The European Parliament has changed your life — really. Here’s how.

5 months ago 3

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Think Brussels lawmakers are powerless? Think again.

The European Parliament may not have the right to propose legislation like national parliaments. It may still be viewed as the weakest of the three EU institutions, despite repeated attempts to beef up its power. But, by intensively scrutinizing and amending proposed laws in one or more of its 20 committees, Members of the European Parliament can mold the shape of new EU rules — and change your life in the process.

Many of the biggest decisions taken in the last parliamentary term — think the climate-based laws aimed at keeping global temperatures to a 2 degree rather than a 4 degree rise, or new rules to govern artificial intelligence — won’t be felt for many years.

But as we wait to see how the 2024 EU election shakes down, here’s a snapshot of some of the smaller but more tangible things MEPs have done over the last five years.

One charger to power them all

Apple itself will never admit it, but when it launched the iPhone 15 with a regular USB-C charging port instead of its proprietary Lightning port, you could thank the EU for that. The company anticipated EU rules — better known as the “common charger” — mandating that smartphones should all have a USB-C port by the end of this year. The rules — which were long pushed for by the European Parliament and extended to cover e-readers, keyboards and mice, earbuds and wearables by MEPs — were meant to fight one of EU customers’ annoyances: a drawer full of different chargers for different sorts of charging ports. Sure, EU executives touted that by making the USB-C charger the standard e-waste would be reduced. But this was definitely one for the consumers — from Brussels, with love.

Cheaper cross-border calls

EU citizens will soon(ish) be able to dial their Erasmus buddies or sun-chasing friends who’ve relocated to Europe’s brighter shores for the same cost as calling their friends down the road. It was no easy win but lawmakers got EU capitals to agree to abolish surcharges applied by telecoms operators when you call or text someone in another EU country — complementing the EU’s famed free roaming regime, which allows you to use your phone like at home when traveling within the bloc. The only caveat: this will only start in 2029, assuming the European Commission did its homework and adopted the necessary technical rules.

Google Maps (or does it?)

Europeans have been driven to distraction by Google Search since the company changed how location results show up. People used to be able to search for somewhere on Google, click on the Google Maps link that popped up and start navigating their way to the location. That trick doesn’t work in Europe any more courtesy of the European Union’s Digital Markets Act, which forced Big Tech firms to stop prioritising their own products and services over smaller rivals’ on their platforms. While this may pave the way for smaller players to get some more exposure on search engines, Google users are finding it hard to adjust: some have started sharing cheat codes and — ironically — Google Chrome extensions that reinstate the old version of Search.

Right to repair

When faced with a broken laptop or a smartphone whose battery needs to be replaced, the question has always been: ‘Should I fix it or buy a new one, considering it’s almost the same price?’ Brussels wants to make sure people can easily choose the repair option. At least, that’s what it was aiming for when it proposed new rules to force companies to prioritize repairing broken consumer goods over replacing them, and to make spare parts and repair manuals easily accessible. The European Parliament fought hard to widen the scope of the right to repair as much as possible but was met with strong resistance from EU countries to apply only to products for which ecodesign rules already exist. National governments gave their final approval of the new right to repair law last week, just in time for the EU election.

New-look takeaways

In the old world, you’d buy soup in styrofoam cups in the winter and find them washed up on the beach in the summer. But thanks to the EU’s law on single-use plastics, those days are, in theory, long gone. Back when the law was going through the usual legislative ping-pong match between institutions (admittedly under the 2014-2019 Parliament, although it was signed into law after the last election so we’re including it), MEPs fought for restrictions on a wider range of products. Takeaway food vendors had to switch to more sustainable types of containers, like cardboard boxes which can be collected and recycled more easily, to match those wooden knives and forks and paper straws. And thanks to new rules on packaging that have just been adopted, you’ll soon be able to walk to the counter and ask for that Greek salad to be served straight into your lunchbox.

Attached bottle caps

We couldn’t resist including the fact that from this July the caps on your soft drinks bottles will have to be attached to the rest of the container, even though this is also a result of the single-use plastic rules adopted in 2019. The aim? To reduce littering of loose bottle lids and up their recycling rate. The problem? Some fizzy drink fans are complaining the hinged cap keeps scratching or hitting them in the face. The head of Italy’s right-wing populist Lega (League) and the country’s deputy prime minister, Matteo Salvini has even seized the occasion to invoke the Green Deal boogeyman and “surreal” Brussels ecopolicy. But with plastic pollution on the rise, civil society groups would argue a slightly more fiddly plastic bottle is a small price to pay for cleaner seas. Also — just turn it to the side?

Reporting by Pieter Haeck, Mathieu Pollet, Edith Hancock, Louise Guillot, Marianne Gros and Leonie Cater.

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