The European Commission plans to withdraw the proposal to cancel the seasonal time change
The European Commission plans to withdraw its draft directive of 2018, which provided for the abolition of seasonal time change. This was stated by the spokeswoman of the European Commission, Anna-Kaisa Itkonen, informs RMF FM.
“Due to a long deadlock in the EU Council, the European Commission decided to withdraw its proposal”, Itkonen explained.
Currently, it is not about the final decision, but about the proposal of the European Commission. As the spokeswoman explained, the draft directive of 2018, which was supposed to cancel the time change every six months, was included in the package for simplifying EU rules, adopted by the European Commission on February 26.
This package is part of the so-called “Omnibus” — the main project of the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, aimed at reducing bureaucracy in the EU. Now the European Parliament and the Council of the EU must provide their positions on the withdrawal of this directive.
Corresponding letters should reach the European Commission within several months. The EC assures that they will definitely take these opinions into account before making a final decision.
“We will carefully consider their views before we decide to withdraw the proposed bill.” Anna-Kaisa Itkonen stressed.
According to her, the final decision of the European Commission will be made within several months.
We will remind that the idea of canceling the change of clocks was proposed in 2018, when Jean-Claude Juncker was the head of the European Commission, in response to citizens’ requests and the results of public consultations.
The European Parliament quickly supported this initiative, but it remained blocked in the Council of the EU for more than five years, because the member states could not agree on which time to keep permanently – summer or winter.
Southern European countries showed little interest in the issue, while Central and Eastern European states (especially Germany and Poland) were more interested in canceling the change of clocks.
