Conference 'Better regulation: taking stock and sustaining our commitment'

Programme

1. 29 Apr 2019, 08:30 - 09:00 (CEST)

   Registration and welcome coffee

2. 09:00 - 09:30 (CEST)

   Opening address
   Frans Timmermans (First Vice-President of the European Commission)

3. 09:30 - 11:00 (CEST)

   Panel I — Views: Engaging better with interested parties
   To make the EU more transparent and accountable, and to ensure that policies are based on the best available evidence, the Commission is working to consult and listen more, and to better explain what it intends to do and why. Consultations and transparency are the two areas where interested parties believe the Commission has made most progress since 2015. However, they point to the very same areas as being those where more improvements are needed in the future. What should future progress look like? How can all relevant stakeholders be reached, and the public better involved in policy-making, without ‘consultation fatigue’ setting in?

4. 11:00 - 11:30 (CEST)

   Coffee break

5. 11:30 - 13:00 (CEST)

   Panel II — Facts: Scrutiny and quality
   Better regulation aims to provide the best possible basis for timely and sound policy-making. It informs political decision-taking without replacing it. But better regulation cannot happen without honest and credible high-quality analyses of what works and what does not, and of what may work and why. This makes performing such analysis and ensuring its quality a fundamental challenge for all better regulation systems. In this context, a key role is played by regulatory oversight conducted by ‘a standing body close to the centre of government’, as underscored by the OECD. The Regulatory Scrutiny Board has provided such oversight for the European Commission since 2016, and evidence suggests that its scrutiny has helped produce better impact assessments and evaluations. Most stakeholders recognise this, but at the same time are calling for further improvements in the quality and use of impact assessments. How can this be achieved? How can the Board help achieve this?

6. 13:00 - 14:30 (CEST)

   Buffet lunch

7. 14:30 - 16:00 (CEST)

   Panel III — Results: Better regulation as a shared agenda
   All can agree that EU legislation should be fit for purpose: necessary, proportionate and successful in delivering its benefits, while avoiding unnecessary costs. The Commission is continuing to pursue these aims, but cannot deliver the desired results by itself, as its legislative proposals are amended by Parliament and the Council, and transposed and implemented by the Member States. Having so many bodies involved in drafting and implementing a piece of legislation affects how it achieves its objectives and at what cost. Against the background of the 2016 Inter-institutional Agreement on Better Law-Making and the work of the Task Force on Subsidiarity, Proportionality and ‘Doing Less more Efficiently’, how can efforts to have fit-for-purpose legislation be improved?

8. Show 2 more items
9. 16:00 - 16:15 (CEST)

   Closing remarks

Practical information