The European Commission has to explore efficiency gains and address unnecessary administrative burden in environmental monitoring and reporting (M&R) in particular by automatisation of the reporting tools, and by looking at synergies across reporting obligations under different directives; "implementation scoreboards" should be established for additional directives.
The European Commission and the EEA have to further explore within pilot projects how environmental M&R requirements on local and regional authorities can be reduced by ICT and eGgovernment without affecting the impact of legislation.
INSPIRE should be further developed an eGovernment tool to provide the central common format and process for data collecting on environmental spatial information for streamlining environmental M&R. Member States, with support from the European Commission, have to strengthen the involvement of their regional and local authorities in the INSPIRE process.
The European Commission has to come forward in the near future with an initiative on compliance assurance, and supports the option of a horizontal EU directive, which would establish compliance assurance provisions across the EU environmental acquis, based on principles as mentioned in the CoR opinion.
The European Parliament and the Council are requested to jointly explore with the CoR how the CoR in its advisory function can bring the experiences of local and regional authorities to their individual scrutiny exercises, taking account of the CoR/EC Technical Platform for Cooperation on the Environment that could be associated with European Parliament and Council debates on better environmental implementation;
The European Commission should closely associate the Committee of the Regions with any future initiatives that aim at improving environmental implementation and governance, such as the Environmental Implementation Review initiative.
The rapporteur succeeded in promoting the subject of the opinion in his home country and national media by organising in June 2016 a CoR local event and European Green Week partner event on "EU environment law and INSPIRE: improving reporting and compliance - investing for a greener future" in Rakvere, Estonia.
The CoR Outlook Opinion called on the "European Commission to closely associate the Committee of the Regions with […] the *Environmental Implementation Review *(EIR) initiative".
In line with this call, the European Commission Communication on the EIR of May 2017 states that "The Commission will also liaise with the Committee of the Regions in respect of the key horizontal findings in order to engage with local and regional representatives in raising awareness about specific actions (footnote: For example through the Technical Platform for Cooperation on the Environment set up by the Committee of the Regions and the Commission, referred to in the 7th EAP, p. 189). The outcomes of these dialogues will inform the Commission's follow up of each EIR cycle."
On 13 September 2016, a first important cooperative action was successfully co-organised, joint CoR/EC seminar at the CoR on "The new Environmental Implementation Review (EIR): What's in it for regions and cities?", with participation by the rapporteur and several other ENVE members. On 20 October 2016, the ENVE Chair sent letters to Environment Commissioner Vella, the Maltese Environment Minister as the incoming Presidency of the ENV Council, and Mr La Via, Chair of the EP ENVI Committee, informing them about the outcomes of the seminar and suggesting means for cooperation on the EIR.
The European Commission Staff Working Document "Towards a Fitness Check of EU environmental monitoring and reporting: to ensure effective monitoring, more transparency and focused reporting of EU environment policy", SWD(2016)188, of 27 May 2016 recognised the CoR Outlook Opinion by stating that "This undertaking will only be successful if all involved join forces. The Commission and its services will engage actively through workshops, consultations, evidence gathering and bilateral dialogues with EU institutions and bodies to find the best ways forward throughout the process; the opinion of the Committee of the Regions is a valuable contribution to this end."
Moreover, in line with the CoR Outlook Opinions' recommendations to improve compliance assurance (yet the CoR calls for a legislative proposal on this), the European Commission in its work programme for 2017 foresees a "REFIT initiative to ensure proper implementation and enforcement of environmental regulation, including environmental compliance assurance."
On 9 June 2017, the* European Commission adopted the Report "Actions to Streamline Environmental Reporting" (COM(2017) 312 final),* accompanied by European Commission Staff Working Document "Fitness check of Reporting and Monitoring of EU Environment Policy accompanying the document"(SWD(2017) 230 final).
The report takes into consideration several of the CoR outlook opinions' recommendations. The Staff Working Document refers to the CoR contribution to the fitness-check by the CoR Outlook Opinion.
THE EUROPEAN COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS
- urges the European Commission to explore efficiency gains and address unnecessary administrative burden in environmental monitoring and reporting (M&R) in particular by automatisation of the reporting tools, and by looking at synergies across reporting obligations under different directives; "implementation scoreboards" should be established for additional directives;
- calls on the European Commission and the EEA to further explore within pilot projects how environmental M&R requirements on local and regional authorities can be reduced by ICT and eGgovernment without affecting the impact of legislation;
- supports further development of INSPIRE as an eGovernment tool to provide the central common format and process for data collecting on environmental spatial information for streamlining environmental M&R; urges Member States, with support from the European Commission, to strengthen the involvement of their regional and local authorities in the INSPIRE process;
- calls on the European Commission to come forward in the near future with an initiative on compliance assurance, and supports the option of a horizontal EU directive, which would establish compliance assurance provisions across the EU environmental acquis, based on principles as mentioned in the CoR opinion;
- asks the European Parliament and the Council to jointly explore with the CoR how the CoR in its advisory function can bring the experiences of local and regional authorities to their individual scrutiny exercises, taking account of the CoR/EC Technical Platform for Cooperation on the Environment that could be associated with European Parliament and Council debates on better environmental implementation;
- calls on the European Commission to closely associate the Committee of the Regions with any future initiatives that aim at improving environmental implementation and governance, such as the Environmental Implementation Review initiative.