European Union (Approvals) Bill [HL]

Explanatory Notes


Overview of the Bill

1 The purpose of the Bill is to approve two draft decisions of the Council of the European Union. This is to fulfil a requirement in section 8 of the European Union Act 2011 ("2011 Act") which will enable the United Kingdom to vote in favour of the draft decisions.

2 The first draft decision is on the participation of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia as an observer in the work of the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights.

3 The second draft decision is to update the instrument that formalises the Tripartite Social Summit (TSS), the long-established forum for high-level consultation between the EU institutions and the EU social partners. A new decision was proposed in order to take account of the changes in the EU’s legal and institutional framework in the last decade.

Prepared 26th June 2015