Moving in circles

Waste watchers look on with dismay as the European Commission tries to extricate itself from the tangle into which it has got itself following its ill-advised withdrawal of the circular economy package COM(2014) 398 final in December. The rationale given by Vice-President Franz Timmermans, that the new package will be “more ambitious”, was undermined by the fact that many Member States had thought some elements of the package to be too ambitious – especially the waste-related targets. Added to which a loud business lobby had called for the virtual scrapping of the package, warning that it was unaffordable and emasculating. So the likelihood of a “more ambitious” package emerging from the ashes of December’s debacle is rather remote.

Notwithstanding the criticisms levelled at the package when it was published in June 2014, it was generally agreed by the European Parliament that a better course of action would have been to keep the package in play, while modifying and refining its policy proposals to address the various concerns. What the withdrawal has done is unleash a cacophony of intense lobbying by every conceivable interest group. One camp cautions against any watering-down of the original package, while the other has rightly sensed that with everything up for grabs this presents a golden opportunity to get particular policy proposals it does not like – such as revision of the ecodesign directive – scrapped altogether. Both play the jobs-and-growth card, one side claiming the package would provide a positive boost, the other side complaining about “[signing] blank cheques” with loss of competitiveness and jobs.

Lobbying

It is unclear how the Commission will respond. In relation to the waste policies (recycling targets and landfill bans) it is likely to be more flexible. Options include allowing Member States more time to comply, making some or all of the targets aspirational rather than legal, and/or allowing for national variations.

On the demand side the Commission has the option of boosting (mainly non-regulatory) initiatives such as Green Public Procurement and the EU Ecolabel system. The concern must be that protracted arguments over worthwhile but contentious regulatory policy levers (such as ecodesign) could kill off the package if they were put on the table again.

With the Commission’s self-imposed deadline of the end of 2015 for a revised package, it would be all too easy for interested parties to prolong discussions on a particular measure merely in order to kick the entire package into the long grass. The Commission has an unenviable task ahead, in balancing these competing interests while coming up with a package that does not lack foresight and ambition.