Machinery Regulation: no progress at European Council

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Indeed, while the IMCO Committee finalised in early-May a vote giving mandate to MEP Stefanec to engage in negotiations, the competent working party of the Council did not manage to produce a compromise text to be endorsed by the Permanent Representatives of the Member States, gathered in the COREPER. Indeed, the scheduled meeting of COREPER to finalise a Council general approach did not even discuss this topic.

The stumbling block remains Annex I and the whole area around conformity assessment. While the French Presidency continued to champion a compromise including a substantial list of machinery types under third-party certification obligations, other national delegations opposed it.

France is indeed currently presiding over the Council of the European Union and thus holds the responsibility to broker compromises among Member States on this legislation. Since the beginning, CECE highlighted the new obligation of third-party certification as the most radical, unnecessary and dangerous change under discussion. This would only concern “high-risk machinery” – a definition which CECE disputes as faulty and misleading – but it would increase costs and timelines of compliance procedures and placing on the market.

This calls for an even higher attention and involvement by CECE with regards to advocacy. Indeed, in all interactions with the French Presidency and with other national delegations in Brussels, CECE keeps arguing for a sensible solution on this point and on the transition timelines to implement the new legislation.

CECE will keep monitoring the next few days and weeks before the Council achieves a joint position and CECE will engage with the decision-makers in this policy debate over the legal conditions of machinery manufacturing.