Anthea McIntyre (ECR). – Mr President, first of all, I would like to thank the co-rapporteurs for their work on this file. As the Employment Committee’s draftsman, I welcome the fact that several of our proposals have been taken on board, but I want to talk about the annual burden survey (ABS), which I think is one of the most innovative elements of the Interinstitutional Agreement on Better Law-Making (IIA).

In its first annual burden survey, the Commission undertook a survey of businesses’ perceptions of regulation. I am sure that was worthwhile but we must be much more ambitious in implementing the annual burden survey. The point is, we may create a simple piece of legislation at EU level, easy for businesses and others to understand and comply with, but when it is transposed into international legislation it does not always stay like that: additional, or completely unrelated, elements are added to the legislation. The ABS should identify these cases of gold-plating. Member States must always be free to adopt higher standards where only minimum standards are defined in Union law. That is not gold-plating. By using the ABS to bring transparency to the legislative process, we can ensure that legislation remains simple, clear and enforceable and we can make sure that Europe is not blamed for unpopular legislation that has, in fact, been created by Member States.