Supplementary Memorandum by Professor
Damian Chalmers
INQUIRY INTO
THE IMPACT
OF THE
REFORM TREATY
ON THE
INSTITUTIONS OF
THE EUROPEAN
UNION
With your permission, I would like to add two
further observations in addition to the oral evidence I presented
to the committee.
1. I was asked about the new structure of
the Treaties and, in particular, the relationship between the
Treaty on European Union and the new Treaty on the Functioning
of the European Union. If I understood the questions well, there
was a concern that there was a risk of a prioritising of the former
and its broader principles over the detail and checks of the latter.
In my oral evidence, I thought the risk was very slight indeed.
I would re-emphasise that with an observation that I did not make
at the time. The new Article 1 TEU makes clear that the two Treaties
and, one assumes, their individual provisions are to have equal
value. I see this as a further safeguard with equal value being
understood as the detail and checks of the latter Treaty not being
able to be undermined by the more open wording of the former Treaty.
2. We were asked a question about the role
of national parliaments post the Reform Treaty. This was one of
the few questions I did not address with Mr Palmer providing the
oral evidence there. I do have strong views, however, particular
about the new eight week period of notice that is to be provided
to national parliaments before a matter is placed on the draft
Council legislative agenda.
The first observation is that this is very little
time indeed. It is the same period as granted by the Commission
to private parties to make written observations under its consultation
procedures (EC Commission, General principles and minimum standards
for consultation of interested parties by the Commission COM(2002)704).
National parliaments are both more significant than private parties
and have greater organisational responsibilities. I am not clear
why they are treated as equivalent.
The second observation is that the recent enlargements
have fundamentally reshaped the structure of the legislative process
under co-decision. The pressures of such a large number of States
and parties has led to a priority being given to reaching agreement
immediately after the first reading of the European Parliament.
The figures are that 170/228 (74.5%) of dossiers have been agreed
at first reading since the 2004 enlargement (until July 2007),
whilst before it was 146/413 (35.4%). This recharacterises the
nature of the eight week period. In most cases, it is not eight
weeks until the Council first considers it, as a formal reading
of the Protocol might suggest, but eight weeks until the measure
is agreed and the legislation adopted. This makes the period
of eight weeks look even more unsustainable in terms of securing
effective national parliament involvement.
I would make two possibly presumptuous suggestions
as a consequence. The first is national parliaments must insist
that they are more actively involved and have more entitlements
in the Commission's initial consultations, if necessary before
it does its impact assessment and certainly by the time it launches
the formal consultations prior to a formal proposal. After this
period, the only possibility for effective voice, and this is
the second proposal, is through the building of structures between
this parliament and the respective European Parliament committee
which require the latter to consider this parliament's views and,
where they have not been given to the Committee but the matter
appears significant, to solicit actively these views.
30 November 2007
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