Brussels, 13/09/2002 (Agence Europe) - At the press conference at the end of the Convention's plenary, the Vice-President of the European Convention, Giuliano Amato, highlighted Convention Members' extensive support for reducing the number of procedures and adopting terminology corresponding to words commonly used in the Member States, namely laws and framework laws. He said the Praesidium had decided to present the 28/29 October plenary with a draft structure for a constitutional treaty which, in Chairman Valéry Giscard d'Estaing's words, could take the form of a single document in two parts - the first part being constitutional and wholly rewritten by the Convention, with the second setting out and consolidating the "acquis" of the Treaties with the changes indicated in the first part. He said he didn't expect the Convention to redraft common policies, but to mainly focus on procedure. Asked about the legal coherence of a single text and the often proclaimed aim of having two separate review procedures in the future (one for amending the constitutional part and a simpler one for the actual content of the treaties), Amato said that the Convention could not limit itself to drafting the constitutional part, leaving it to others, at a later date, to check conformity with existing Treaties, without opening the way for considerable legal uncertainty.
Speaking to reporters, Partido Popular MEP Inigo Mendez de Vigo hailed the Praesidium decision to publish a draft structure for the future treaty as requested by the European Parliament delegation (that he chairs). He also talked about the progress report on the subsidiary group's work that he presented to the plenary (see p.6). He pointed out the main innovation proposed was to set up a rapid warning mechanism to enable national parliaments to issue a Reasoned Opinion if they feel that the subsidiarity principle is not being respected. If a significant number of national parliaments (the number has yet to be defined) issue Reasoned Opinions, the Commission would have to reexamine its proposal and could withdraw it, amend it or keep it as it is. If it kept it unchanged, the parliaments that published Reasoned Opinions could send the case to the Court of Justice, at the end of the legislative procedures. Deadlines would be set to ensure that this system didn't hold up the legislative procedure. In response to a reporter's question about Valéry Giscard d'Estaing's comment the day before that parliaments could well issue Reasoned Opinions systematically to ensure they didn't lose the opportunity to send proposed legislation to the Court of Justice, Mendez de Vigo said he had confidence in national parliaments. Mendez de Vigo also highlighted that the Reasoned Opinions had to be backed up, adding that they had worked with three golden rules - not creating any new institutions, not blocking the legislative procedure by introducing new veto possibilities or extending deadlines, and creating an easily understandable system. Asked about the lack of any possibility for regions to assert their rights, he said that regional parliaments came under Member States' national powers, but that nothing prevented national parliaments forwarding proposals to regional parliaments for their opinion. On whether to give regions with legislative power the option of appealing to the Court of Justice, he said it might be more appropriate to give the Committee of the Regions the option of appealing to the Court.