{"id":435640,"date":"2025-09-19T08:30:13","date_gmt":"2025-09-19T08:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/435640\/"},"modified":"2025-09-19T08:30:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-19T08:30:13","slug":"eu-commission-sued","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/435640\/","title":{"rendered":"EU Commission sued"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>European Commission sued: A summary <\/p>\n<ul class=\"b-article-body-skinny b-article-body-list\" style=\"margin-left:14px;list-style-type:disc\">\n<li>The European Commission has been taken to court by organisations Foodwatch International and Access Info <\/li>\n<li>The case is around its refusal to disclose documents pertaining to plans for mandatory front-of-pack labelling <\/li>\n<li>The plans have now been shelved <\/li>\n<li>The case was filed last week at the EU General Court<\/li>\n<li>It was previously taken to the European Ombudsman, who said the Commission was guilty of maladministration <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">The European Commission is being taken to court by the organisations Foodwatch International and Access Info over its refusal to disclose plans for its now-shelved mandatory front-of-pack labelling scheme in Europe. <\/p>\n<p>Shelved plans of mandatory rollout <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">As part of 2020\u2019s Farm to Fork Strategy, the EU had planned to implement a mandatory front-of-pack labelling scheme across the entirety of the EU. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">Furthermore, plans were made to include compulsory indications for ingredients lists and nutrition declaration for alcoholic beverages.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">Lastly, the EU planned to change the rules on date marking (such as \u2018best-before\u2019) to be revised. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">However, earlier this year the European Commission <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foodnavigator.com\/Article\/2025\/03\/04\/has-the-european-commission-abandoned-nutriscore\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.foodnavigator.com\/Article\/2025\/03\/04\/has-the-european-commission-abandoned-nutriscore\/\">declined to commit<\/a> to rolling out Nutri-Score, the preferred choice of front-of-pack labelling for many member states. <\/p>\n<p>Case against the Commission<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">In August and September 2023, the organisation Foodwatch International requested access to relevant documents around front-of-pack labelling plans. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">The Commission identified several relevant documents, but refused to disclose them. These included an opinion by the Regulatory Scrutiny Board (RSB) on its draft report for the labelling rollout, a draft impact assessment, and minutes of related meetings.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">The Commission stated that its refusal to disclose the documents was due to its desire to avoid external pressure. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">The case was then taken to the European Ombudsman, Teresa Anjinho, under the argument that the disclosure of such information was of external interest. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">The Ombudsman then examined the documents requested, deciding that the Commission did not have adequate reason to withhold the information, and that doing so constitutes maladministration. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">She stressed that the Commission is required to have high standards of transparency and suggested that the reason given for the lack of disclosure was not good enough. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">The case is now being taken to the EU General Court. <\/p>\n<p>Case taken to the General Court <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">Foodwatch and Access Info, another organisation, have now taken the case to the EU General Court, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.euronews.com\/my-europe\/2025\/09\/16\/eu-commission-sued-for-secrecy-over-ditched-food-label-plan\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.euronews.com\/my-europe\/2025\/09\/16\/eu-commission-sued-for-secrecy-over-ditched-food-label-plan\">reports Euronews<\/a>. The aim of the case is to overturn its refusal to disclose the documents. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">Access Info took the case to the General Court following the Ombudsman\u2019s judgement, and was soon joined by Foodwatch. The case was filed last week. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">Suzy Sumner, head of Foodwatch\u2019s Brussels office, questioned why information about the scheme\u2019s shelving had not been released. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">\u201cWhy has the EU Commission silently buried its plan to present a Europe-wide nutrition label as planned in the Farm to Fork strategy?\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body-skinny\">The European Commission has been contacted for comment. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"European Commission sued: A summary The European Commission has been taken to court by organisations Foodwatch International and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":435641,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[3608,35,2000,299,5187,9673,147742,147743],"class_list":{"0":"post-435640","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-creativity","9":"tag-energy","10":"tag-eu","11":"tag-europe","12":"tag-european","13":"tag-impact","14":"tag-mergence","15":"tag-motion"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115230030187873375","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=435640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435640\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/435641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=435640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=435640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=435640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}