Following a lengthy vote in COM ENVI, there was no majority amongst MEPs to support their Committee’s Report on the Commission proposal on EU Nature Restoration Law. In the vote that started on Thursday 15 June and continued on Tuesday 27 June, COM ENVI finally rejected the Report. The final vote was 44 votes in favour, 44 against and 0 abstentions, falling short of a majority in favour.

This means that COM ENVI report will not be put to a vote in plenary but instead, COM ENVI has to table the proposal to completely reject the Commission’s proposal. This will be the first amendment to be voted on in the July plenary in Strasbourg. If the amendment is supported, the President of the Parliament shall ask the Commission to withdraw the proposal. If this amendment is rejected, the EP plenary session will then vote on the other amendments tabled ahead of the EP plenary to modify the original EC proposal.

To remind, the political strategies on Nature Restoration Law became very turbulent ever since the EPP Political Assembly in its EPP Vision for Agriculture in Europe called for the rejection of the EC proposal on NRL. Consequently, MEPs from COM AGRI and COM PECH lead by EPP, and supported by ECR, ID, and Renew have voted for complete rejection of the Nature Restoration Law (NRL). 

At the same time, in a meeting held on 20 June, EU Ministers adopted the Council’s General Approach on NRL . This agreement was without support from Poland, Italy, Sweden, Finland and the Netherlands. In a follow-up of this meeting, Statements from Latvia, Malta and Poland, raising concerns on the applicability of the proposal notably the mandatory rewetting targets, have been made available

It remains to see what will be the final verdict of the European Parliament in order to analyse the future of the EU Restoration Law.