After over six years of negotiations, a new draft OLAF regulation is up for adoption at second reading. Following a year of trilogues (informal meetings between the European Commission, Council and Parliament) between October 2011and June 2012, the Parliament's committee on budgetary control endorsed the compromise reached in October 2012. The Council adopted the draft regulation at first reading in February 2013 and on 18 June 2013 the committee unanimously backed a recommendation that the European Parliament approve the draft text. The European Parliament aims at reaching an early second-reading agreement.
The new regulation offers a number of improvements to increase OLAF's competence in terms of its investigations, enhancing procedural guarantees and protecting fundamental rights, and its ability to co-operate with third countries and international organisations. The draft text is a good compromise and its functioning will be reviewed in the near future (two years after it enters into force). The legislative process should not be held to ransom due to diverging political views on just one investigative case.