Brussels, 29/01/2002 (Agence Europe) - Last week, the EP's Committee on Constitutional Affairs had an exchange of views on the draft report by the UDF member of the EP, Alain Lamassoure on the distribution of powers within the EU, text which, as the rapporteur told a few journalists, somewhat "dumbfounded" his colleagues. Mr. Lamassoure, who has handed in his report to the President of the Convention, Valery Giscard d'Estaing, indeed sets out ideas that led to a certain amount of "emotion", like that of adding foreign policy to the EU's "exclusive" powers. Experience shows that, "as long as this power is shared, we are in the hands of the good will of national leaders", he considers, while acknowledging that his proposal "puts the cat among the pigeons". At the same time, it would be "good if we managed to return some powers to Member States", and he says that it is "absolutely not terrorised by the idea of playing with the acquis communautaire". According to him, contrary to what some Europeans think ("like the father of all of us, Jacques Delors") examination of the distribution of powers is neither "dangerous or harmful", and would not affect the acquis of the "internal Market".
Among Lamassoure's other suggestions, we can cite the following:
Recognition in the Treaty of the role of "the Union's partner regions", regions that would be defined by each of the Member States concerned, and which would benefit from certain rights, like that of being consulted by the Commission when it is preparing texts affecting their powers and turning to the Court of Justice on conflicts of powers affecting them. Faced with the prospect of entry into the EU of "micro-States" which have a much lower population than that, for example, of regions like Catalonia or Bavaria, "we must avoid setting up a system that would encourage regions to demand independence", says Lamassoure
Recall "more formally and strongly the need to co-ordinate the economic and budgetary policies of Member States, and find the "means to involve national parliaments" in the work of the Eurogroup, where rapporteurs on the budget and chairs of finance committees of these parliaments should sit alongside the finance ministers.