The Czech Minister for European Affairs, Mikuláš Bek, said on Friday 2 December that the Czech Presidency of the Council of the European Union will not invite the Member States to formally decide on the launch of a Convention to reform the European treaties.
“It is very clear that there is unanimity in the EU Council on this issue and, surprisingly for me, that we should wait for the European Parliament’s Committee on Constitutional Affairs to finish its work on new proposals. I therefore expect the EU Council to take a position in the spring of next year”, he replied to a question from EUROPE, alongside the closing event of the Conference on the Future of Europe.
In his view, while the thorny discussions on possible financial sanctions related to the breach of the rule of law in Hungary continue (see other news), “it will be very difficult to reach unanimity [of Member States] on such [institutional] issues”, such as the use of “passerelle” clauses in the current treaties to get around the obstacle of unanimous decision making in the EU Council.
Representing the European Parliament at the Conference on the Future of Europe, Guy Verhofstadt (Renew Europe, Belgian) set the record straight: the work in progress is aimed at forging a global vision on the revision of the European treaties and the European Parliament has already formally activated the so-called ‘Article 48’ procedure for a revision of the treaties, which requires a decision by the EU Council (see EUROPE 12968/17), by a simple majority of Member States, to forward the dossier to the European Council.
On Friday, almost 500 European citizens who participated in the citizens’ panels at the conference asked the three EU legislative institutions what they had done to implement their recommendations since 9 May (see EUROPE 12948/1).
According to the European Commissioner for Democracy, Dubravka Šuica, “80%” of the 49 recommendations of the Conference are included in the Commission’s 2023 work programme (see EUROPE 13043/23). Verhofstadt and Bek reported progress on climate and social issues, but not on energy issues.
Ms Šuica said that the European Commission’s suggestion to set up citizens’ panels to provide input for major legislative proposals would be implemented. On Friday 16 December, a citizen panel will speak on the issue of combating food waste. This will be followed by two further panels, one on mobility and one on the future of the digital sector such as the metaverse. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)