Clear-cutting of the EU Supply Chain Directive

In today's vote by the European Parliament's Legal Affairs Committee (JURI) on the Omnibus I package, a series of draft amendments are expected to be adopted that call into question the effectiveness of the EU Supply Chain Directive as a whole.

Sofie Kreusch comments on behalf of the Initiative Lieferkettengesetz:

"As the Initiative Lieferkettengesetz, we are appalled by the planned massive encroachments on human and labor rights worldwide—and equally appalled by the shameful manner in which this agreement was reached. The fact that the conservative EPP openly threatened to cooperate with the anti-European far right is a political taboo breach – and the fact that the Social Democratic faction leadership actually gave in to such blackmail is a serious mistake. The victims of this power play will be the workers along global supply chains – whose rights were once a central concern of social democracy. One thing is clear: this bill must not be passed in its current form. The SPD in particular must remain steadfast in further negotiations instead of sacrificing the hard-won supply chain law."

Jan Königshausen from the human rights organization Society for Threatened Peoples (STP), which is part of the Initiative Lieferkettengesetz, comments:

"By watering down due diligence obligations, Europe is accepting that vulnerable groups such as Indigenous Peoples will continue to be disenfranchised and their habitats destroyed. In the Amazon in particular, where timber, soy, and mining products are extracted for European markets, this leads to displacement, violence, and environmental destruction. Human rights violations along supply chains thus remain effectively unpunished – and Europe is making itself an accomplice. The EU must not outsource its responsibility. Without binding liability rules, the supply chain law will become an empty shell and the promise of a values-based foreign policy a farce."

The Legal Affairs Committee's proposal would remove the CSDDD's uniform EU-wide liability rules. This would deprive victims of human rights violations of the possibility of claiming damages under EU law. Due diligence obligations would also only apply to companies with 5,000 or more employees and annual revenues of €1.5 billion. In Germany, this would only affect around 120 large corporations – a fraction of the 5,200 German companies currently covered by supply chain due diligence obligations (LkSG).

You can find the background to the cooperation between the conservative EPP and the far-right factions in our latest briefing, “Right-wing alliance against sustainability?”

You can contact Jan Königshausen from the STP at j.koenigshausen@gfbv.de or 0551/49906-14.

You can contact the Initiative Lieferkettengesetz at (0)30 577132890 or presse@lieferkettengesetz.de.

The Initiative Lieferkettengesetz is supported by over 90 human rights organizations, environmental associations, trade unions, church and development policy organizations, including the Society for Threatened Peoples.