CYIL vol. 15 (2024)

RADKA MacGREGOR PELIKÁNOVÁ Namely, this Proposal was prepared based on the results from a public consultation conducted between January and April 2022, on the “Have Your Say” portal with 331 respondents, of which 166 were EU Citizens. 32 A large majority of the respondents pointed out the problem of the decreased lifespans of consumer goods, often coupled with the issue of the lack of the availability for repairing them. The respondents asked, overwhelmingly, for the promotion of sustainable consumption by incentivizing the repair on the EU level, i.e., under the auspices of EU law and in the context of the satisfaction of SDGs. The European Commission acted accordingly and, in March 2023, produced two proposals leading to special framework changes: the Proposal for a Green Claims Directive and the Proposal for a Repair Goods Directive to support the durability and re-use of products. Both Proposals were linked to SDGs and based upon Art. 114 TFEU, focused on the functioning of the internal single market and advanced special aspects of consumer protection/rights in relation to the sustainability as understood by the first common priority, the European Green Deal, and its EGD3 Circular economy action plan. The Explanatory Memorandum to the Proposal for a Repair Goods Directive highlighted It is therefore necessary to harmonize certain aspects of repair outside the existing liability of the seller, in order to ensure the functioning of the single market concerning the relation between a consumer and a repairer, increase legal certainty and reduce transaction costs in particular for small and medium sized enterprises, mostly represented in the repair sector (page 3) and linked these endeavors to the global dimension of SDGs by stating “The SGD has already fully harmonized certain rules on the sale of goods purchased by consumers. As this proposal changes one aspect of these rules in order to promote repair within the legal guarantee, the change needs to be done at EU level” (page 3). In order to do it, there was selected a standalone directive, while the constitutional dimension was mentioned, including references to Art. 16 (Freedom to conduct a business), Art. 26 (Integration of persons with disabilities), Art. 37 (Environmental protection), Art. 38 (Consumer protection), and Art. 47 (Right to an effective remedy and to a fair trial) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU. 33 Already, the original wording of the Proposal for a Repair Goods Directive specifically indicated the choice of the full harmonization (Art. 3), the compulsory use of the standardized European Repair Information Form set out in Annex I allowing a transparent comparison for consumers (Art. 4), and the famous obligation to repair (Art. 5). This obligation means there is a duty of producers to repair defects of products listed in Annex II, provided these defects are outside the liability of the seller and consumers request their repair and are ready to pay for it. The linking of the obligation to repair to existing reparability requirements as listed in Annex II ensures that this obligation can be performed in practice and that there is a legal certainty for economic operators. 32 EUROPEAN COMMISSION. Sustainable consumption of goods. Promoting repair and reuse. Factual summary report Open Public Consultation. [online]. Available from: https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/13150-Sustainable-consumption-of-goods-promoting-repair-and-reuse/ public-consultation_en. 33 CHARTER OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS OF THE EUROPEAN UNION (2016/C 202/02) [online]. In EUR-Lex. Available from: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:12016P/TXT.

170