European businesses are under considerable pressure. While global competitors move fast and invest, the EU economy continues to grow slowly, held back among others by the cumulative weight of regulation.

The reports by Mario Draghi and Enrico Letta set out a clear diagnosis and a credible way forward, and their recommendations are more relevant today than ever. Yet the gap between ambition and delivery remains wide: according to the Draghi Implementation Index, as of July 2026, only 60 of the report’s 383 recommendations (15.7%) had been fully implemented. [1]

The first simplification packages were a welcome signal, but progress has been too slow and too narrow to change companies’ day-to-day reality, particularly for SMEs. Without decisive follow-up, the momentum behind the Commission’s commitment to revive the EU economy risks fading and businesses will continue to pay the price in lost competitiveness.

Regulatory burden is clearly the horizontal thread running through every policy and legal framework of the EU acquis. Acknowledging this, the Commission launched an Action Plan for Regulatory Deep Cleaning in its Communication “A Simpler, Clearer and Better Enforced EU Rulebook”, targeting 12 priority areas to be examined in 2026 and 2027.

While the initiative was welcomed by the chamber network as an opportunity to change course, timelines, methodological framework, and prioritisation criteria of the Action Plan proposals remain vague. Eurochambres calls on the Commission to accelerate the “simplification for competitiveness agenda” by stress-testing all policy areas of the EU acquis, removing overlapping and outdated rules, and giving continuity to the Action Plan after 2027. Chambers see every day where EU rules create unnecessary costs, overlaps, and uncertainty. In this spirit, this checklist includes more than 60 targeted proposals across 12 areas, drawn directly from the experience of businesses of all sizes and sectors.

At the same time, cleaning up the existing rulebook will achieve little if new legislation keeps adding to it. EU institutions and member states cannot call for simplification while continuing to adopt rules that pull in the opposite direction to the detriment of the competitiveness of European businesses. The forthcoming annual Commission Work Programme must focus on measures with a strong simplification dimension, in line with the principle of simplicity by design and the commitment to ‘’regulatory restraint’’. However, the commitment to legislate less and better needs to be coupled with withdrawing proposals that have not found consensus among the co-legislators, such as the Commission proposals for a Late Payment Regulation, Directive on Green Claims, and Financial Data Access (FiDA) Regulation.

The simplification agenda must deliver a predictable regulatory framework and clear benefits for businesses, including less time spent on administrative and reporting tasks. To make decisive progress, Eurochambres invites the Commission to implement the following guiding principles:

• Competitiveness must be tested, not assumed. The SME filter, test and check need to be applied systematically and evaluate impacts such as the SME compliance capacity. Eurochambres calls on the co-legislators to operationalise the 2016 Interinstitutional Agreement on better lawmaking and ensure that substantial amendments with relevance to SMEs, introduced during the co-legislative process, are assessed using a common methodology.
• Get it right the first time and make “once only” and “digital by default” a reality. Fewer, better-designed rules with consistent definitions across files would prevent many of the burdens that must later be cleaned up.
• Implementation matters as much as legislation. Gold-plating and divergent national transposition fragment the single market. The Commission should monitor implementation more closely and act against unjustified additional requirements. The pact against gold-plating, announced in the 2026 State of the European Union, needs to be put into practice without delay.
• Stability is a competitive asset and simplification must not create new uncertainty. Businesses need predictable rules and realistic application timelines, with guidance and standards available well before obligations apply. Eurochambres calls on the Commission to systematically apply SME-friendly provisions when drafting new legislation.
• Go beyond paperwork. Reducing reporting obligations is necessary but not sufficient. The deep cleaning must bring down compliance costs and remove overlapping or disproportionate requirements as part of the entire EU acquis.
• Measure what businesses feel. Burden reduction targets should be tracked transparently, with results verified against the actual experience of companies rather than estimates alone.
• Involve those who apply the rules. Eurochambres and the chamber network are committed to acting as a permanent reality check throughout the deep cleaning exercise, from identifying burdens to testing solutions.

[1] European Policy Innovation Council tracker: Draghi Observatory & Implementation Index – EPIC