Following a complaint by civil society organisations, European Ombudsman Teresa Anjinho opened an inquiry into the Commission's decision not to carry out an impact assessment on two legislative proposals to combat migrant smuggling. Specifically, the legislative proposals concern the directive to prevent and counter the facilitation of unauthorised entry, transit and stay in the EU and the regulation on enhancing police cooperation in relation to the prevention, detection and investigation of migrant smuggling and trafficking in human beings. The package was presented in November 2023 (→eucrim 3/2023, 257-258).

After the Ombudsman asked the Commission to explain why no impact assessment had been carried out, the latter is now also required to explain the urgency of these two legislative proposals. The state of play of the Ombudsman's inquiry can be retrieved here. The European Parliament has already criticised the lack of an impact assessment and the EP's Research Service did a "targeted substitute impact assessment", concluding that the proposed directive is not consistent with either international or EU standards (→eucrim news of 13 March 2025).