Von der Leyen's deregulation drive blindsides Brussels with speed and secrecy

Ursula von der Leyen's second term as European Commission president began not with a fanfare of consultation but with a surprise announcement in Budapest that caught her own administration off guard. In November 2024, standing alongside European heads of government, she declared a dramatic pivot: the Green Deal's legislative architecture would be pruned, streamlined and in places dismantled through a series of "omnibus" bills. Four Commission officials told reporters they learned of the plan, which directly affects their directorates and which they would be tasked with drafting, from the speech itself.

The speed and secrecy have set off alarm bells across the Brussels policymaking apparatus. National diplomats, MEPs, industry groups and NGOs describe a centralised operation run from the president's private office, with her head of Cabinet Bjoern Seibert as the dominant figure. Internal planning documents circulate with blank sections for the most consequential policies. Emails carrying key texts are password-protected. When the Commission's 2025 work programme leaked, the "kill list" of legislative proposals to be withdrawn, normally a routine housekeeping exercise for obsolete laws, had a blank space where the green finance omnibus should have been. Two officials said they did not know whether the blanks were deliberate opacity or genuine indecision.

A pivot announced in Budapest

The Budapest meeting of the European Council on 7, 8 November 2024 was the inflection point. Von der Leyen used the gathering to signal that competitiveness, not climate leadership, would define her second mandate. The shift had been building: France and Germany, alongside the centre-right European People's Party, had pressed for regulatory relief. Business groups argued that reporting obligations, the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive, the Taxonomy Regulation, had accumulated faster than companies, especially smaller ones, could absorb.

Von der Leyen insisted the omnibus approach would not weaken substantive standards but merely remove duplication and paperwork. Few in Brussels believe the distinction will survive the legislative process. Reopening files, as one senior official put it, "invites amendment." The Commission has since promised "at least" five omnibus packages in 2025 and asked the Council and Parliament to fast-track them without reopening other parts of the legislation, a procedural shortcut that bypasses the ordinary legislative give-and-take.

Centralised control and information vacuums

Commission staff at multiple levels describe a working culture more opaque than under the previous mandate. "It's all decided at the top," a mid-ranking official said. "We're never sure if it's her, or if it's her head of Cabinet." The reference to Seibert reflects a widely held view that the president's private office has become the sole engine of policy, with directorates-general reduced to implementation units. Work on the simplification plan reportedly paused during von der Leyen's hospitalisation with pneumonia in January, a fact the Commission declined to disclose at the time, underscoring how much depends on a single decision-maker.

A senior national regulator, granted anonymity to discuss sensitive talks, captured the unease: "When we're going that fast, how can we be sure we're getting it right?" The question hangs over a process that has already produced public confusion. A leaked version of the kill list published one day showed the Financial Data Access (FiDA) regulation, currently in trilogue negotiations, slated for withdrawal. Twenty-four hours later, the official version omitted FiDA. Two EU officials attributed the reversal to direct lobbying of von der Leyen by banks; a third cited "internal wrangling" at the highest level. Officials working on FiDA had no warning.

The FiDA episode and the kill list

The FiDA episode illustrates the unpredictability now characterising the Commission's legislative management. The kill list, traditionally a technical instrument for withdrawing superseded or stagnant proposals, has been repurposed as a political signal. Its composition appears fluid. The blank sections in leaked documents, whether intentional redactions or placeholders for unfinished decisions, have become a metaphor for a process that insiders describe as "writing the script while the cameras are rolling." One national diplomat called the shifting scope and timeline a "clear credibility issue" for the executive.

For the Commission's critics, the FiDA flip-flop confirms that the simplification agenda is being driven by the loudest voices in the room. Trade unions, green finance groups and environmental NGOs argue that the omnibus bills will disproportionately reflect industry demands because no proper consultation has occurred. The Greens/EFA group in the Parliament said it was "alarmed" by the first omnibus, citing a "rushed process and timeline" that "goes against the principles of good governance and is inherently undemocratic."

Parliament sidelined

The European Parliament, co-legislator on almost every file targeted by the omnibus packages, has been kept at arm's length. Aurore Lalucq, the French Socialist who chairs the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee, told reporters in January that MEPs were "left out of the loop" and that the Commission should "work together" with other institutions rather than keeping them in the dark. On 21 January, von der Leyen met the chairs of the four main political groups, EPP, S&D, Renew and Greens, to discuss competitiveness and the upcoming omnibus. According to three senior group officials, she proposed strengthening the Commission's dialogue with the political families before the bill's presentation on 26 February, "to ensure that a parliamentary majority stands strong behind a key law, basically avoiding chaos as like with [the] deforestation [regulation]."

Three weeks later, the Commission had still not formally reached out to Parliament to begin that dialogue. "Three weeks ago von der Leyen promised to work with Parliament, and as of this morning we had received nothing," one official said in early February. The deforestation regulation, which faced a chaotic last-minute delay and amendment after member states and MEPs revolted over implementation timelines, is the template the Commission wants to avoid. But the remedy, early political coordination, requires the Commission to share its drafts, something it has so far declined to do.

The competitiveness chorus

For all the procedural criticism, von der Leyen's drive has powerful backers. Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank, co-authored an op-ed in the Financial Times with von der Leyen in January praising the "unprecedented simplification effort" as part of a "wave of actions" to help the EU economy keep pace with rivals. The pair promised to "do whatever is necessary to bring Europe back on track." Jean-Paul Servais, chair of the global securities watchdog IOSCO, went further: "In wartime, speed is maybe the most important aspect." The wartime analogy, increasingly common in Brussels, frames deregulation as a survival imperative rather than a policy choice.

The argument rests on a genuine diagnosis: Europe's productivity growth has lagged the United States for two decades, the Inflation Reduction Act has redirected green investment across the Atlantic, and the return of a protectionist US administration under Donald Trump has sharpened the sense of vulnerability. But the remedy, stripping back the very rules designed to align private capital with public goals, carries risks that the speed of the process may not allow time to assess. As one senior Commission official noted, the executive is "only one player in this game." Governments and MEPs often water down proposals in negotiations. "If they want ambition, we give them ambition. But then they have to be ambitious."

What the omnibus will touch

The first omnibus, due on 26 February 2025, is expected to target the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), the Taxonomy Regulation and the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), the core pillars of the Green Deal's financial architecture. Subsequent packages may address the Deforestation Regulation, the Batteries Regulation and elements of the Fit for 55 package. The Commission has not published a definitive list, contributing to the uncertainty that now pervades compliance departments across the continent. Companies that invested heavily in reporting systems face the prospect of seeing requirements changed before they are fully applied.

The political calculus is transparent. Von der Leyen needs a majority in Parliament that spans the EPP, S&D and Renew, the same coalition that elected her in July 2024. The Greens, who opposed her re-election, are being offered dialogue but not a veto. Member states, especially France and Germany, want relief for their industrial bases. The Commission is betting that the fear of deindustrialisation will override attachment to the Green Deal's legislative detail. Whether that bet pays off depends on whether the omnibus texts, when they finally appear, can be sold as simplification rather than dilution.