019. (The trend of ‘Ursula von der Leyen as President of the Commission seemed to go back in the analysis of press releases until 2020.)

November 3, 2022

Click for PDF

Summary

• On October 25, 2022, the European Commission (“the Commission”) issued guidance to clarify and modernize its Leniency Notice for companies seeking cartel protection.

• These measures demonstrate the Commission’s continued commitment to enforcing its anti-cartel laws by encouraging potential whistleblowers to come forward.

• The Commission’s guidance includes the possibility for companies to inquire anonymously whether they can benefit from the leniency programme, which will be beneficial for companies involved in behavior outside the traditional scopes of the Commission, such as non-poaching or other novel behavior.

• The Commission has also created the new role of leniency officer as a point of contact for potential leniency applicants to obtain “informal adviceand discuss the leniency process.

• These new tools are likely to prove useful in assessing and managing legal risk when considering potential leniency applications.

Background

The fight against cartels remains a top priority for the Commission. Last year alone, the Commission adopted ten cartel decisions with total fines of around €1.8 billion, the highest cumulative fines since 2016.

The Commission said it was committed to aggressively pursuing cartel cases and building on its recent successes. On October 22, 2021, Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager said that “cartels are the most fundamental threat to competition […] thus, since the beginning of the EU, the fight against cartels has been at the top of the Commission’s priorities.”[1]

The leniency program has been a key tool for the Commission’s cartel enforcement over the years – with many cartels uncovered because companies self-reported the behavior and applied for immunity. Yet the Commission has seen a decline in the number of leniency applications in recent years.

In response to this recent decline, the Commission has actively considered changes to make its leniency program more attractive to potential claimants, including protecting the immunity claimant from subsequent claims for damages.[2] or provide clearer guidance to companies involved in non-traditional cartels (such as no-poaching cartels).

The Commission published guidance on 25 October 2022 which adopts several changes to its leniency program and offers clarification to potential applicants on how the program works in practice. In many ways, the Commission’s new guidance draws on Frequently Asked Questions (“FAQs”) published by the U.S. Department of Justice, which have successfully provided clarification of DOJ practices and procedures for implementation of its corporate leniency policy over the past 25 years. .

The Commission’s guidance is part of a broader effort by competition authorities, such as the Brazilian competition authority CADE, to reinvigorate leniency programmes.

Commission guidelines aim to make the leniency program more attractive

The Commission’s guidance aims to further clarify the rules applicable to companies potentially involved in a cartel who wish to cooperate with the Commission and disclose their involvement in exchange for full immunity or a partial reduction of fines.

While the Commission’s guidelines highlight various aspects of the leniency programme, the most notable changes concern the possibility of approaching the Commission anonymously and the introduction of a leniency officer – which illustrate the will of the Commission to engage in informal discussions with potential candidates in order to reduce the uncertainty that may arise in a specific case.

Firstly, the Commission’s guidelines state that “the Commission is available for informal exchanges on possible immunity claims on an anonymous basis and without any obligation to disclose the sector, participants or other details identifying the cartel.”

The ability to engage in informal discussions, on an anonymous basis, to determine whether particular behavior is eligible for the leniency program will be helpful for potential leniency applicants – especially”if the behavior is new.”[3]

In recent years, the Commission has imposed fines in cases other than traditional hardcore cartels. This includes, for example, fines imposed on companies that engaged in restrictions on innovation, which effectively restricted competition on technical development. The Commission has also expressed its wish to extend its fight against cartels to anti-poaching agreements and other agreements on the labor market.[4]

Thanks to the Commission’s advice, businesses will have more certainty when assessing whether their behavior creates legal risks that could be avoided or mitigated if they decide to come forward.

Second, the Commission’s guidelines introduce a leniency officer who will be the first point of contact for any potential leniency applicant. Although new to the Commission, the position of leniency officer was created in France in 2011 and has existed in the Netherlands since at least 2006.

As explained in the Commission’s guidelines, “the leniency officer may offer informal advice, provide information about the leniency process, and engage with potential applicants or their legal representatives to discuss potential applications on an “anonymous” basis.The clemency officer may also inform potential immunity applicants if immunity is available for the arrangement in which those potential applicants are involved.

The Leniency Officer will be a useful point of contact for potential and actual leniency applicants in the future and is designed to provide leniency applicants with additional assurances when considering self-reporting of their conduct.

Conclusion

The Commission’s guidance is a valuable recognition that its leniency program needs to evolve and a significant step towards reducing uncertainty and building trust that can help ensure its continued success. This guidance provides potential leniency applicants with the opportunity to make a more informed decision about whether or not to apply for leniency, which should lead to increased use of the leniency program. Conversely, the Commission may receive more leniency applications in new areas that it wishes to investigate while avoiding unwanted leniency applications that might otherwise occupy its resources.

Companies that are party to agreements or other forms of collaboration with their competitors that they suspect of constituting a potential cartel should immediately seek the advice of an outside lawyer in order to examine the nature of their involvement and to avoid potentially significant fines.

Any potential whistleblower should act quickly, as the first participant to come forward is eligible for full immunity from fines and subsequent participants are eligible for progressively lower fine reductions.

_______________________

[1] Speech by Executive Vice President Vestager at the annual conference of the Italian Antitrust Association, “A new era of cartel enforcement,available at: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/commissioners/2019-2024/vestager/announcements/speech-evp-m-vestager-italian-antitrust-association-annual-conference-new-era-cartel- enforcement_en.

[2] GCR,”EU reviews leniency policy amid drop in first applications, law enforcement official saysavailable at: https://globalcompetitionreview.com/article/eu-reviewing-leniency-policy-amidst-drop-in-first-in-applications-enforcer-says.

[3] Antitrust: the Commission provides guidance on its leniency policy and practice, available at: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_22_6373.

[4] EU Competition Commissioner signals tougher enforcement of anti-poach and other labor market agreements, available at: https://www.gibsondunn.com/eu-competition-commissioner-signals-tougher-enforcement- of-no-poach-and-other -labour-market-agreements/.

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The following Gibson Dunn attorneys have prepared this Client Alert: Christian Riis-Madsen, Stéphane Frank, Jeremy Robison and Sam Latif.

Gibson Dunn attorneys are available to answer any questions you may have regarding these developments. Please contact the Gibson Dunn lawyer with whom you usually work, the authors, or any officer or member of the firm’s Antitrust and Competition practice group:

Antitrust and Competition Group:
Stéphane Frank – Brussels (+32 2 554 72 07, sfrank@gibsondunn.com)
Jeremy Robison – Washington, DC (+1 202-955-8518, wrobison@gibsondunn.com)
Christian Riis-Madsen – Co-president, Brussels (+32 2 554 72 05, criis@gibsondunn.com)
Ali Nikpay – Co-Chair, London (+44 (0)20 7071 4273, anikpay@gibsondunn.com)
Rachel S. Brass – Co-Chair, San Francisco (+1 415-393-8293, rbrass@gibsondunn.com)
Stephen Weissman – Co-Chair, Washington, DC (+1 202-955-8678, sweissman@gibsondunn.com)

© 2022 Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP

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BRUSSELS, Oct 29 (Reuters) – The European Union on Saturday urged Kosovo to allow a longer transition period to phase out old Serbian license plates still used by the country’s ethnic Serb minority.

Kosovo said on Friday it would delay a rule confiscating cars belonging to ethnic Serbs who refuse to use local license plates following criticism from Western countries that such a move could escalate ethnic tensions.

Kosovo has tried a few times this year to demand that its Serbian minority change old car license plates that date from before 1999, when Kosovo was still part of Serbia. However, this decision met with strong and sometimes violent resistance from local Serbs who live in the north of the country.

The last deadline was November 1, when around 10,000 motorists had to change their old registrations.

The European Union has said Kosovo has the right to phase out old license plates and has taken a step in the right direction, but a 2016 agreement provided a 12-month deadline for the process which does not had not been followed.

“Kosovo should allow for a longer transition period,” said Nabila Massrali, spokesperson for foreign affairs and security at the European Commission.

“This has been the constant advice of Kosovo’s closest partners, including the EU and the US, it is disappointing to see that it has not been followed,” she added.

Massrali urged all parties to maintain calm, exercise restraint and “avoid any action or rhetoric that could undermine stability on the ground, particularly in northern Kosovo.”

On Friday, Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti said the phasing out would be implemented gradually.

He said drivers would first receive warnings for three weeks, then a fine for a period of two months, followed by a period of temporary car plates. If they don’t change their plates by April 21, their vehicles will be confiscated.

Kosovo declared independence in 2008, but around 50,000 ethnic Serbs who live in the northern part of Kosovo refuse to recognize Pristina’s authority and still consider themselves part of Serbia.

Reporting by Sabine Siebold Editing by Chris Reese

Our standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

BRUSSELS (AP) — The executive arm of the European Union on Wednesday sought to tighten pollution restrictions to ensure harmful pollutants are phased out by 2050 to potentially save the lives of hundreds of thousands of people.

The European Commission’s proposals focus on air, waste and water pollution, and require the support of the European Parliament and Member States before they can be made binding. This may take several months.

Air pollution is the biggest threat to the bloc’s 450 million citizens. The proposals include doubling the limits on fine particles allowed in the air by 2030. These particles make up a significant part of global air pollution, which the EU says kills nearly 300,000 people a year.

READ MORE: New climate law signed by Biden to cut carbon pollution by 40%, study finds

As effectively enforcing pollution rules has so far proven difficult, the proposals will allow sick citizens to seek redress in court with better compensation rights and collective action to seek damages.

Looking at air pollution alone, the Commission estimates that up to €121 billion could be saved by 2030 if the rules are adopted.

“The cost of inaction far outweighs the cost of prevention,” said Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevicius.

Russia’s war in Ukraine affects all EU plans and environmental protection is no exception as Moscow’s energy pressure on EU countries has already forced many countries to relaunch policies centered on the use of fossil fuels.

Implementing anti-pollution measures “isn’t getting any easier under the current geopolitical conditions, but we can’t afford distractions,” Sinkevicius said.

by Markus Wacket (Reuters) The European Commission warned the German government last spring not to approve an investment by Chinese company Cosco in the port of Hamburg, the German daily Handelsblatt reported on Friday, citing sources.

Last year, shipping giant Cosco made a bid to take a 35% stake in one of three terminals at Germany’s biggest port in the northern city of Hamburg.

Germany’s ruling coalition is split over whether to approve the investment, government sources say, even as Beijing urges Berlin not to politicize the bid and the port authority warns it could harm the EU. ‘economy.

Also Read: Port of Hamburg backs acquisition of COSCO terminal amid German government concerns in China

According to the Handelsblatt, the EU has warned that sensitive information about the company could end up in Chinese hands if Germany allows the investment.

The German government, which is still considering whether to approve the deal, declined to comment on the report. A spokesman for Olaf Scholz said the German Chancellor had not yet agreed with the relevant ministers how to proceed.

The Commission said it comments on individual cases.

European Union leaders are due to discuss reducing their economic dependence on China on Friday, among other topics, in their second day of talks in Brussels.

Also Read: German Chancellor tries to quell port deal dispute with China’s COSCO

(Reporting by Markus Wacket; Writing by Maria Sheahan; Editing by Matthias Williams, Reuters)