The View from Brussels #284

News, Publications and Consultations from the Past Week

News CW06 (05.02.2024-11.02.2024)

Gigabit Infrastructure Act: In the negotiations on the Gigabit Infrastructure Act, a political agreement was reached in the trilogue on 6 February. This had already become apparent beforehand and is currently being finalised at a technical level. The regulation also aims to accelerate the deployment of high-capacity networks, in particular by reducing the costs of network deployment and simplifying authorisation procedures. (Euractiv)

CSAM: On 7 February, the European Parliament gave the green light for negotiations with the Council on a temporary extension until 3 May 2025 on the e-Privacy derogration – namely, the current rules on the voluntary detection of child sexual abuse material. These had been due to expire in August 2024. In the vote, 496 MEPs voted in favour of the negotiations with the Council, with 111 votes against and 22 abstentions. (EP)

Sustainability: The EU Commission has announced that it will adopt the outstanding European sustainability reporting standards (ESRS) in accordance with the CSR Directive two years later than planned. Instead of June 2024, this is now planned for June 2026. The postponement is intended to give companies more time to prepare for the new obligations. (EP)

Selected Publications from the EP Think Tank:

Ongoing Relevant European Commission Consultations

Product safety – interoperable interface of the Safety Gate Portal (until 19.02.2024)
Farm Sustainability Data Network – compiling data on farm sustainability (until 26.02.2024)
Unlocking private investment in energy efficiency – guidance to Member States and market actors (until 26.02.2024)
Energy efficiency – assessing the level of EU & national funding (until 26.02.2024)
Proposal for a Council Regulation on HPC (until 25.03.2024)
Proposal for a Council Regulation on HPC (until 28.03.2024)
Combating child sexual abuse – review of EU rules (until 08.04.2024)
R&D on dual-use technologies – options for support (until 30.04.2024)

Selections of the Current Week CW07 (12.02.2024-18.02.2024)

Council:

The current preview of the Council’s work for the upcoming days until 25.02.2024 can be found here.

Summit and Ministerial Meetings:

Informal Meeting of Competitiveness Ministers, 14-15.02.2024

Preparatory Bodies:

JHA Counsellors, 02.2024, Agenda
WP on Cooperation in Criminal Matters (COPEN), 02.2024, Agenda
COREPER I, 02.2024
COREPER II, 02.2024
WP on Competitiveness and Growth – Industry, 02.2024, Agenda
WP on Telecommunications and Information Society, 02.2024, Agenda
COREPER I, 02.2024
WP on Transport – Intermodal Questions and Networks, 02.2024, Agenda

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 European Parliament plenary sittings 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 2024 is available here (PDF).

Committees

LIBE Committee (Civil Liberties)

The agenda for the current meeting of the LIBE Committee taking place on 14/15.02.2024 can be found here. From the perspective of the Internet industry, the following agenda items are relevant:

Establishment of the digital euro, 2023/0212(COD)

JURI Committee (Legal Affairs)

The agenda for the current meeting of the JURI Committee taking place on 13.02.2024 can be found here. From the perspective of the Internet industry, the following agenda items are relevant:

Harmonised rules on Artificial Intelligence (Artificial Intelligence Act) and amending certain Union Legislative Acts, 2021/0106(COD)

The current timetables of the JURI Committee (as of 30.11.2023) can be found here.

ITRE Committee (Industry)

The agenda for the current meeting of the ITRE Committee taking place on 14/15.02.2024 can be found here. From the perspective of the Internet industry, the following agenda items are relevant:

Establishing a framework of measures for strengthening Europe’s net-zero technology products manufacturing ecosystem (Net Zero Industry Act), 2023/0081(COD)
Measures to reduce the cost of deploying gigabit electronic communications networks and repealing Directive 2014/61/EU (Gigabit Infrastructure Act), 2023/0046(COD)
Laying down measures to strengthen solidarity and capacities in the Union to detect, prepare for and respond to cybersecurity threats and incidents, 2023/0109(COD)
Establishing the Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform (‘STEP’) and amending Directive 2003/87/EC, Regulations (EU) 2021/1058, (EU) 2021/1056, (EU) 2021/1057, (EU) No 1303/2013, (EU) No 223/2014, (EU) 2021/1060, (EU) 2021/523, (EU) 2021/695, (EU) 2021/697 and (EU) 2021/241, 2023/0199(COD)

The current timetables of the ITRE Committee (as of 30.01.2024) can be found here.

IMCO Committee (Internal Market)

The agenda for the current meeting of the IMCO Committee taking place on 13.02.2024 can be found here. From the perspective of the Internet industry, the following agenda items are relevant:

Harmonised rules on Artificial Intelligence (Artificial Intelligence Act) and amending certain Union Legislative Acts, 2021/0106(COD)

The current timetables of the IMCO Committee (as of 25.01.2024) can be found here.

CULT Committee (Culture and Education)

The current timetables of the CULT Committee (as of 13.02.2024) can be found here.

Outlook:

An overview of the following session weeks can be found here.

European Court of Justice

You can find the judicial calendar of the ECJ here.