The Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) failed to win qualified majority support in the final vote of the European Council on Wednesday.

The vote was postponed from the originally planned date of 9 February to deal with opposition from the German and Italian governments. However, the result on Wednesday was that out of the 27 EU member states, 13 abstained and one voted against the current text of the CSDD, leaving the legislation far short of the required approval by the 15 member states, representing 65% of the EU's population.

This is a disappointment for those who have been advocating for the CSDDD for the past four years. The CSDDD aims to introduce a corporate due diligence obligation into national law, which requires companies to identify, prevent, mitigate and account for the negative impacts of their actions on human rights and the environment, including their value chains in Europe and beyond. Supporters of the draft legislation have described it as essential for curbing corporate human rights and environmental abuses. However, a key objection from key members of the European Council has been the breadth of the CSDDD and the level of administrative burden it would impose on companies in its scope, given the ever-increasing complexity of global supply chains. (Catherine Sellars, Angelica Lovell, more at lexology.com)