Policy & Law
21.04.2026

The View from Brussels #15-2026

News, Publications and Consultations from the Past Week

News CW 16 (13-19.04.2026)

Competition: Anthony Whelan has been appointed as Director-General of the Directorate General for Competition (DG Comp). In this role, he will promote the continued evolution of policy, while ensuring consistency between broad political objectives and the policy instruments the competition department is developing.

Age verification: Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has unveiled a European age verification act. She stated that it had overcome the final technical hurdles and would soon be available to citizens. Shortly afterwards, reports emerged of security vulnerabilities.

Minimum age: The Special Panel on Child Online Safety, which advises Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, convened for a second meeting. The discussions focused on current EU regulations and initiatives to protect minors online, as well as international approaches such as Australia’s social media minimum age.

Digital majority: France intends to introduce an age limit of fifteen on certain social media platforms and has now notified the European Commission of the corresponding draft legislation. (EU Member States are required to notify the European Commission of national legislation drafts before it is adopted, in order to prevent barriers to the Internal Market or incompatibilities with existing EU rules).

Selected Publications from the EP Think Tanks

 

Ongoing Relevant European Commission Consultations

Selections of the Current Week, CW 17 (20-26.04.2026)

Council:

The current preview of the Council’s work for the upcoming days until 03.05.2026 can be found here.

Summit and Ministerial Meetings:

Preparatory Bodies:

An overview of the various Council dates can be found here.

Commission:

The agenda of the current Commission meeting was not available at our time of writing. You can potentially find it on the Commission’s website in the near future.

Parliament:

Plenary Sittings

There are no plenary sittings of the European Parliament taking place this week.

Here you can find a list of the upcoming dates of the European Parliament. The calendar of the plenary sittings for 2026 is available here (PDF).

Committees

LIBE Committee (Civil Liberties)

The agenda for the current meeting of the LIBE Committee taking place on 20.04.2026 can be found here.

The current timetables of the LIBE Committee can be found here.

 

JURI Committee (Legal Affairs)

The agenda for the current meeting of the JURI Committee taking place on 23.04.2026 was not available at the time of going to press. You may be able to find it at short notice on the JURI Committee’s website.

The current timetables of the JURI Committee can be found here.

ITRE Committee (Industry)

The agenda for the current meeting of the ITRE Committee taking place on 20.04.2026 can be found here.

The current timetables of the ITRE Committee (as of 14.04.2026) can be found here.

IMCO Committee (Internal Market)

No meeting of the IMCO Committee is scheduled for this week.

The current timetables of the IMCO Committee (as of 26.02.2026) can be found here.

CULT Committee (Culture and Education)

No meeting of the CULT Committee is scheduled for this week.

The current timetables of the CULT Committee (as of 02.03.2026) can be found here.

 

Outlook:

An overview of the following session weeks can be found here. The provisional agenda for the upcoming plenary sittings can be found here.

 

European Court of Justice

You can find the judicial calendar of the CJEU here.

  • The judgment in the case Commission v Hungary (Valeurs de l’Union) (C-769/22) is scheduled to be delivered on Tuesday, 21 April 2026.
  • The Advocate General’s Opinion in the case Telekom Slovenije (C-164/25) is scheduled for Thursday, 23 April 2026.
  • The Advocate General’s Opinion in the case Spielerschutz Sigma (C-683/24) is scheduled for Thursday, 23 April 2026.
The View from Brussels #48-2025 1

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