Milan, 30 September 2002

ASSOLOMBARDA - Young Entrepreneurs Group

THE YOUNG ENTREPRENEURS' GUIDE FOR EUROPE

REFORMS FOR GREATER EFFICIENCY IN EUROPE

Abolition of veto: majority vote of the states and the population of Europe for all EU decisions. A more transparent system to prevent both Euro-sceptic minority blackmail and degeneration of exchange of votes for favours.

Same rules for all Member States, no to derogation accorded to some countries: elimination of unhealthy opting out, i.e. of Great Britain and Denmark being free to choose not to implement some European regulations.

Institution of secession right: freedom to leave the Union endorsed by the European Constitution. Assumption of responsibility by all member countries through elimination of the alibi of not being able to leave the Union, which lends itself to easy exploitation by the Euro-sceptics.

Splitting of the General Affairs Council: reorganisation of the EU Council of Ministers. The General Affairs Council should be replaced by the Home Affairs Council - with full political and economic competence, and the Foreign Affairs Council - with competence for foreign policy, defence, security and immigration. More efficiency in dossier management.

REFORMS TO MOVE CITIZENS CLOSER TO THE EUROPEAN INSTITUTIONS

The European Government elected by the citizens: direct election of the commissioners, one per country. Response to the democratic deficit (i.e. citizens' distance from Europe) and low transparency of the European system. Through popular elections the citizens of Europe will become more familiar with the Commission's activities and more involved in the governing of Europe.

Extension of the European Parliament's control powers: institution of censure of single commissioners in place of the current ineffective censure of the whole Commission. Majority vote qualified by the Euro MPs to prevent political exploitation.

Creation of a Subsidiarity Vigilance Authority: more delegation to the Regions and national parliaments in Europe. The Committee of the Regions - together with the parliaments - will appoint a Subsidiarity Vigilance Authority.

REFORMS FOR GREATER EUROPEAN UNION INFLUENCE

A single recognisable figure for common foreign policy: fusion of the figure of Mr. FPCS with that of the Commissioner for Foreign Affairs to create a single reference point for European foreign policy.

The President of the Commission chosen from commissioners elected by the citizens, by the national governments: the European governments should select the President from the directly-elected commissioners. Five year term of office (like the European Parliament). Dual legitimacy (popular + governmental) and transparency of the programmed undertakings. Power to attribute portfolios to the Commissioners according to their competence.

One single President for the European Union and the Commission: fusion of the role of President of the European Union with that of the Commission. An optimal level of representation of the entire Union thanks to popular investiture and a transparent inter-governmental agreement. Greater independence of the office thanks to this dual legitimacy. Maximum co-ordination of the often-opposed Council and Commission.

FOR THE EUROPEAN CONVENTION

“Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time is ripe”
(Victor Hugo)

1. THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS VOTING SYSTEM

Abolition of veto in exchange for efficient transparent majority voting

Europe cannot become hostage of the veto of one or more states for important decisions. All the more so on the eve of the entry of new countries whose pro-European commitment is still to be substantiated. There can no longer be decisions which require a unanimous vote. We need to apply majority voting with a simple transparent system which can be easily explained to the citizens of Europe. Indeed, they must know the majorities allowing for the approval or defeat of the directives and what are the conflicting interests of the majorities or minorities. Majority voting must be subjected to two controls: 1) the simple majority of the member states 2) the majority of the European population, summing the population of the states voting in favour. This system will push the seeking of consensus of both the small states, whose vote is important for reaching the simple majority, and of a large enough number of large countries, who are essential for notching up the majority of the European population.

In this way the power of blackmail against the majority by one or more states will disappear. At the same time the exchange of votes for favours margin will be reduced, since there will be a higher probability of reaching a majority and it will be easier to pinpoint the interests of the individual states and explain them to public opinion. A voting system which stimulates the different governments to strengthen relations between each other to reach a majority in the council will take us towards a competitive federalism model which rewards the governments with the most enterprising EU foreign policies. Furthermore, this system leaves a reasonable power of influence to the largest European countries, but makes the favour of a large enough number of small countries indispensable. Only Euro-sceptic countries will fear a system which leads to the revelation of their real intentions. And in the dialectics of the majority who change according to the decision to be made, the citizens of Europe have the tools with which to gain knowledge of the different alliances and understand the interests which are in play.

We know that on some sensitive subjects such as the tax system, and social and cultural issues, there is a certain political resistance to acknowledging qualified majority voting. However, it must be emphasised that a unanimous vote of 28 states is such an unrealistic prospect that we should ask ourselves whether those defending this argument are not in reality inspired by anti-European interests. It would be more intellectually honest to decree that Europe must never intervene on these subjects - a position that would certainly please the British. This is why it seems to us to be more logical with the project for the development of Europe to propose a qualified majority system in such cases, possibly with a threshold of two thirds for both controls. We cannot deprive Europe of the possibility of making choices in these areas of competence too, when there is an overwhelming majority.

2. ELIMINATION OF THE DEROGATION CONCEDED TO SOME STATES

The European rules must be the same for everyone, without favouritism

Now that we are witnessing the refoundation of the EU, we need to be sure of parity of rights and duties for all member states. We understand that there was a period when the European Community could not do without Great Britain and Denmark, and so that in order to keep them it had to concede these two countries derogations from the application of directives and regulations. We are referring to the convention of opting out i.e. the right to not apply some directives in one's own country.

Today, with a long list of candidate countries for the expansion of the Union, the success of the single currency, and the fruits of progressive economic integration, Europe can afford the luxury of imposing equity and compliance with its rules on all states. Italy in particular, thanks to its recognised pro-European tradition, is in a position of high credibility for requesting the cessation of this derogation, which is the fruit of a compromise that is now obsolete. In addition to being favours which are contrary to all criteria of fairness, the derogations in force expose us to the risk that other states will believe that they in turn have the right to receive special treatment, which would finish up by denigrating the whole EU system.

3. INTRODUCTION OF SECESSION RIGHT

Every member state is free to leave the European Union.

From the international law point of view, it is supposed that a government has the option of declaring some treaties it has signed with other states null and void. Therefore, through a similar action there would be the de facto option of leaving the European Union. Leaving aside this prospect - which is not, however, codified in the EU treaties - it is important that the secession right be explicitly included in the future European Constitution. Europe cannot become a straight-jacket for those who do not see it as a great historical opportunity.

Since joining the European Union originates from an act of will of a state, which is taken completely freely, we should ask ourselves what will happen in the event that the people of a member state no longer wish to be part of the Union. This is a taboo argument which no-one wants to tackle in public, leading us to suspect that there is a political inferiority complex in the European Union. If the process of European integration is the forerunner of positive transformations for those who join, we must not be frightened of reflecting on what would happen to a country which no longer agrees with the objectives of Europe. Consider the risk of loss of credibility for the EU system if it were to try to retain - through compromises - a country which had become strongly Euro-sceptic. What is fundamental with regard to the secession right is not so much its being made official as its pedagogical value in forcing everyone to assume responsibility - governments, parliaments and citizens. We must avoid creating easy alibis, such as the impossibility of leaving the EU, which can favour political exploitation by certain anti-European ailments. Europe must think big and must not be frightened of losing along the way some countries who do not love it.

4. REORGANISATION OF THE EUROPEAN UNION COUNCIL OF MINISTERS

The Council must split in order to exercise its legislative power in a more effective way

Today the Council is in a position of great difficulty in managing its work. This is a serious dysfunction if we consider that the governments can exercise their legislative power in Europe through it. The Council is a body which is divided up into different sub-councils according to the contents of the dossier proposed by the Commission. If the argument concerns the environment then the member states' environment ministers attend it, while if the argument is agriculture or health then the other competent ministers will be present. The problem occurs when the dossier in question appoints different competencies which require a political-level choice in addition to a technical choice. In this case the General Affairs Council - attended by the foreign ministers - will meet. Imagine a directive on infrastructures, which includes the competence of the ministers of transport, the environment and the treasury. It will still be up to the foreign minister of every European state to represent and co-ordinate the above-mentioned competent ministries.

This system was able to function in a small European Community whose objectives were strictly economic. With the growth in both the number of dossiers with political content and the complexity of the subjects, the General Affairs Council has found itself to be structurally inadequate for the volume of work it has to manage. These same permanent representatives of the national governments in the European Union report the difficulty of preparing the information support for their ministers on questions for which different competence is required, and at the same of serving as a connection for all their country's public administration. The result is that ministers have often had neither the time nor the tools with which to analyse their dossiers sufficiently, and have relied on the opinions of other people.

For all these reasons the General Affairs Council must be split into two different councils. The Foreign Affairs Council must be established, being reserved as before for the Foreign Ministers, with competence for foreign policy, defence, security and immigration. Presiding over the EU Policy Council, without voting rights, will be the Commissioner for Foreign Affairs (see earlier proposal) who, following the Commission's proposals, will act as an effective connection between it and the Foreign Ministries of all member states.

With regard to all the other economic and other competencies, the Home Affairs Council will be established and will be made up of different figures - the Minister for EU policies of each country or a representative of the government with full delegation for co-ordinating all competent ministries. Presiding over the Council, given the wide-ranging arguments and political weight of the decisions to be taken, will be the President of the Commission, or one of the Commissioners delegated by the latter, in order to present the content and objectives of each dossier more effectively. In this case also, the President of the Council will not have the right to vote but will carry out the precious function of following the proposals to submit to the governments' representatives. This focusing of the presidency of the Commission on subjects mainly connected with economic integration is also a response to the serious gap in Europe caused by the absence of real co-ordination between the European economies. Indeed, many economists are debating the need for a privileged dialogist for the European Central Bank in order to co-ordinate European economic policy initiatives with the single currency policy.

The need for this reorganisation of the Council of Ministers originates above all from the risk that decisions will be taken without enough appraisal of the consequences for each country and its citizens. There is no lack of examples from the past in which there were negative repercussions for a number of production sectors due to lack of preparation of the competent minister at the time of voting.

5. DIRECT ELECTION OF THE MEMBERS OF THE COMMISSION

A Commissioner for every member state, elected directly by the people

Every EU member state will have the right to one member of the Commission, chosen by means of popular election in the country of origin. With the expansion to the East, the number of Commission members will rise. This move is obligatory; no candidate state - however small - would ever agree to join the Union without being guaranteed a place in the Commission. As regards nomination, direct election of the Commission member in his or her own country has two benefits: 1) a response to the democratic deficit problem 2) greater independence of the commissioners from the national governments. When the democratic deficit is discussed there are complaints about the low level of representation of European citizens in the European institutions, so direct election of the Commission members will provide an effective solution to this problem and give this fundamentally important institution the popular mandate it lacks today.

Through a traditional electoral campaign citizens will be able to become familiar with their country's commissioner, and this will increase their attention to the work of the Commission. More particularly, the importance of communications targeting the citizens during the elections should be emphasised, as this will contribute to improving their knowledge of the role the commissioner will have to play. The second benefit - that of greater independence, originates from the popular mandate which direct election gives rise to. At the moment the commissioners are formally independent on the basis of the vow they take when a new Commission is formed. However, we cannot exclude the formation of a bond of loyalty or gratitude with the government responsible for nominating them. Since independence from national interests is an essential requirement of the Commission, popular investiture will constitute an improvement as it will loosen this bond with the government.

The biggest criticism of this electoral innovation is that of the risk of politicisation of the Commission. In practice, as it is inevitable that the political parties manage the selection of the national candidates for Brussels, the use of a more political rather than technical selection criterion is feared. An initial response is that this defect is present even today in the governments' choices. Usually the commissioners come precisely from the national political line. The current system is no better from this point of view. The second response is that this risk is balanced out by two natural selection mechanisms.

The first of these mechanisms is self-selection at the source. Candidates know they will be away from national politics for a full five years, so only those seriously interested in a prestigious international role will accept such an engagement, and this will easily exclude those whose hearts are set above all on a national political career, and who do not want to spoil precious contacts at home. The second selection mechanism comes from the assignment of the Commission portfolios. The most important portfolios cannot be assigned to commissioners without priority being given to competence as opposed to nationality. This should lead to natural competition between member states to send elected members with publicly recognised competencies, in order that they may aspire to the most prestigious offices. Therefore it will be the responsibility of the political parties, with a view to the voters, to select those candidates with a solid curriculum of international experience and technical competence, as well as a good knowledge of foreign languages.

The number of portfolios available is a real problem. A proposal by the Commission to establish a presidency cabinet is a very interesting response to this. This would mean that some members of the Commission would have the function of co-ordinating a number of areas, instead of having one single portfolio. For all practical purposes they would be vice-presidents of the Commission, and this would create new roles. Aside from this proposal, it is inevitable that some commissioners will have a lower delegation of authority, similarly to what happens in Italy with the institution of ministers without a portfolio. However, given the growing complexity of Europe it should not be difficult to find minor delegations with specific technical competence, which will lighten the heaviest portfolios.

6. GREATER EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT CONTROL POWERS

The European Parliament must be able to censure even single commissioners

The European Parliament's level of control should be increased in the scenario of a Commission with members who are more independent as they are directly elected by the people, and strengthened powers of the presidency. At the moment the Parliament has three instruments available for the control of the Commission: 1) examination and passing of the Commission members at the start of term; 2) approval of the Commission's budget 3) censure of the whole Commission and its consequent resignation.

The latter control mechanism is inadequate. The exercising of censure of the Commission in toto results in a dilemma - if one commissioner is guilty of embezzlement requiring censure, then why should the whole Commission resign? Or is it better to tolerate even serious offences by one individual so as not to damage the work of the other members? So, is it better to accept a reduction in the level of morality of the Commission or to disrupt Europe's political and economic planning? The control of Euro MPs must be really effective, allowing censure ad personam. Europe cannot afford the resignation of an entire Commission halfway through its term of office because of offences limited to only a few members, nor can it allow a reduction in the high standard of public morality which is rightly required of the members of the Commission.

Naturally, the exercising of such powers cannot run the risk of being subject to any type of political exploitation, such as a simple majority of a certain political complexion wanting to remove an awkward commissioner. It is therefore appropriate to set a qualified majority of at least two thirds of the Euro MPs necessary for resolving censure.

6. CREATION OF A SUBSIDIARITY VIGILANCE AUTHORITY

The Regions and National Parliaments to be responsible for subsidiarity vigilance.

We need to respond to the widespread perception of surplus use of EU regulations in everyday life. For this reason it is desirable to establish a vigilance authority which can receive claims and reports “from below” on directives suspected of breaching the principle of subsidiarity. Indeed, the principle of subsidiarity provides that Europe must not intervene in subjects for which local government has more effective regulations in its area. However, there is no body to police and impose compliance with subsidiarity, in other words to provide real protection of citizens and affected categories from surplus European legislation. An effective response to this problem is to institute a subsidiarity vigilance authority.

When speaking about those administrations which could apply subsidiarity more effectively in Europe we must make reference to the states and the regions. The latter in particular are being called upon to play a increasing role in the European institutions. Indeed, we cannot understand why Lombardy, like other regions of Europe with autonomous legislative power, has no type of representation, as compared with some of the candidate states which are much smaller in terms of population, geographical size and economic importance. It was for this reason that the Committee of the Regions was established in 1997, even if it was not, unfortunately, given an incisive role. It is now the right time to give this committee real power i.e. the power to nominate - jointly with the member states' national parliaments - the parties which will make up the subsidiarity vigilance authority.
This newly-constituted body will be able to receive all the claims from the regions and parliaments of Europe and then send the regulations breaching the principle of subsidiarity to the Council and the European Parliament. Thanks to the creation of this control instrument, the citizens and affected categories will be able to contact their regional or national representatives in order to notify the vigilance authority of the breach of subsidiarity, thus securing protection.

8. THE EUROPEAN UNION FOREIGN POLICY REPRESENTATIVE

We need a single institutional figure who will represent Europe abroad

When the member states decide to have a unified policy, Europe will inevitably need a single legitimate and credible spokesperson. Such a figure is required due to our need to play an incisive international role in all situations in which the foreign policy of a single member state would be ineffective. We need only consider the difficulty in finding peaceful solutions to conflicts without having a joint effort. Otherwise, we will have to resign ourselves to Europe's playing a passive international role and being dominated by the decisions of other superpowers.
The two figures currently devoted to European foreign policy, the FPCS Representative and the Commissioner for Foreign Affairs, must become one single entity in order to prevent jealousy, rivalry and co-ordination problems. Furthermore, being unable to conceive a common foreign policy disengaged from other EU initiatives in the fields of economics and trade, it is important that the sole representative of European foreign policy be a member of the Commission. The Commission has already demonstrated its effectiveness in representing European interests in international trade questions, and it would be a mistake not to avail ourselves of its experience and organisation. Direct control of trade policy instruments would also strengthen the credibility of the Commissioner in "pure" foreign policy questions. The Commissioner for Foreign Affairs would therefore become representative of the entire European Union for common foreign policy initiatives, this remaining subject to the creation of a consensus between the national governments.

9. NOMINATION OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION

The President should be chosen from the elected commissioners, by the national governments

The President of the Commission should be nominated by the governments of Europe, from the Commission members elected by the citizens, with a qualified majority vote so as to prevent exploitable vetoes. In this manner the President of the Commission will have both legitimacy derived from the electoral mandate and the confidence of the member states' governments necessary for carrying out this decisive role for Europe. This system introduces some transparency to the choice of the presidency, as the obligation of first tackling an electoral campaign in their own country will force candidates to notify the voters of their political programme, including their specific stance to Europe and their own objectives. This system will also allow other Europeans to gain knowledge of the political approach of a President from another country through the international press. At the same time this increased transparency would render the nomination of a populist President - or even a Euro-sceptic - very difficult. As already stated, the President of the Commission presides over the General Affairs Council or is replaced by a competent Vice President. In addition, the President has the power to attribute portfolios to the commissioners on the basis of their competence and experience. This discretionary power of the President is a decisive privilege as well as a great responsibility. Such power would not be easy to manage without the independence derived from the dual legitimacy of the electoral mandate by the citizens and inter-governmental nomination.

10. ONE SINGLE PRESIDENT FOR EUROPE

The President of the EU and the European Commission’s President should become one single figure

The rotating six-month Union presidencies should disappear as this system is inapplicable in a scenario with over 20 member states, as well as being ineffective for European policy management. When it holds the presidency, a government defines the Council's planned work priorities according to domestic policy needs, which is unlikely to lead to concrete results due to the lack of time (six months) for serious policy planning. But above all, at the moment Europe does not have a President devoted to the role full-time and who can be easily pinpointed in the eyes of all European citizens.
The President of the Commission should also be President of the European Union, with a five year term of office. This is a direct consequence of the already-studied proposal to have the President of the Commission preside over the General Affairs Council. It is also the most effective solution to the well-known antagonism which exists between the Commission and the Council, which has contributed to slowing down and in some cases blocking reforms in Europe. A single presidency for the two institutions will ensure maximum co-ordination, as this figure will have available all the time necessary for a full term, in order to meet the objectives and priorities defined at the time of investiture. We shall thus have a presidency which is more visible and more recognised by the citizens of Europe, and which will also be more influential and incisive at the international level (please see the diagram of EU representation below).

For further contacts: Ugo Andrea Poletti, “European Constitution” Project Leader ASSOLOMBARDA - Young Entrepreneurs Group
gruppo_giovani@assolombarda.mi.it