Nobody was ever stopping individual member states from prosecuting Temu - they just don't do it because I don't know why, it's too much work? So finally after decades (because this is a decades-long issue with Aliexpress etc) they set up a EU-wide framework and once it starts acting, it's again EU's fault it took so long? They can only do what the member states delegate to them.

But it will eventually get better because in addition to DSA there are other steps; the importers have to declare a responsible person in the EU, the packages will get more expensive etc.

> Nobody was ever stopping individual member states from prosecuting Temu

As a general principle, the EU commission handles all international trade and member states are not allowed to impose tariffs or rules on what has been imported into other member states.

I say general principle because in many cases pre-existing legislation was allowed to continue, however anything new and any changes went through the EU commission (meaning the executive branch has full control, not parliament as generally was the case, even against the wishes of both the EU parliament and member state parliaments)

So no, the EU commission was stopping member states from doing this. So yes, it is very much the EU's fault it took so long.

Oh and, look up the history of the EU commission. If you think the EU commission will help anyone against big business, well, look up their history until you find "European Coal and Steel Community" and look up some of the scandals they were accused of. And yes, they're better than they were in 1951, but that's coming from a pretty damn bad start.

> So no, the EU commission was stopping member states from doing this.

No it wasn't. I wrote 'prosecuting', that is a term from criminal law, and that still is in the agenda of the member states. If Temu is breaking law, which it probably is when they were fined for selling "illegal products", then the states should have acted, but they didn't.

> If you think the EU commission will help anyone against big business

The difference is the seat of the said business.

My argument is that the government lets certain companies get away with large scale law violations, to the point that it killed local companies.

Both of your arguments are "but it's this slightly different part of government that's responsible: see it was X, not Y".

Ok fine, you're right but that doesn't refute what I said. Obviously people look at the effect of what government does as a whole. The net effect of what the entire government did was letting a LOT of companies get away with a lot of crimes, to the point of bankrupting a great deal of European businesses.

> My argument is that the government lets certain companies get away with large scale law violations

your argument is besides the topic of foreign companies violating the law and the member states doing nothing about it.

I don't understand. The EU purposefully advantaged Chinese companies for decades to the detriment of EU companies. I don't understand how anyone can either believe this was an accident or say it really was someone else.

Makes no sense.

The EU did nothing like that - it's quite simply a lie you are proclaiming here, and once again, the EU only does what the member states agree upon. China was for decades an important export market so chinese imports were accepted as a part of the deal by majority of the EU countries (otherwise they would simply change the rules). Now the tide is turning, many European imports are not needed anymore in China and so it is to be expected that chinese imports will be less welcome here. You may or may not agree with this politics, but there is no sinister conspiracy you are implying.

But all of this is still very much off topic in this discussion about the illegality of some imports (because that's a completely different issue than trade barriers and tariffs). And since you seem to claim (hard to tell really since we are veering offtopic all time) that the members states were powerless to act against those imports, I remember that even back in 2014 in our paltry Slovakia I had to personally visit our "Regional Public Health Office" and sign a form that the tea I imported from Yunnansourcing (less than 2kg in total) really is just for my personal consumption, otherwise they wouldn't let me have it or I would have to pay for maximum residue limits testing. And of course that was after I already paid the import duties. So when this much attention was possible in Slovakia for a small amount of tea, why wasn't it possible for any random package from China everywhere else? Because many countries simply decided they don't care although health and security is still their responsibility.

The EU is the member states. And I don't claim it is a sinister conspiracy, I simply claim the result is that the EU let Chinese companies get away with violating laws that EU companies would be sued and destroyed for.

Most packages out of China weren't tested at all in Western Europe. That's why the baby toys with lead paint ... was discovered by diagnosis, not by import checks. In other words: a whole bunch of children had their lives destroyed (lead contamination in children leads to permanent stunted brain growth in tiny doses. In other words, there is NO way medical fix once it happens, it is permanent life altering damage to those children, just like if you cut of an arm, except less visible)

Needless to say, Chinese companies didn't pay for anything ... and if you were caught painting baby toys in lead paint in Europe, we're talking billions in damages.

So there was nothing like those checks in the Netherlands or the UK. Nothing remotely like what you describe.

Yes, because it is the start of enforcement. That's how it works, not just a one-and-done slap on the wrist.

If they don't fix it, it'll eventually continue to the "20% of worldwide revenue" kind of fine everyone on HN was so afraid of when the GDPR was introduced. But that's not what it starts with.

This is a key observation and I also remember those dumb discussions. The top end of the fine scale is more or less theoretical if you demonstrate any willingness to improve. Looks like Temu has engaged in really bad practices, and they still only get what's (to them) a gentle reminder that there are rules.

So you're saying if I start a company in the EU that violates safety standards, copyright, trademarks, ... I will be allowed to profit of that for 3 years (let's pretend it's just 3 years that Chinese producers have been doing that) before facing any consequences and at that point STILL only be required to clean up my act (ie. not face any consequences for violations already done)?

I find this incredibly, incredibly hard to believe.

The EU does in fact not have an infinite amount of safety inspectors, however hard this is to believe for you.

Does it have enough to submit 1 chinese package to a safety inspector every 10 year? You know, because:

1) we all know it would only take a single one

2) they didn't do this for 20 years

In all seriousness. Does ANYONE believe that the EU commission/parliament did not know about this (despite millions of complaints) and only now discovered the problem? Is that seriously your point?

Or is it somewhat more believable that they did this with the express purpose of destroying local industry and the change is happening now because we have "Mercosur" causing the same issue, but moving from China to South America.

If you start the company in China and ship to EU. If you start it in a EU country I think local laws will stop you much faster than the EU commission. Still there are plenty of grifters that start fraudulent companies in the EU and roll assets into a new one as they bankrupt, and they can operate for decades before they eventually get stopped.

Exactly. This was an explicit policy by the EU to allow this for a very long time, destroying local industry.

It will never continue to 20% of worldwide revenue. No matter how long they refuse to comply with EU laws for.

GDPR has been a farce in terms of enforcement.

Because the GDPR enforcement is left to privacy agencies in the members states. The DSA is enforced at the EU level, so that might actually work.

Also a big problem is that the GPDR is a law in the style of all EU laws:

1) they are NOT laws. Despite what's published everywhere you get zero legal rights from the GPDR. A legal right is some right you have, and if someone violates that right you can ask a court to intervene. With the GPDR, there is no such right. No court will help you under the GPDR.

The executives of member state governments (and ~40 "international organizations", most famously Interpol) have the right to enforce GPDR. You can only complain to these new, totally separate from any other enforcement mechanism (ie. they're not police) organizations. And they, of course, generally don't listen.

If you go check the complaints lists are full of people complaining that their medical files were leaked by hospitals (because private doctors are in revolt to the GPDR) to various other government organizations, with very large consequences. For instance medical files being used to decide on insurance status, immigration status, unemployment/long term illness status, and family law status. There is no reaction to this, even when it does violate the GPDR. And my next paragraph is why it generally doesn't.

Second, the executives of member state governments have the right NOT to enforce GPDR. Specifically, the executive has the right to grant exceptions to the GPDR to any organization they want (including transitively: allowing a government contractor not only violate the GPDR themselves but to allow anyone else they use to violate the GPDR. For example, this is the reason Google, Amazon and Microsoft have essentially all medical files of everyone in the EU, and Palantir has some 20%)

These exceptions are made transitively AND after-the-fact. Neither of which is legal, but the only one who can complain is the government itself.

2) It means there is no point for individuals to file GPDR complaints. Normally there is "1831", which is a legal principle which refers to a particular law. Essentially that if you damage someone else by violating the law, you are responsible for that damage (ie. you can be made to pay for them). This applies to essentially every EU law. But not GPDR (and also not to other famous EU laws like DMA)

To illustrate the common problem: you go to the hospital, because you took drugs. Maybe you're scared it'll have serious consequences, whatever. Now you go to your insurance ... and they will no longer cover your treatment for heart arythmia. "It's your own fault, because you did drugs". Now what happened is that the hospital updated your medical file, and sent it to the government. Medical insurance is national, so they have access to medical files. Of course, it is a VERY serious GPDR violation that the information leaked, and with any other law this would mean that a judge will convict the hospital to pay for what you lost, say in this case, they would be forced to pay, WITHOUT the insurance covering it, your heart treatment.

Not with the GPDR. Even if you get the government to go after it, and you get them convicted, you get nothing. Nor is the insurance forced to change their decision.

This is how most new EU law works. The crucial difference is that for essentially all these laws, the EU commission holds all the cards. They then use their position of power to negotiate and come to an understanding with all these organizations. That's how they work, how they've always worked.

And it's one more reason I'm very opposed to the EU. Europeans will THOROUGLY regret giving the commission this power, that's a certainty in my mind.

Specifically what the commission does is to give companies exceptions to these rules. For example, Teresa Ribera, as well as Ursula Von Der Leyen, personally (and without any parliament approval) have the right to extend Apple's exemption to the DMA (and thus Apple's 30% cut to all transactions involving an iPhone in the EU). Both were born rich (Ursula Von Der Leyen is a member of a noble family that has been very wealthy for at least 400 years. Notably, her family's wealth survived WW2 in Germany ...) How is such enormous power in the hands of individuals used? Well, look up how and why a communist served for 8 years as the chairman of Goldman Sachs International.