The European Commission proposed a new Directive in order to create a more harmonised framework for prosecuting and punishing crimes involving the EU budget so that criminals no longer exploit differences between national legal systems. According to Viviane Reding, the EU's Justice Commissioner, currently some Member States punish one crime with imprisonment whilst others take no action.

The new Directive proposed by the European Commission provides common definitions of offences against the EU budget and for minimum sanctions, including imprisonment in serious cases, and for a common level playing field for periods within which it is possible to investigate and prosecute offences (ie. statutes of limitation). According to the Commission, it will help to deter fraudsters, provide for more effective legal action at national level and make it easier to recover lost funds. In June 2011, the Commission adopted its new Anti-Fraud Strategy.

In particular, the new rules presented defines offences such as fraud, or other fraud related crimes such as corruption, the misappropriation of funds, money laundering or obstruction of public procurement procedures to the detriment of the EU budget. These common definitions will help to ensure equal application by judicial authorities across the EU. In addition, it provides for Member States to impose a minimum sanction of six months' imprisonment for serious cases. In order to help the recovery of funds it provides for confiscation of the proceeds of these crimes.

Currently, there is a wide variety of approaches to the protection of EU funds across Member States. The interpretation of what constitutes fraud to the EU budget differs from one country to another, as do the penalties. To give one example: the level of sanctions for fraud varies across the European Union from no mandatory sentence for fraud to 12 years imprisonment. Equally periods within which it is possible to investigate and prosecute offences vary widely, ranging from 1 to 12 years. Moreover, the conviction rate for cases of fraud detected in Member States when executing the EU budget ranges from 14% to 80% (with an EU average of 41%) depending on the Member State concerned.