The EU Omnibus is a massive deregulation endeavour that empties out due diligence and sustainability reporting obligations. Designed by the European Commission through an opaque process that ignored the governance and democratic rules of the Union, the project jeopardizes years of legislative work aiming to ensure companies respect human and social rights, preserve the environment and align with climate goals. In this context, Reclaim Finance analysed the Omnibus proposal in a note and uncovered a very high degree of similarity between its content and the desires of industry lobbies (Medef/BDI/Confindustria, the French Banking Federation, Business Europe and the American Chamber of Commerce). This finding suggests the proposal is the result of corporate capture and makes it a democratic necessity to stop the Omnibus.

The Omnibus proposal put forward by the European Commission would turn due diligence into a compliance exercise and erase the requirement to implement a climate transition plan. At the same time, it would limit mandatory reporting to a handful of very large companies and focus on information that is already – at least partially – available today, thus failing to address the need to provide ample reliable data.  

Overall, the Omnibus is an historical attack on human rights, environmental protection and climate action, at odds with the bloc’s own objectives. It directly conflicts with the need to mobilize massive financing to fund the ecological transition, with 80% of the additional funding needed coming from the private sector according to the Draghi report.

In February 2025, fifty-two organizations – including Reclaim Finance – warned the Commission that “the process underpinning the Omnibus proposal is depriving the public of its democratic rights under the Treaties” and that there was a “serious risk of regulatory capture”. Indeed, the Omnibus was rushed through by the Commission without public consultation. It targets directives that are still to be fully implemented, without waiting for evaluations nor providing any impact assessment. On the contrary, many of the changes proposed contradict previous impact assessments.

The input received by the Commission originated from direct meetings with stakeholders and two “so-called” forums where it presented its project. The exact content of the meetings Commissioners leading on the Omnibus – and notably Commissioner Dombrovskis and Executive Vice-President Séjourné – and their teams had with large companies and their representatives in the weeks preceding the proposal is not disclosed.

In this context, Reclaim Finance analysed the demands from four major industry groups received by the Commissioners recently looking at the below documents:

• The joint letter from the Commission from Medef, BDI and Confindustria

• The “cutting the red tape” position paper from the French Banking Federation (FBF).

• “Reducing regulatory burden to restaure the EU’s competitive edge” from Business Europe.

• “The Omnibus package: a critical opportunity for Europe’s future” from the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham).

This reveals a very high degree of similarity between the measures included in the Omnibus and these demands. The demands from the four groups may not be worded in the same way but they largely converge. A clear common direction emerges and closely matches the Commission’s proposal. In fact, all the measures of the Omnibus are at least partially aligned with the lobby demands studied.

70% (7/10) of the demands included in the letter signed by Medef, BDI and Confindustria ended up in the legislative proposal presented by the European Commission. The French Banking Federation (FBF) managed to include 62% of its demands (8/13) in the final text. And these were not small asks: they actively lobbied for a definitive exclusion of financial services, for weakened liabilities and sanctions, or for the suspension of the Due Diligence Directive. On all these points, they secured a great first win, which will now depend on the European Parliament and the EU Council.

Given the opacity of the process and disregard for usual EU regulatory steps, the fact that the content of the Omnibus closely matches the demands of major industry lobbies cannot be brushed off. It suggests the Omnibus design is largely the result of corporate capture, in a catastrophic breach of EU rules. As the Omnibus would severely weaken frameworks protecting human rights and the environment and necessary to help drive the bloc toward climate action, it is both a democratic and a socio-ecological necessity to stop the Omnibus.