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You are required to carry out an Impact Assessment on EU proposals that would have force in the UK or require implementation in the UK, as you are on the UK Government's own proposals. Impact Assessments should be prepared in order to inform the UK negotiating position and collective agreement on it. For European proposals this includes directives, regulations, decisions, technical adaptations to EU provisions, and joint positions and conventions under second– and third–pillar co–operation.
The European Commission is committed to producing impact assessments for all significant proposals included in its Annual Legislative and Work Programme [External website]. The Commission has comprehensive guidelines [External website] on what impact assessments should cover and how they should be carried out.
If requested to do so by the Commission, you should consider sharing UK data on the likely impact of a proposal. In cases where you think that the Commission is not sufficiently aware of the impact of a potential proposal on the UK, you should consider taking the initiative to lobby the Commission directly to consider UK data.
Commission impact assessments are a valuable evidence base for officials negotiating EU legislation and it is important that they are discussed in Council negotiations before the proposals themselves are debated. If necessary, you should lobby the Chair of meetings to follow this practice.
Clarification should be sought from the Commission if its Impact Assessment does not meet its own guidelines, particularly if it:
You should make use of the UK impact assessment when lobbying other Member States to win support for the UK position. It may be that you can alert them to potential outcomes which would affect them which the Commission impact assessment has not identified. You should also consider sharing your impact assessment with UK Members of the European Parliament, and other Members such as committee rapporteurs.
The Council and Parliament have committed themselves to carrying out impact assessments on substantive amendments to Commission proposals. Should the UK impact assessment contain data which point towards a possible evidence–based alternative policy outcome not covered by the Commission either in its proposal or impact assessment, you should lobby in the Council and Parliament to encourage them to prepare an impact assessment on the amendment.
More information on the Cabinet Office European Secretariat is provided on the European Secretariat website [External website].