Michel Barnier, European Commissioner instructed by President Prodi to represent him within the Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) on institutional reform, has taken a stance on the ongoing work. His article - published in "Le Figaro" of 9 May, is not intended to present the European Commission's stance on institutional reform; this has already been done in the basic document that the Commission adopted in February. The interest of Mr. Barnier's intervention resides essentially in the fact that he takes account of the unfolding of the IGC and reacts to certain tendencies being expressed.
We here publish the what we take to be the important parts of his article. EUROPE itself has added the headings of the chapters to make the presentation clearer and more obvious.
"FOR THE UNION, IT'S NOW OR NEVER", by Michel Barnier
The quality of the reform prevails over the timetable. I've already expressed my conviction that to complete this reform is not the same as to make a success of it. And that a hasty conclusion, on poor compromises, would be a mistake. The Union's enlargement, or the move from fifteen Member States to some thirty in the coming years, means a robust adaptation of the institutions. The obligation for a result foremost relates to the quality of the reform, and only then the date at which this reform will be concluded. Let me not be misunderstood: I'm certain that a serious revision of the institutions can be secured by the end of the year. This timetable must encourage Member States to act well and swiftly but cannot serve as argument to botch the work.
The institutions must not exchange points of views, but decide. The Intergovernmental Conference has to enable the current institutions to improve the way they are now run and then to remain effective with the arrival of new Member States. The effectiveness of the European Union is an absolute necessity. The founders of Europe left us with a very special institutional system, where Member States place everything in common or share competencies until then exercised in an isolated manner. It's a system organised not to exchange points of view in a consensual manner, but to assess national constraints, arbitrate and produce, in the interest of all, the results that change the course of things.
To weaken Europe would be to exchange a reality for an illusion. A less effective Europe would not open the way to the return of all-powerful nations (…) Political and economic Europe enables Member States to collectively recover margins of manoeuvre. The more the European project is credible, the more the euro, our currency, will find its place and its strength. To accept a less effective Europe would be to weaken each by weakening the whole. It would be exchanging a shared sovereignty for a virtual sovereignty, a reality for an illusion.
The conditions for effectiveness. To remain effective with close to thirty Member States, the number of decisions taken through unanimity has to be reduced to the strictest minimum: with rare exceptions, majority decision-taking is necessary. With the arrival of a large number of weakly populated States, the demographic weight of each Member state will, in one way or another, be taken into account when voting. In a large Community of some thirty States being prepared, how not to see the demand to preserve a place for coherence and unity for European action? That place is the European Commission, with its work as a college, its singularity, with its exclusive right of initiative. And, if one wants the Commission to remain effective, then one has to think seriously, and now, about the maximum number of its members.
Taking account of the diversity of ambitions. Is it possible that thirty or so countries to share, as much as the six founding ones did, the same concept of what they must accomplish together? Does their economic and cultural disparities allow for that? (…) Indeed, we will not prohibit certain countries from conserving, after enlargement, the ambitions they share today. If the European Union loses its effectiveness, if the common will withers, these ambitions will find expression outside the Union's institutional framework.