Latest news from the EU Constitutional Convention

national | miscellaneous | news report Tuesday March 11, 2003 23:19 by Anthony Coughlan jcoughln at tcd dot ie

Latest news from the EU Constitutional Convention

Latest news from the EU Constitutional Convention 43rd EU Convention Newsletter Monday 10 March 2003 (For your information from TEAM, The European Alliance of EU-critical Movements,regarding the latest debate in the EU Convention. . . Note particularly the second paragraph below)

Introduction: The debate on the Constitution's articles at the last
informal session of the Convention launched a political dialogue with
the
categorisation and the definition of competences proving highly
controversial. Moreover, the principles of the primacy of EU law,
conferred
powers, national identity, religion and horizontal competences also
produced lively debate.

WHERE DOES THE POWER OF THE UNION COME FROM?

In the present draft of Article 8.2 it is stated that "...the Union
shall
act within the limits of the competences conferred upon it by the
Constitution...". Vice-president Amato started the session by
suggesting
that this be changed to "...in the Constitution...". That spurred a
larger
debate about where the Union's powers come from. In Mr. Hain's (UK,
Gov.)
opinion, the Constitution should state clearly that the powers come
from
the Member States. This was supported by most speakers, and everybody
agreed that this should only be stated once in the Constitution. Mr.
Vitorino's (Portugal, Commission) view on the process of the transfer
of
powers was that the sovereign Member States by an act of free will
decide
to confer powers to the Constitution through a treaty. From then on all
the
Union's powers are drawn from the Constitution.
Mr. Hain and Lord MacLennan (UK, NP) both expressed their wish for a
redrafting of Art. 9.1, which states that EU law enjoys primacy. Not
because they did not agree with the principle, but because they thought
that it might upset the citizens. These interventions provoked many
comments supporting the present wording of the article, since it is one
of
the fundamental principles of the Union. Vice-president Mr. Dehaene
regretted Mr. Hain's statement as it showed that some Member States are
afraid of telling the truth about the Union's nature.

Many speakers advocated better and clearer language in the
Constitution.
They outlined that many points were stated twice and that the contents
of
some articles did not clearly correspond to their headings - especially
articles 8 and 9.

SUBSIDIARITY

To Mr. Rack s mind (Austria, MEP), the central element of subsidiarity
is
to limit the level of details in European law. Mr. Hain (UK, Gov.)
underlined that the Union should recognise the regional and local
structures of the Member States in accordance with the principle of
subsidiarity. This would correspond to the ability of the regional and
local structures better to solve some problems. Finally, there was a
discussion on whether subsidiarity should also apply to exclusive
competences. Mr. Hain (UK, Gov.) supported this, whereas Mr Antunes
(Portugal, Gov.) and Mr. Méndez de Vigo ( Spain, MEP) thought that this
should not be the case.

COMPETENCES (Article 11, 12 and 15)
The discussion on the three categories of competences (exclusive,
shared
and supporting competences), was focussed more on the question of
whether
the distinction was coherent and workable rather than on the lists of
policies under the competences as discussed in last week's plenary.

Lord MacLennan (UK, NP) did not support the definition of exclusive
competences. Excluding the Member States right to legislate within the
limits of Union law, as present, would be a massive and non-acceptable
extension on the Union's competences. Today, the Member States have the
possibility of legislating in the areas of free movement of services
and
goods, for instance. Lord MacLennan elaborated with examples of marine
biology resources and the right to establish business. He demanded that
the
list of exclusive competences as mentioned in art. 11 should be moved
to
the shared competences.

Vice-President Amato explained that today the Union only has exclusive
competences in those areas which are interstate and not intrastate
matters.
He agreed that there was a problem in the definition. He clarified that
the
Member States in the present definition cannot take legislative
initiatives
in areas of exclusive competences. In the framework of shared
competences,
they cannot take initiatives when EU legislation already covers a given
area. Should the EU adopt legislation under exclusive or shared
competences, the Member States would have to change their legislation
accordingly.

Two governmental representatives, Mr Hain (UK, Gov.) and Mr Andréani
(France, Gov.), advocated deleting the list mentioned under shared
competences. In addition, Mr Andréani suggested that instead of a list
it
should simply be stated that when the Union has exercised its
competences
the Member States can only exercise competences when the adopted law
sets
out minimum standards.

Of the speakers who were in favour of lists of policy areas under these
categories, most favoured non-exhaustive and clear lists. On the other
hand, several German speakers were in favour of exhaustive lists.

Mr. Bonde (Denmark, MEP) explained that there has never been a legal
clarification of the scope of legislation that can be adopted under
supporting action. Article 15.4 only states that the legislation cannot
entail harmonisation of Member States laws, but that does not exclude
the
possibility for the EU to make laws on, for example, education. This
problem should be solved, limiting the scope of the article to the
adoption
of budgets for various programs such as Erasmus. Mr Andréani (France,
Gov.)
on the contrary, found that supportive action was too strictly defined.
It
should not exclude harmonisation.

The problems of the strict definition of categories and their
respective
lists of policy areas were in particular visible when several members
wanted a specific mention to be made of the coordination of economic,
social, and employment policies. Although this method belongs to
different
competences of categories, some speakers still wanted it to mentioned
in
one article. Furthermore, there was a broad consensus on a coherence
and
integration clause making sure that values and objectives was
integrated in
all policies (a horizontal clause).

CORDINATI9ON OF ECONOMIC POLICY (Art. 13)

On this article there were two debates. The first revolved around the
topic
of who should coordinate the economic policy. Both Mr. Hain (UK, Gov.)
and
Lord Tomlinson (UK, NP) argued that instead of reading "the Union
coordinates", the article should read "the council coordinates". Mr.
Carnero González (Spain, MEP) strongly disagreed with this, stating
that
this would make economic policy an area of exclusive Union competence.
The
other debate revolved around whether the article should only mention
economic policy, or social and employment policy as well. The majority
of
speakers, including Mr. Fayot (Luxembourg, NP), Mr. Voggenhuber
(Germany,
MEP), Ms. Berger (Austria, MEP) supported mentioning all the areas.
Only
Ms. Kiljunen (Finland, NP) argued explicitly against it.

COMMON FOREIGN AND SECURITY POLICY (Art. 14)

Mr. Lamassoure (France, MEP) opened the debate by mentioning the
discrepancy between the Laeken declaration and the present reality. The
Laeken declaration, adopted by the Member States, urged the Convention
to
go further on CFSP but the Member States are not even meeting the
Maastricht treaty's provisions for working together on international
questions, as the current split on Iraq shows. Therefore, Mr.
Lamassoure
(France, MEP) suggested kicking the ball back to the Member States
asking
them to state what they really want. Beside these new suggestions, the
debate showed that the Convention was far from reaching a consensus on
the
matter, as some called for a stronger CFSP and the inclusion of defence
while others argued for a more restrictive drafting.

THE FLEXIBILITY CLAUSE (Art. 16)

On this article the debate didn't move beyond the last session. Some
argued
for the use of qualified majority voting such as Mr. Antunes
((Portugal,
Gov.), while others wanted unanimity, as for example Mr. Hain (UK,
Gov.).
Some, for instance Mr. Carnero (Spain, MEP) argued that it should be
possible to confer powers back to the Member States via this article (a
two-way clause). Others were against this proposal.

RELIGION AND NATIONAL IDENTITY

Mr. Brok (Germany, MEP) expressed his wish for a clause recognising the
Member States right to organise their religious structures as they
wish.
Mr Bonde (Denmark, MEP) underlined that the principle of
non-discrimination
(Art 13 TEU) could be used to interfere in the Member States' religious
structures, where some states give special status to certain churches
(e.g.
the Danish Protestant church has pre-eminent rights compared to other
church communities in Denmark). Therefore, this should be clarified in
the
Constitution, leaving no grey area.
National Identity was also debated as mentioned under the application
of
fundamental principles (art 9.6). During the debate, a consensus was
reached on having a broad and extensive definition of National Identity
and
that this should only be mentioned once in the Constitution.

Written by Peter Jonasson Pedersen; Edited by Michael Strangholt

____________________
Henrik Dahlsson
Secretary General TEAM

TEAM Secretariat:
The European Parliament
Rue Wiertz 2H 246
1047 Brussels
BELGIUM
E-mail: hdahlsson@europarl.eu.int
Tel: 00 32 2 284 65 67
Fax: 00 32 2 284 91 44
Website: www.teameurope.info