Macron calls for the abolition of the directive on the duty of care of companies

On Monday, May 19, Emmanuel Macron called for the outright abolition of the European directive on the duty of care, or CS3D, as did the new German Chancellor Friedrich Merz ten days ago.

"We fully agree with Chancellor Merz and other colleagues that we need to move much faster" on simplification, "and the CS3D (Duty of Care Directive, editor's note) and some other regulations should not just be postponed for a year but sidelined," he said in a speech to participants at the Choose France summit.

Emmanuel Macron observed that Europe had increased "many constraints and regulations in many sectors, while opening its markets to companies" , notably Chinese, "practicing lower standards" , while at the same time European companies were subject to "the aggressive policy" put in place by Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

The European Commission has "started to react (by postponing the directive from 2027 to 2028, editor's note) but now everything depends on the speed and scale of our response," Emmanuel Macron declared. "We must move quickly and strongly if we want to get back in the race," he assured.

Also in the name of the fight against bureaucracy, Friedrich Merz called on the EU on May 9 to abolish this directive, which imposes rules on companies regarding respect for the environment and human rights throughout their production chain.

Friedrich Merz had considered that simply postponing the directive was "not a sustainable solution. Ultimately, the solution must be to abolish it," he assured.

The two leaders thus agree with the employers' associations of both countries, who had been calling for this abolition rather than a simple postponement.

NGOs, on the other hand, denounce the unravelling of environmental measures adopted during the Commission's previous mandate.

• Business and service company
• Emmanuel Macron
• European Union (EU)