With the European Parliament’s slow-motion confirmation of the new European Commission finally complete, this week’s EU Politics Decoded is diving into the first 100 days of the fresh executive. 

This week in news was no ordinary one – from once-in-a-half-century political upheaval in France and South Korea, to mass pro-EU demonstrations in Tbilisi, to President-elect Donald Trump’s increasingly interesting cabinet picks.  

For the author of a newsletter on the minutiae of EU politics, it was a week that brought some much-appreciated perspective – and allowed the saga around the confirmation of the new European Commission to be viewed, at last, in the rear-view mirror. 

Just to tie up that particular thread: very little came out of month-long tug-of-war between political groups in the European Parliament.

As predicted, EU lawmakers had little appetite to actually reject any nominees – instead, we were treated to a protracted, closed-door negotiation that yielded only title tweaks for a handful of commissioners, and Hungary’s Olivér Várhelyi having reproductive rights removed from his portfolio – even though the area already falls outside the EU’s competence.

Competitiveness, competitiveness, competitiveness

But now, we can look forward – and so too can Europe’s new leadership. The Commission will soon publish its work programme, outlining its priorities for the near and not-so-near future. 11 February has been pencilled in as the launch date for now, according to an internal Commission document seen by Euractiv.

We’ve also seen a draft of the programme – and unsurprisingly, competitiveness seems to be the focus. 

All the way back in her July bid for re-election, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced a Clean Industrial Deal. This is shaping up to be a multi-layered plan to further slice European dependency on Russian energy imports, introduce a brand new “competitiveness fund”, and a “New Competitiveness Act” – all to come in the Commission’s first 100 days, Euractiv understands. 

Forged in the image of the EU’s 2021 climate law, the “New Competitiveness Act” will set benchmark targets reflective of the proposals in the Draghi report. In his hallmark paper, the former Italian prime minister delivered a solemn diagnosis of the EU’s inability to compete with its global counterparts. 

In January, the new Executive Vice-President for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy, Stéphane Sejourné, is due to present the annual Single Market and Competitiveness Report, and propose a Competitiveness Compass, to guide the direction of EU policymaking going forward. 

Playing politics with pharma and migration 

Also coming up early in the new Commission mandate is the Critical Medicines Act, focusing on securing fragile value chains for the EU’s pharmaceutical businesses.

Euractiv understands that some policymakers are pushing for the legislation to be done, or as close to done as possible, by mid-2025 – both out of an urgent need for new legislation and to avoid the file landing in the hands of the Danish presidency next July. The EU’s most valuable company, Novo Nordisk, is a pharmaceutical company headquartered in the Scandinavian country, prompting fears that national interests might take precedence should the Danes take the lead. 

The documents seen by Euractiv also confirm longstanding suspicions that the Commission will propose brand-new legislation on migrant returns. A recast of the current legislation has been stuck in the European Parliament’s civil rights committee for more than four years.

Facing mounting political pressure, the Commission now wants to start over. At his confirmation hearing, new migration chief Magnus Brunner had hinted at a new proposal to be announced by summer 2025, but the repeal of the recast is expected to happen sooner. 

Although there is plenty of work to be done, the new Commission may still get off to slow start. Two forthcoming events may stifle any major policy initiative in its infancy – or at least prompt a delay while the Commission re-assesses the lie of the political land: the return of Donald Trump to the White House in late January, and the German federal elections in February.