Standing Committee on the Convention
Wednesday 7 May 2003
[Mr. Frank Cook in the Chair]
The Future of Europe
3.20 pm
The Chairman: Order. Rig for silent running, please. Now that we are quorate, we are starting at precisely five minutes after the official time. The Committee has up to one and a half hours to hear statements from our parliamentary representatives and the alternate representatives, and to ask them questions. There will then be a debate on the motion and I shall put the question, if not previously concluded, when the Committee has sat for two and a half hours. In addition to members of the Committee, any other Member of the House of Commons or the House of Lords may ask questions or participate in the debate. I know that many will wish to participate and I hope that questions and contributions to the debate will be brief in order to allow as many hon. Members as possible to participate.
As we have to conclude our business by 16 June, we do not have a right lot of time left in which to do it, so I should hate to see developing the kind of situation with which I was faced on the last occasion on which we met, when I had to suspend the sitting.
3.21 pm
Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston): Let us all hope that the sitting will run to its full length, Mr. Cook. You were right to point out the time limits and time constraints of our sittings. We are now in a position to see what the complete first cut of the proposed treaty will look like. A number of questions arise from it for us as parliamentarians. I recommend to anyone who finds it difficult to follow the proceedings of the Convention and may be drowning under papers, that the best starting point is the reports that are published by the House of Lords with running commentary. They are timely and extremely relevant.
Let me give the Committee some idea of the timetable. The Convention will have a discussion next week on the institutional papers and on something that is easily understood—final provisions. I shall explain the context of those matters. The Praesidium will then have four days from 20 to 24 May to consider the amendments, the debates and how part 2, which has been drafted by legal experts, fits in with part 1. It will be highly significant, particularly in such areas as competences. As a result of that meeting, which should conclude on 24 May, we shall present to the whole Convention a first redraft of the whole treaty.
Two formal sittings of the Convention are timetabled for 5 and 6 June and 12 and 13 June. However, I advise all colleagues that they should allow for being in Brussels for the first two weeks of June, because that is when compromises will be reached and negotiations will go on between the institutions as well
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as between the political families. If national parliamentarians are not in Brussels, they will not be at those meetings.
The hope is that we shall be in a position to submit to the Heads of Government on 20 June at least part 1 of the treaty; it might be that some technical areas of part 2 have not been completed at that stage. With the agreement of the Heads of Government, we might well have to have some spillover meetings in July. However, much to my delight, because I think that it was the right decision, the Heads of Government have insisted that the Convention submit its main report on 20 June.
I shall say just a few words on the institutional articles. I think that it is a significant achievement to have decided to create the position of a President of the Council—a view that a few months ago was seen very much as an isolationist view of the British Government, but which was supported first by Spain and then by France and Germany. The language is unfortunate; I think that there should be not a President but a Chair of the Council. However, we are somewhat constrained by a rare event: the poverty of the French language. While most languages have two terms for a chair and a president and their functions, I understand that in French, they are one and the same word. Hence the slight duplication of language.
The Chairman: Order. I regret that I have to say that we have just lost our quorum. While I am on my feet, I shall say that I have sensed that the atmosphere in the Committee Room is uncomfortably warm. As I want everyone to be comfortable, rather than tell hon. Members that they are in disorder when they divest themselves of their jackets without permission from the Chair, I now confer that permission on everyone, who may divest themselves of their top garment. That applies to all Members, excluding ladies.
I am sorry about this suspension. That was the point of my admonition at the beginning that we must maintain the quorum.
3.26 pm
The Chairman's attention having been called to the fact that ten Members were not present, he suspended the proceedings; and other Members having come into the Room and ten Members being present, the proceedings were resumed.
3.30 pm
On resuming—
Ms Stuart: If the institutions of the European Union have to be strong and provide balance, the one element that I have always thought suffered from an imbalance has been the Council of Ministers. The Commission, elected for five years, is a stable body. The European Parliament, elected for five years, is a stable body. Yet when we come to the representation of the member states, which is part of that triangle, we have rotating presidencies, which means that priorities change every six months. Even the troika arrangements have not been as satisfactory as they should. The most compelling case for reform was made by the Danish Prime Minister at the end of the
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very good Danish presidency. He said that it was virtually impossible to have that system with 15 countries and that it could not be continued with 25 or more. He supported an end to the current system of six-monthly rotation.
The institutional articles make it quite clear that a President of the European Council, who would take on a much more strategic role on behalf of the member states, should be created. As I said, I think that that is a positive move. It was quite extraordinary that throughout the time when the Iraq problem was clearly developing, the Council of Ministers never formally discussed the issue to form an opinion. The change will allow the Union to have a forum where member states can discuss their own strategic long-term interests and those of the Union.
I am happy to take any questions on the institutions afterwards, but I shall now make detailed comments on two clauses: one on treaty ratification and the other on the exit clause. As it stands, the proposal makes it clear that this constitutional treaty should be ratified in the way in which all other treaties have been ratified hitherto—it would come into force once all members had ratified it. However, there have been discussions on whether that process will become too cumbersome in a Union of 25 or more countries. My view, which I have presented on behalf of parliamentarians, is that we should never trade democratic accountability for bureaucratic efficiency. The process may take longer with 25 members, but it is absolutely vital that, in a Union whose fundamental underlying principle is that competences are conferred by member states to that Union, any treaty ratifications that involve that transfer of competences must be done by every member state, however large or small.
Various options have been suggested, including something called organic law—which the European Parliament seems to favour—where a kind of constitutional law is created that could be ratified in the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament by a super-qualified majority without ever going back to national Parliaments. Another option would be for the treaty to come into force if 80 per cent. of the population of member states ratified it. All the options that have been put forward, however, breach what I see as a fundamental principle deserving to be maintained, respected and fought for: that such issues must go to each member state.
My second point is on the exit clause. The clause as it stands is fairly straightforward and describes the political reality that members can always leave the Union. At one stage Greenland left and on that occasion the whole process took place legally under the Vienna convention. To put that into the treaty is logically coherent because a union that describes how to join should also describe how to leave. However, a disturbing line of argument during the Convention debate from some hon. Members was that the exit laws should be combined with the new process of treaty ratification and that when a significant number of countries had ratified, those that failed to do so could be given the option to leave. That, again, is utterly unacceptable. The two clauses stand on their own.
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There is no relationship between them and I would not wish that relationship to be made.
I want to say a few words about the role of national Parliaments. At the beginning of the Convention, a working group was set up and a commitment was made following the Laeken mandate for greater accountability through national Parliaments. In the treaties as they stand there is frequent reference to national Parliaments, but that reference sometimes makes national Parliaments accomplices instead of giving them a real say. A classic example is the suggestion that a congress of the people should be created so that national and European parliamentarians elect the Commission President. That sounds seductive. However, national parliamentarians would turn up for the election process and provide democratic credibility to the elected person, but would be unable to hold that person to account. Democratic legitimacy should always be combined with accountability, but only the European Parliament would continue to hold the Commission to account. Frankly, I do not believe that it is the role of national Parliaments to hold the Commission to account.
Treaties often state only that Parliaments should be informed, told or notified, but that is not sufficient. I want to return within the Praesidium to the mechanism for subsidiarity which, as it stands, allows only for a yellow card. If one third of national Parliaments object, the Commission must consider the objection. If we move to the position of national parliamentarians agreeing to more use of qualified majority voting and new legislative instruments to give more power to the European Parliament, there must be a mechanism so that we can use a red card on subsidiarity and provide a stop. If two thirds of national Parliaments say that something breaches subsidiarity, the Commission must withdraw, although it can resubmit. That work is in progress.
In many areas, we still need to examine how that marries with part 2. I want to put on record the process of accountability through national Parliaments—going through it carefully with the help of the lawyers in the House to see whether it amounts to a substantive role for national Parliaments and whether it is being overlooked in areas such as justice, home affairs and so on, so that we can remedy that in the final negotiating processes.
3.38 pm
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