Brussels, 05/04/2000 (Agence Europe) - Francisco Seixas da Costa, the Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs who leads (among other things) the work done by the preparatory group of the Intergovernmental Conference on institutional reform of the European Union, said, according to the Portuguese press agency Lusa, that such divergences remain between the Member States over the main questions - on the agenda of the IGC that do not exclude that the Portuguese Presidency calls on the Heads of State and Government to decide on these issues, to give momentum to the negotiation.
Still according to Lusa, Mr. Sexias da Costa, while talking to Portuguese journalists after the meeting of the preparatory group of 4 April, noted that, in this negotiation, "many Member States have not yet shown their cards," and that the main difficulties relate to: the make-up of the European Commission. The majority of the Member States, said Mr. Seixas da Costa are for the formula of one Commissioner per country, but according to some of them such a solution would require the creation of an "internal hierarchy" within the College (with Deputy Commissioners, that most countries are refusing: Ed.); the weighting of the votes in the Council. There is a need to find a "point of balance" between the taking into account of the demographic weighting and the principal of equality between Member States, said the Secretary of State, while noting that most of the countries feel that qualified majority voting in the Council should represent the future for at least 50% of the total EU population, while for some it should represent 58-60%.
In a note on the weighting of votes in the Council, the Portuguese Presidency asked a series of questions to the Member States and notably that of knowing if there is a need for a "minimum ceiling of the total population of the EU to assure the democratic legitimacy of the Council decisions." The Presidency reminds that the percentage is presently at 58.16% and that will fall to 51.45% if the present system was extrapolated in a linear manner to a Union of 28 members. Furthermore, the Presidency said that the ceiling for qualified majority voting is, over the years, remains more or less unchanged, around 71% of all the votes (more precisely 71.26% of the votes, or 62 votes out of 87, the minority blocking being 26 votes: Ed.), asked the Member States if, according to them, they must keep this ceiling, in terms of votes at its present level, reduce it or increase it.
Let us recall that the Portuguese Presidency must present a report on the IGC to the European Council on the 19 and 20 June in Santa Maria da Feira (Porto)