Consumer Product Safety Regulation: Detailed Appraisal of the European Commission's Impact Assessment

Análisis en profundidad 04-04-2014

This paper seeks to provide a detailed analysis, from a methodological perspective, of part of the European Commission's Impact Assessment (IA) accompanying its proposal for a Consumer Product Safety Regulation (CPSR). Requested by the IMCO Committee, the aim of this analysis is to determine whether the IA covered adequately the following elements of the Commission's proposal: Country of origin marking (Article 7 of the CPSR) and obligations for economic operators (Articles 8 to 11 of the CPSR). It performs the requested 'health check' from two angles. Firstly, it analyses whether the Commission's IA - with regard to the above subjects only - is fit for its overall purpose, which is to aid political decision-making by presenting a comprehensive assessment of the likely impacts of all options. Secondly, it analyses whether the IA meets the standards which the Commission has laid down in its internal Impact Assessment Guidelines, as well as the quality criteria which the Parliament has defined in its resolutions.