Poland’s “year of deregulation” produced dozens of useful improvements for businesses. But, at the very same time, policymakers were creating new rules that undermined legal stability and contradicted the spirit of deregulation itself.
A year has now passed since Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk invited entrepreneurs, led by Rafał Brzoska, to cooperate on deregulation. In February 2025, the “SprawdzaMY” initiative was launched, producing hundreds of reform recommendations. The following month, the government established a Deregulation Task Force chaired by Maciej Berek. The Polish parliament also created a Deregulation Committee headed by Ryszard Petru. For several months deregulation became a prominent topic in public debate – and indeed, quite a lot happened.
From today’s perspective, it is fair to say that a number of improvements were achieved, although expectations had undoubtedly been much higher. After all, the initiative had been presented as a “Year of Breakthrough”. Most of the reforms were relatively modest. Taken together, however, they improved the quality of Poland’s business environment and made everyday life somewhat easier for citizens. What was missing were major structural reforms – for example those that could have accelerated the extremely slow judicial system or simplified Poland’s complex tax system. Much, therefore, remains to be done, which is why deregulation needs to become a continuous process rather than a one-off political initiative.
Principles of Good Law
At the same time, while policymakers were approving deregulation proposals developed by entrepreneurs, experts, and civil society organizations, new regulations were being drafted in the parliament and ministerial offices. Concerns arose not only about their content, but also about the way they were introduced. In other words, while several steps forward were being taken, others were made in the opposite direction.
The Economic Freedom Foundation and the Civil Development Forum published a set of principles titled Ten Principles of Good Law. These included, among others, the presumption of economic freedom, proportionality of state intervention, legal stability, and the “EU+zero” rule – meaning that national lawmakers should avoid adding extra domestic regulations when implementing EU directives. As the first anniversary of the “SprawdzaMY” initiative passed earlier this year, many commentaries focused on what the deregulation effort had achieved. This article instead highlights examples of policies that not only violated the principles proposed by these organizations under the Deregulacja.pl project, but were also inconsistent with the very idea of deregulation that the government had placed at the centre of its agenda.
Good Intentions, Poor Execution
The beginning of 2026 was dominated by heated debates about Poland’s National e-Invoice System (KSeF). Although the idea of digitizing tax settlements was a step in the right direction, the way it was implemented raised understandable concerns among businesses. Repeated postponements of deadlines, continuous changes to the system, a lack of deeper debate about compliance costs for firms, doubts about data security and the mandatory – rather than voluntary – nature of the system all contributed to uncertainty. As a result, instead of a smooth digital transition, many businesses faced growing anxiety and concerns about the potential misuse of the system by the tax authorities.
A similar pattern appeared in the introduction of the deposit return system. Ambitious environmental goals were combined with rushed and inconsistent implementation. The lack of an adequate implementation period, an unclear division of responsibilities, and extensive administrative obligations hit smaller retail businesses particularly hard. Instead of a predictable rollout, the system ran into the usual teething problems that a better regulatory design could largely have prevented. As a consequence, meaningful debate about effective environmental policy tools became more difficult.
Labor Market Reforms Moving in the Wrong Direction
Within the “SprawdzaMY” initiative there had been many discussions about the labor law, which no longer reflects the realities of a modern economy. At the same time, however, for many months the Polish Ministry of Labor attempted to introduce sweeping new powers for the National Labor Inspectorate, allowing it to change employment contracts without waiting for a court ruling. In its most radical versions, the proposal even envisaged retroactive application of the law over several years, which would have created enormous costs and legal uncertainty. Although the proposal was ultimately blocked by Prime Minister Tusk in January, the question remains: Why had it been treated as a serious legislative option for so many months?
Another example of regulatory inconsistency emerged just before the New Year’s Eve, when the government announced changes to the rules governing the employment of Ukrainian citizens. The proposal to phase out some provisions of the special legislation regulating their employment was prepared without consultation with employers’ organizations. It could significantly disrupt companies employing nearly one million foreign workers and create administrative chaos in the labor market. Instead of predictable rules and social dialogue, policymakers proposed solutions that increased legal uncertainty for both businesses and employees.
Regulatory Instability in Alcohol and Tobacco Policy
Regulatory instability was also clearly visible in the alcohol and tobacco sectors. In the second half of 2025, the government abandoned the so-called ‘excise duty roadmap’ for alcohol, after having already undermined it a year earlier in relation to tobacco products. These roadmaps were intended to ensure stable market conditions, limit the shadow economy, and reduce arbitrariness in setting indirect taxes. Breaking them violated the principle of legal stability and undermined the credibility of the state as a regulatory partner – not only for those industries. Ultimately, the planned increase in alcohol excise duty was vetoed by President Karol Nawrocki.
At the same time, work continued on additional regulations, including proposals to ban alcohol sales at petrol stations – which account for only around 2% of total alcohol sales – and to further restrict advertising, including advertising for non-alcoholic beer. Some of these proposals appeared to be symbolic political gestures rather than elements of a coherent, evidence-based alcohol policy.
Chaotic Regulation of E-Cigarettes
For many months, policymakers also attempted to address the problem of disposable e-cigarettes, citing their growing popularity among minors. This is a serious issue that requires coherent and comprehensive solutions rather than a series of ad hoc interventions.
First, alongside excise duties on e-liquids, a tax on devices themselves was introduced. It failed to generate the expected revenue, partly because the rules could be relatively easily circumvented — for example, through modular or foldable devices. Then, at the end of December 2025, the Ministry of Finance targeted only one type of device based on induction technology, proposing to impose double taxation compared with other products.
Instead of technological neutrality, policymakers introduced confusing inequalities in haste. Such regulatory chaos not only contradicted the rhetoric of deregulation, but also made it harder to conduct a serious debate about public policy towards nicotine products – a debate that should be informed by international experience and the principle of harm reduction.
Tax Stability and the Risk of Gold-Plating
Banks also became a target for lawmakers. In this case, the government – thanks to the president’s support – succeeded in introducing a higher corporate income tax for the sector. Although formally a fiscal decision, it also had a significant regulatory dimension because it undermined the principles of stability and neutrality in the tax system. If taxes can be increased for one sector simply because politicians consider its profits “excessive”, it raises the question whether other industries might face similar treatment – especially in the context of strained public finances. Although the government had repeatedly emphasized a general rule that tax changes should come with at least six months’ vacatio legis, in this case, the draft legislation was presented only four months before its planned entry into force.
During this supposed year of deregulation there were also examples of regulatory gold-plating – adding additional national requirements when implementing European legislation. One example was a law regulating the crypto-assets market, which was vetoed by President Nawrocki. As many experts pointed out, the proposal introduced excessive regulatory obligations going far beyond the requirements of the Markets in Crypto‑Assets Regulation. The issue was not the implementation of MiCA itself, but the attempt to expand it with additional domestic rules that increased regulatory costs without delivering proportional benefits for market security.
Deregulation Requires Rules
The government’s acceptance of more than 190 deregulation proposals was good news. Yet, the overall balance of this “year of deregulation” shows that Poland still lacks a coherent philosophy of lawmaking. Deregulation should not consist of isolated corrections implemented while new, unstable, and excessive regulations are produced at the same time.
Without firm principles – legal stability, proportionality, technological neutrality, limits on gold-plating, and simple regulatory restraint – deregulation will remain a seasonal political project rather than a lasting improvement in the quality of the state. And that is something Poland, which should aspire to become one of the twenty most attractive places in the world to start and grow a business, simply cannot afford.
The article was previously published in Polish on the Forsal portal.