LAW & CORPORATE AFFAIRS
Public affairs, legislative, regulatory and corporate law

On Wednesday January 19th, Emmanuel expanded on the French EU Presidency priorities before the European Parliament. Broadly speaking, President Macron advocated for European values and sovereignty, together with regaining citizens’ trust in the EU.

The year 2021, in the continuation of 2020, has been special and complex. Our profession of public affairs advisors has been enriched and our values strengthened.

Report of the event organized by Numeum and SAMMAN Law & Corporate Affairs, 3 December 2021

1. Background

France will take over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union (EU) from January 1^st to June 30^th, 2022, coinciding with the general election campaign, i.e., the election of the President of the Republic in April, and that of the National Assembly members (Parliament's lower house) in June.

In a deliberation dated 26 July relating to MONSANTO COMPANY, the French data protection authority (Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés -CNIL”) confirmed – and this is good news – that personal data processing that consists of collecting information for the purpose of identifying influential individuals to whom a company would like to promote its interests can be, subject to certain conditions, carried out on the basis of the legitimate interest pursued by the data controller.

In June 2021, the European Commission presented a proposal for a revision of Directive 2008/48/EC on credit agreements for consumers (CCD, Consumer Credit Directive), kicking off a reform with significant implications for the financial, e-commerce and fintech sectors in the European Union (EU).

The fast pace of EU decision making during the Covid-19 outbreak showed that “Europe is more united, more resilient, more efficient than 10 years ago”. It is with these words that French Junior Minister of European Affairs Clément Beaune launched our series of dialogues on the issues at stake for the upcoming French EU Presidency.

The draft law on the management of the health crisis was adopted on July 25, 2021. The Constitutional Court (Conseil Constitutionnel), to which the draft law was referred for review, will issue its decision on August 5, 2021. The entry into force of the law is announced for August 9th. 

The  bill to reduce the environmental footprint of the digital economy, sponsored by Senator Patrick Chaize (Conservatives), is the direct outcome of the report presented by the Senate’s task force on this issue in June 2020.

The second round of the French regional elections went ahead yesterday, June 27^th. In France, regional councils are elected every six years under a proportional voting list system, where the first list of the second round gets an absolute majority of councilors. In all, 1,758 regional councilor positions are up for grabs. This second round confirms the lack of interest among voters for these intermediary elections, recording a slightly lower abstention rate (65,7%) than in the first round (66,7%), but which remains among the lowest turnouts since 1945.

The first round of the elections for the renewal of the members of the 18 regional councils (local governments mainly in charge of local economic development including digital transformation, higher education and research, transportation) was held yesterday, June 20^th. The second round will be held on June 27^th. Regional councils are elected every six years under a proportional voting list system, where the first list of the second round gets an absolute majority of councilors. In all, 1,758 regional councilor positions are up for grabs.

Seven years after the last Summit held in the presence of a U.S. president, the EU heads of states or governments welcomed President Joe Biden in Brussels on June 15^th. The agenda included a long list of issues that have often put at odds the two transatlantic partners throughout the Trump administration. 

France is accelerating its vaccination campaign. Find out where the situation stands in this overview of the French measures taken to manage the sanitary crisis.

2021 05 06 Measures taken to manage the Covid-19 outbreak in France.pdf

Twenty years after the adoption of the e-Commerce Directive, the European Commission released its Digital Services Act Package (Package) comprising two proposals for a Regulation, the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Digital Markets Act (DMA), that will profoundly modify the legal regime for online services:

With 2020 having been such a peculiar year, marked by the global pandemic, we decided as a firm to support a cause that really resonates with us. 

Two members of our team have joined the governing bodies of the FIPRA network present in more than fifty countries around the world and which SAMMAN Law and Corporate Affairs represents in France. 

We keep monitoring actively the measures taken by the Government and the European institutions to tackle the crisis. You can follow the adoption of Covid-19 related measures in France on our LinkedIn.

The Covid-19 epidemic and subsequent lockdown did not slow down our activities for our clients, quite on the contrary. We have developed new actions, such as actively monitoring measures taken by the Government and the European institutions to tackle the crisis, or, with our network FIPRA, an interactive tool compiling the European approaches on contact tracing apps.

The European Commission published its Digital Package on February 19th, 2020, setting the framework for action over the next five years in the digital sphere. The COVID-19 outbreak has, however, forced the European institutions to rapidly switch into crisis management mode; political energy has been drawn towards containing the spread of the virus, with marginal reviews so far of its 2020 Work Programme. 

Digital look at the EU Digital agenda in light of COVID19 - 21 April 2020.pdf