8 EU enlargement: Albania
| Committee's assessment
| Politically important |
| Committee's decision | Cleared from scrutiny
|
| Document details | Commission Report: Albania's Progress in the Fight Against Corruption and Organised Crime and in the Judicial Reform
|
| Legal base | —
|
| Department | Foreign and Commonwealth Office
|
| Document numbers | (36110) 10582/14, COM(14) 331
|
Summary and Committee's conclusions
8.1 The Commission recommended that Albania be granted
accession candidate status in its October 2013 progress report
(part of the 2013 "enlargement package"). The December
2013 General Affairs Council (GAC) concluded that more time was
needed to demonstrate sustained and concrete delivery in the areas
of anti-corruption and judicial reform strategies, recently adopted
relevant legislation, and pro-active investigations and prosecutions,
including in the area of organised crime; asked for a further
progress report; and looked forward to a decision regarding granting
candidate status in June 2014, subject to endorsement by the European
Council.
8.2 In January, the Committee made its position clear:
"an unqualified statement of the Government's position before
the event, so that we can scrutinise it". In reaching its
position, the Committee had taken into account the EU's experience
with Bulgaria and Romania, both of whom — after seven years
"in special measures", under the Cooperation and Verification
Regime — have still to reach the appropriate standards in
precisely all of these "good governance" areas; with
this experience and all its consequences in mind, whether or not,
in mid-2014, Albania was going to move to this next, highly important
stage of the accession process would be both highly important
and controversial (see paragraphs 8.5-8.7 below for full details).
8.3 The further Commission report was published on
5 June and deposited on 15 June. Notwithstanding the Committee's
expectation, all that the Minister for Europe said in his 16 June
EM was that the Government had not taken a final view on whether
to support the granting of candidate status and that a decision
would be reached in time for the 24 June GAC.
8.4 The Committee accordingly invited the Minister
for Europe (Mr David Lidington) to give oral evidence on 16 July
(see the Annex to this chapter of our Report for the full text
of the exchanges between the Minister and the Committee).
8.5 In essence, the Minister argued that:
— the timing outlined above gave him no
other choice, as the Government only had that period in which
to work out its collective position;
— it then decided that to refuse candidate
status would set back the reform process, and thus contradict
UK objectives, whereas granting it would be an incentive for Albania
to do more;
— to have provided the Committee with any
insight into its thinking between January and June would have
infringed upon the right relationship between government and parliament;
— the granting of candidate status was
in any event only a symbolic statement, and Albania was not going
to be ready for accession before the late 2020's on the most optimistic
calculations.
8.6 The Committee's position was, and remains,
different. If, as was the case, the Government had talked at length
with the Commission about all this, there was no good reason for
remaining silent vis à vis the Committee until the
eve of the GAC meeting. Moreover, the Government "talks"
regularly to the Committee about all sorts of other EU external
activity, prior to the decision stage. In a nutshell, there was
nothing in what the Minister said to the Committee on 16 July
that could not have been said well before mid-June. In the final
analysis, we agree that the decision was a matter of judgement.
But we do not accept that, as the Minister seems to have suggested,
the House had no proper process in considering that judgement
prior to its being put into effect: indeed, this is what parliamentary
scrutiny requires. In this instance, therefore, we continue to
believe that what was — its symbolism notwithstanding —
a highly important and controversial decision escaped prior scrutiny
for no good reason.
8.7 Elsewhere in this Report, we consider the
2014 "enlargement package" and the associated Country
Progress Reports.[25]
Following the granting of Candidate Status to Albania in June,
the Country Progress Report states that further progress has been
made towards fulfilling the political criteria but Albania needs
to consolidate the momentum of reform. The Government agrees that
the Albanian government has made progress in its fight against
organised crime and corruption. However, it also agrees that it
needs to sustain the process of reform and in particular put substantial
effort into further judicial reform to underpin other activity.
It also regards it vital to establish a track record of prosecutions
and convictions of criminal activity and corruption; has detailed
concerns with regard to human trafficking and migration pressures
from Albania; and has emphasised that more needs to be done to
improve effective border controls. All in all, Albania needs to
intensify its efforts to ensure a sustained, comprehensive and
inclusive implementation of the key priorities, notably the reform
of the public administration and the judiciary, the fight against
organised crime and corruption, the protection of human rights
and anti-discrimination policies. The Government also supports
the Commission's call on both the Albanian government and the
opposition to develop a constructive and sustainable political
dialogue to assist the reform process.
8.8 We now clear the Commission report.
Full details of the document:
Commission Report: Albania's Progress in the Fight Against Corruption
and Organised Crime and in Judicial Reform: (36110), 10582/14,
COM(14) 331.
Background and previous scrutiny
8.9 Commission Communication 14942/13: Enlargement
Strategy and Main Challenges 2013-2014, provided the customary
annual statement of the EU's evolving enlargement strategy, assessment
of progress, and forward look to the challenges and priorities
for 2014.
8.10 Having been invited by the Council to report
as soon as the necessary progress had been achieved, and taking
into account the further action taken by Albania to fight corruption
and organised crime, including by proactive investigations and
prosecutions of such cases, this "annual enlargement package"
included a Commission recommendation that Albania should become
a candidate country.[26]
8.11 Among other things, we noted the breadth and
depth of the issues that Albania still needed to address. The
Minister had highlighted the importance of tackling the rule of
law upfront, building track records of effective implementation
and enforcement and developing robust track records on issues
such as organised crime and corruption, in the pre-accession as
well as the accession process. Some other Member States apparently
took a more positive view.
8.12 The December 2013 GAC commissioned a further
such report and concluded that, in the light thereof, and "on
the understanding that Albania builds on the encouraging progress
made so far", it looked forward to a decision regarding granting
candidate status to Albania in June 2014, subject to endorsement
by the European Council.
8.13 The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington)
said at that time that he agreed that more time was needed to
demonstrate sustained and concrete delivery".
8.14 Our second Report under reference[27]
dealt with Minister's letter of 24 January 2014, the purpose of
which, he said, was to provide an update on the detail of the
UK Government's position and "clarity on the next steps following
the 17 December 2013 General Affairs Council Conclusions".
With regard to Albania, we annexed to our Report the Minister's
summary of the previous Commission report on Albania and his previous
comments, together with an extract on Albania from the 17 December
2013 GAC Conclusions. [28]
8.15 Looking ahead to when the Minister deposited
this further Commission report for scrutiny, we said:
"we shall expect him to provide an unqualified
statement of the Government's position. By then, the position
will be clear, one way or the other: there will be no justification
for further prevarication about possible last minute changes on
the eve of the Council meeting."
8.16 In his Explanatory Memorandum of 16 June 2014,
the Minister summarised this second Commission report thus:
"the report notes that Albania has continued
to make headway in a number of areas, backed up by demonstrable
political will. The report also highlights areas where further
efforts are required to reach EU norms. It confirms and repeats
the Commission's recommendation that Albania be granted candidate
status, but states clearly the Commission's view that further
progress will be needed for Albania to advance to any subsequent
stages of its EU path."
8.17 He also said:
"The Government has not taken a final view
on whether to support the granting of candidate status. This is
a complex decision that requires consultation across multiple
Departments, which is currently in progress. A decision will be
reached in time for the June General Affairs Council, when the
question of candidate status will be discussed."
8.18 The Minister explained that, as part of the
decision process, the question of whether Albania should be granted
candidate status was:
"currently under discussion by the European
Affairs Committee on the basis of the Commission Report and other
available evidence. I will write to the European Scrutiny Committee
with the Government's final position at the relevant time."
8.19 In response, we noted that:
— in reaching its position, the Committee
had taken into account the EU's experience with Bulgaria and Romania,
both of whom — after seven years "in special measures",
under the Cooperation and Verification Regime — have still
to reach the appropriate standards in precisely all of these "good
governance" areas;
— with this experience and all its consequences
in mind, whether or not, in mid-2014, Albania was going to move
to this next stage of the accession process would be both highly
important and controversial;
— we could thus not have been clearer about
what was required in order for us to be able to scrutinise effectively
such a significant decision of the Government;
— as to the Government's views, the very
least that we expected was an assessment of whether the Minister
regarded the Commission's findings as constituting sufficient
evidence of "sustained and concrete delivery";
— all such calculations have been "a
complex decision that requires consultation across multiple Departments"
for many years, with many other countries;
— there was in our view no excuse for the
Minister not having warned the Committee in good time that he
was not going to accede to the Committee's long-standing request;
— instead, sending his Explanatory Memorandum
only on 16 June was far too late for it to be considered at our
last meeting before the June GAC, as his staff, if not he, would
have known.
8.20 We therefore found the timing and nature of
the Minister's response — which effectively denied the House
the opportunity to scrutinise meaningfully the Government's position
on a highly controversial matter — unacceptable. Against
this background, the Committee was driven inescapably to the conclusion
that, through the Minister, the Government was showing disrespect
to the scrutiny process.
8.21 The Committee therefore invited the Minister
to appear before it on 16 July to discuss these matters.[29]
Previous Committee Reports
Fourth Report HC 219-iv (2014-15), chapter 4 (25
June 2014); also see (35395) 14942/13, (35399) 14946/1/13, (35400)
14947/13, (35401) 14948/13, (35398) 14945/13, (35396) 14943/13,
(35397) 14944/13, (35402) 14949/13, (35403) 14950/13: Thirty-third
Report, HC 83-xxx (2013-14), chapter 18 (29 January 2014) and
Twenty-Second Report, HC 83-xx (2013-14), chapter 11 (6 November
2013).
25 See (36392), 14152/14: Commission Communication
Enlargement Strategy and Main Challenges 2014-15, and the
associated Country Progress Reports, at chapter 4 of this Report. Back
26
See our Twenty-Second Report HC 83-xx (2013-14), chapter 11 (6
November 2013) for the full details of the Commission Communication
and the Albania Country Progress Report. Back
27
Thirty-third Report, HC 83-xxx (2013-14), chapter 18 (29 January
2014). Back
28
The Council Conclusions are available at http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/EN/genaff/140142.pdf. Back
29
See Fourth Report HC 219-iv (2014-15), chapter 4 (25 June 2014). Back
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