BRITISH MANAGEMENT DATA FOUNDATION

Introduction

This summary analysis is extracted from the full analysis in Volume One of this book and gives an outline of the voting of the Council and the key issues in the Treaty of Nice.

The principal issues discussed at Nice were the ‘left-overs’ from the Treaty of Amsterdam concerning the changes needed to the institutions of the Community for enlargement of the Union. These included matters that had been left over from Amsterdam, i.e. the size and composition of the Commission, the reweighting of votes in the Council of Ministers and the possible extension of qualified majority voting. One of the main issues was the change in the weighting of the votes in the Council to more accurately reflect the size of population of each Member State.

The Treaty has developed the interests of the Union and increased the role of the Community in several significant ways. These include the introduction of the Eurojust system, the development of enhanced co-operation, and the extension of qualified majority voting in thirty-nine areas.

An important Declaration attached to the Treaty describes the future aims of the Community both in the immediate future and in the long-term. It raises a number of issues that are intended to be debated over the next four years in order to be resolved at the next Inter-Governmental Conference, to be held in 2004. One of the areas is the contentious subject of the separation of the roles and competences between the Community institutions and the Member States.

Two of the other areas under consideration at Nice, the Charter of Fundamental Human Rights and the role of a European rapid reaction force, under the foreign and security policy, proved to be too contentious to be agreed on; as a result, these were excluded from the text of the main Treaty. They have been referred to in separate declarations attached to the Treaty, indicating that both will become more important to the Union in the future.

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Voting in the Council

There have been thirty-nine changes to the method of voting in the Council, from unanimity to qualified majority voting.

The Treaty of Nice has altered the weightings of the votes in the Council for qualified majority voting, with the intention of more accurately reflecting the respective size of each Member State.

At the moment, the number of weighted votes to produce a majority in the Council is 62 votes out of 87, representing 71.26% of the votes. In the Protocol on the Enlargement of the European Union, the voting arrangements of the existing Member States will change on 1 January 2005, so that the total number of votes will increase to 237, before there are any new members. The number of votes required to produce a majority will increase to 169 and a blocking minority will be 69 votes, reflecting a majority share of 71.31%.

In addition, a Member State can ask that the votes in favour of a motion should represent at least 62% of the total population of the Union. This means that votes representing 232.7 million people are required to pass a motion. 

Key Issues

The structure of the Treaty follows the same format as previous treaties, in that the articles are in the form of amendments to the existing treaty provisions. The Treaty on European Union and the Treaty establishing the European Community are referred to as TEU and TEC, respectively. The Treaty concentrates on seven principal areas:

a.       Measures preparing for enlargement of the Union:

The provisions refer to the institutional changes necessary for enlargement are covered by a protocol attached to the Treaty of Nice (Protocol on Enlargement). The main amendments to the consolidated Treaties concern the change to qualified majority voting to elect the President of the Commission and the Commissioners (Article 214 TEC).

b.       Enhanced co-operation:

The general principles have been rewritten and expanded to make them much more precise and functional; they cover the Common Foreign and Security Policy (Articles 27a to 27e TEU), Police and Judicial Co-operation (Articles 40 to 40b TEU) and are incorporated into the text of the Treaty establishing the European Community (Article 11 TEC). A minimum of eight Member States are able to establish closer co-operation and the national veto (the “emergency brake”) has been removed, except in Foreign and Security Policy. The emergency brake has been replaced by a right to appeal to the European Council.

c.       Fundamental rights:

The Council may now decide that there is a clear risk of a serious breach of fundamental rights by a Member State, rather than that there is a serious breach (Article 7 TEU). The Charter of Fundamental Rights has not been incorporated into the consolidated Treaties, but is mentioned in a declaration that its status should be assessed in 2001, with any decisions being made at the next IGC, due in 2004 (Declaration no. 23).

d.       Security and defence:

The main issue is the declaration to make the EU rapid reaction force operational as soon as possible. The decision relating to the rapid reaction force is covered by the existing treaty provisions, concerning the WEU, and therefore is not determined by the ratification of Nice (Declaration no. 1). In addition, the Council may appoint a special representative by qualified majority voting, (Article 23 TEU).

e.       Crime:

Nice incorporates the European Judicial Co-operation Unit (‘Eurojust’) into the Treaty on European Union to co-ordinate action in criminal matters in the Member States. In the wording of Nice, the Council will promote co-operation through Eurojust, but there is no mention of the Council making any decisions in this area and Eurojust remains a matter for inter-governmental co-operation, and not a competence of the Community (Articles 29 and 31 TEU).

f.       Court of Justice:

There are new provisions and a revised protocol, which have the intention to make the Court of Justice operate more efficiently and to reduce the backlog of cases and reduce the length of time required to process new ones (Articles 220 to 223 TEC). The Court of First Instance has been changed and its importance increased (Articles 224 and 225 TEC). Judicial panels have been introduced, to cover areas such as Community staff matters, with the intention of freeing up the main courts to deal with more important matters (Article 225a TEC).

g.       Social provisions:

These include anti-discrimination (Article 13 TEC), and visas, asylum and free movement of people (Article 67 TEC, Protocol on Article 67 and Declaration no.5). In these areas, the Council will act by qualified majority. A Social Protection Committee is to be formed with advisory status, (Article 144 TEC).

There are a number of other areas covered by the Treaty. These include the venue for the European Councils (Declaration no.22), the future of the Union (Declaration no.23) and a protocol on the financial consequences of the expiry of the ECSC Treaty.