Brussels, 02/03/2006 (Agence Europe) - On 22 February the European Parliament's Civil Liberties Committee adopted the report by British Labour Party member Michael Cashman, who proposed amending existing legislation in an effort to increase transparency and facilitate public access to Council of the EU documents. The report is calling on the Commission to present revised legislation before the end of the year on “right of access” to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents. The fruit of lengthy negotiations between the Parliament and Council, Community legislation on public access to institutional texts goes back to 2001, MEPs now feel that the final formulation is too vague. The Civil Liberties Committee is calling for a clarification of what basic documents can be classified as “confidential” in order to “protect the essential interests of the EU”. They believe that further measures should be introduced, requiring access to be granted to all preparatory documents linked to procedure, Parliament or Council debates when they are “acting in their role as legislators”. The EU, according to members of the parliamentary committee, should limit the rights of Member States to restrict access to their contributions and amendments in co-decision and other legislative procedures.