After starting their work more than a month ago, the coordinators of the European Parliament's Committee on Civil Liberties (LIBE) have so far been unable to reach agreement on the priority dossiers and the resumption of certain sensitive work such as the trilogues by videoconference. This is the case in particular for the regulations on the removal of terrorist content online or on cross-border access to electronic evidence, where work in the European Parliament has also been put on hold (see EUROPE 12462/17).
The LIBE Committee was due to give its opinion at the beginning of May (see EUROPE 12478/23), but the political groups are clearly unable to agree on a list of priorities. “They have far too different ideas”, a parliamentary source said on 13 May: the very notion of “priority” is a matter of debate.
Negotiations are stalled, at least on several issues and not just one. The exercise will be particularly difficult on initiative reports, which often reflect the priorities of the groups.
The LIBE Committee meetings have resumed at the rate of one per week, but their duration is limited. Some items on the agenda were decided before the crisis, we were told, while others were agreed upon between the group coordinators by majority vote.
However, discussions on the list of priority issues to be taken forward are stalled. Opponents cite in particular the difficulty of negotiating at a distance and the issue of confidentiality of discussions by videoconference.
According to some, there is a real problem of means, especially with the constraint of translation, which is difficult to carry out from a distance. For some groups, this inability to agree would almost reflect ill will, with the crisis serving as a pretext for delaying work that does not go their way. All these actors are in any case worried about a situation that is bound to last and is really starting to cause problems.
At the time of going to press, it was not yet clear whether or not the secretariat of the LIBE Committee was going to make a new proposal for priority dossiers or whether it was simply going to “drop out”, believing that no agreement can be reached. However, some sources felt that physical meetings could potentially resume soon, or at least in early June, with the gradual return of some of the staff to the European Parliament.
Same situation in JURI
Similar discussions are under way in the European Parliament Committee on Legal Affairs (JURI).
On Tuesday 12 May, another parliamentary source told us that no formal decision had yet been taken to resume the 'trilogues' by videoconference, notably on the regulations aimed at digitalising judicial cooperation (see EUROPE 12031/12), but that there was a “sincere willingness” to continue the legislative work between May and June. The source hoped that “the problem would be resolved as soon as possible”. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic and Marion Fontana)