The enforcement of consumer law has traditionally been based primarily on private enforcement, complemented by administrative enforcement. Because of longstanding issues of non-compliance with EU consumer rights, the Commission has introduced an ‘EU representative action’. In this tenth and final post in RENFORCE Blog’s special series on the enforcement of EU law, Esther van Schagen summarises the main features of the new Directive and explains some of the assumptions as to the effect of more enforcement which underlie the Directive and become visible in the impact assessment. Arguably, the Directive has overlooked opportunities that could have contributed to managing key barriers to bringing collective actions – the complexity, length and costs of collective redress – and which ought to be addressed in order to enhance cross-border enforcement.
Continue readingTag Archives: Enforcement
Digital forensics standards: Enforcement under the radar of EU plans for electronic evidence
In the ninth post in RENFORCE Blog’s special series on enforcement, Gavin Robinson argues that the extreme volatility of electronic data calls for EU law to promote not only efficient and secure access thereto for criminal investigators, but also robust standards of digital forensics. Currently, it is national laws and criminal justice systems which achieve varying levels of forensic soundness for digital evidence. Drawing on a comparative, multidisciplinary research project and sharing insight from legal practice in Luxembourg, the post advocates a stronger emphasis on the development of common European rules on digital forensics – potentially within dedicated EU legislation on the admissibility of evidence.
Continue readingClosing the gender pay gap: time for the Member States and all stakeholders to finally put their money where their mouth is
Statistics clearly show that not a single country in the European Union has managed to establish equal pay for women and men. In this blogpost, the eighth in RENFORCE Blog’s special series on the enforcement of EU law, Linda Senden and Rian Hesdahl argue that a major reason for this lack of progress is a strong reliance on individual-rights-based enforcement, before examining whether the new directive proposed by the European Commission is likely to significantly boost the effective enforcement of the equal pay principle.
Continue readingEcocentric values and enforcement in illegal environmental markets
The EU is an important market for illegal environmental trades – such as timber, wildlife, fish, waste, minerals and metals – which are causing serious harms to the environment worldwide. In this blogpost, the seventh in RENFORCE Blog’s special series on the enforcement of EU law, Daan van Uhm argues that ecocentric values should be embedded in both EU legislation and in EU law enforcement cultures.
Continue readingEnforcement of intellectual property rights: pioneering in private enforcement
European law plays a major role in the enforcement of intellectual property rights. The innovative rules and practices developed by the EU in this area provide a wide range of enforcement tools and introduce a European system of enforcement principles. In this post, the sixth in RENFORCE Blog’s special series on the enforcement of EU law, Peter Blok explains that intellectual property law is therefore a rich source for the study and further development of European law enforcement in general and private law enforcement in particular.
Continue readingAccess to justice and EU enforcement agencies in the field of migration: an emerging problem
In this post, part of a special RENFORCE Blog series on the enforcement of EU law, Salvatore Nicolosi acknowledges the potential of EU migration agencies to support Member States in enforcing EU rules, but explains how an enhanced form of EU law enforcement through agencies should not be detrimental to the legal guarantees of migrants.
Continue readingThe EU Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime: How to Enforce Member States’ Compliance with Travel Bans?
In this second post in RENFORCE Blog’s special series on enforcement, Cedric Ryngaert highlights the Commission’s unsuccessful attempts to expand its limited enforcement powers over travel bans in the context of the recent adoption of the Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime. If centralized EU-level enforcement of travel bans is desirable, how might it be secured: through treaty change, or political pressure?
Continue readingFor EU law enforcement strategy and theory building!
Calls for EU law enforcement are a common and logical response to address recent challenges – and crises – across multiple policy sectors, but may face constraints of a legal, political and practical nature. According to Miroslava Scholten, these constraints are exactly where we all need to focus in order to ensure the resilience of the EU into the future. Today, on May 9, the Day of Europe, we make a start of a special blog post series by RENFORCE experts to put the need for more and better enforcement of EU law in the spotlight. Check our blog page out in the coming days!
Continue readingThe DSA and future enforcement of EU consumer protection law
Bram Duivenvoorde
This blogpost is part of a series of short commentaries on the European Commission’s proposals for a Digital Markets Act and a Digital Services Act, released on 15 December 2020. Stay tuned for more.
On 15 December 2020, the draft Digital Services Act (DSA) was published by the European Commission. The DSA will regulate digital services that act as intermediaries, connecting consumers with goods, services and content. Amongst other goals, the DSA aims to provide better protection to consumers online and should lead to a fairer digital market. What will the DSA mean for the future enforcement of consumer protection law through and against platforms? These are my initial thoughts on this topic.
Continue reading(R)evolution in the EU System of Political Accountability: Joint Parliamentary Scrutiny mechanism
Source: Lex van Lieshout
On 11 May 2016, the European Parliament adopted a new regulation for Europol, which will enter into force on 1 May 2017. This Regulation establishes the – so far unprecedented political accountability mechanism in the EU – Joint Parliamentary Scrutiny. The introduction of a mechanism, which links political accountability fora of the EU and the national levels, is a revolutionary development for the evolving multi-level accountability system (of EU agencies). To enhance democratic legitimacy of the EU structures and decisions, the legislative and accountability roles of the European Parliament have grown significantly in the last decennia (Scholten 2014). Yet, never before did national parliaments become involved in holding EU entities to account, too. Continue reading