![Why we reject the Treaty change proposal [Promoted content] | INFBusiness.com](/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/1f6fac56b9ff8d468c749c18a80f2acc.jpg "On 22 November 2023 in Strasbourg, the European Parliament adopted a report proposing a series of Treaty changes that constitute a revolutionary and radical reform plan aimed at irreversibly transforming the EU from a community of sovereign nation-states into a dystopian superstate run by a hegemonic oligarchy, increasing already existing in the EU a high democratic deficit.")
On 22 November 2023 in Strasbourg, the European Parliament adopted a report proposing a series of Treaty changes that constitute a revolutionary and radical reform plan aimed at irreversibly transforming the EU from a community of sovereign nation-states into a dystopian superstate run by a hegemonic oligarchy, increasing already existing in the EU a high democratic deficit.
Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, Shadow-Rapporteur for the European Conservatives and Reformists Group.
Despite the ECR Groups’ reservations as to the need for Treaty changes, and for the hasty procedure that the majority wished to pursue, we have engaged in good faith with representatives of the other five groups involved in the drafting of the proposals. Our hope was that the draft proposal would be a result of a cooperative, fair, and comprehensive process aimed at improving the EU’s policymaking. Sadly, this is not how things turned out.
Among the changes proposed by the rapporteurs, Belgian “pro-European” veteran Guy Verhofstadt and four German MEPs on behalf of other 4 groups which were adopted in the plenary vote, are the abolition of the veto right granted to all Member States by the voting rules of the European Council in areas such as: implementation of common foreign and security policy, and the multiannual financial framework. In total, unanimous voting would be massively abolished in 34 areas where it currently applies, and but it would remain e.g. for votes on the admission of new Member States. Which is a paradox in light of principal goal of enlargement.
The national veto is arguably the most important safeguard against undue usurpation of power in the hands of the Union, and is of particular importance to the smaller Member States and their national democracies whose influence would be greatly diminished.
When reflecting upon such radical proposals the famous principle of Chesterton’s fence comes to mind. Chesterton employs the metaphor of a fence to illustrate the rationale for undertaking reforms. It explains that one should not decide to tear down the fence without first understanding why it was built. The same logic applies to reforming institutions and their laws. Had the rapporteurs made an effort to understand why the veto exists, they would have never proposed an idea of depriving Member States of their fundamental right. I cannot stress enough that given all inequalities among the Member States (including the weight of their votes in the Council), it is precisely the right of veto that provides the medium and smaller Members (and their citizens) the sense of participating on equal footing in the EU politics. After all, it is the veto right that renders every member’s voice to be reckon with.
Abolishing veto in the medium-term perspective would lead to the dominance of the biggest Member States, and in the long run it would contribute to a disintegration of the EU. Thus, promoting such proposal is utterly anti-European, shows a grave error of judgement, and reflects lack of political imagination.
In addition to eliminating the veto power, the proposal would grant a new exclusive competence to the EU (negotiations on climate change) and extend the number of shared competences to include seven new areas such as public and reproductive health; education; foreign affairs, external security and defence; civil protection; industry; external border policy; and cross-border transport infrastructure. There is no evidence that the European public wants the EU to intervene in these areas, and under the principle of subsidiarity there is no reason why it should.
To further illustrate how one-sided this report is let me quote a fragment of Article 48 of the Treaty on European Union which lays down the procedure of the Treaty change. Paragraph 2 of this article clearly stipulates that “These proposals may, inter alia, serve either to increase or to reduce the competences conferred on the Union in the Treaties.” This passage serves as a useful point of departure to review the EU policies and identify which of Union’s competences could be exercised more effectively at the Member States’ level. Nonetheless, it is rather telling that the rapporteurs allowed in their document only proposals to increase EU’s competences.
These changes are said to be necessary to allow the EU to expand and take in new Member States, such as Ukraine or countries in the Balkans. However, while an expansion of Member States may be called for, an expansion of the EU’s jurisdiction does not at all follow from that. The mainstream narrative is that deepening is necessary for the enlargement is factually wrong and it has been definitively dispelled by scientific research. Indeed, the risk of the Union fragmenting altogether and decision-making breaking down is likely to increase as more Member States with different cultural and ideological perspectives are forced to agree on or have one-size-fits-all solutions imposed. The rapporteurs express frustration that European policy-making is slow. However, this is wrong because previous enlargements accelerated, not slowed down decision-making.
Second, the reason why decision-making sometimes grinds to a halt is that the EU already does too much, instead of doing less but better. With more areas now under its umbrella than it was ever designed for or has the powers to deal with, the EU has overextended itself. The more power the EU takes on, the less time it has to devote to each policy area, and the more half-baked and haphazard its proposals become. The real solution to this problem is strengthening and applying the principles of subsidiarity, proportionality and proximity. Contrary to the advocates of deepening the EU, while enlarging the EU should not centralize, but needs to decentralize, as empirical evidences suggest.
Those concerned about the efficiency of EU policy-making would do well to consider whether the process wouldn’t improve if the EU, rather than expanding scope of what it already does, retreated and focused on delivering better quality proposals in a smaller number of areas (e.g. the external border) that Member States are unable to deal with on their own, as the principle of subsidiarity prescribes. Furthermore, I believe that the use of vetoes could be largely avoided if the Commission and the majority in Parliament accepted the process as it is and tried to shape proposals with the interests and views of all Member States in mind, rather than passing proposals in the hope that the majority in the European Council will be able to bully the minority into going along rather than vetoing them.
The motto of the European Parliament is in varietate concordia; united in diversity. Unfortunately, by excluding all realistic views from the Treaty change proposals, the parliamentary majority groups have once again shown that for them unity only means unity among those who already agree.
A new treaty along these lines would meet with fierce resistance and struggle to be agreed upon and ratified by many Member States. Meanwhile, the process of trying to ratify the treaty would risk paralysing European politics and diverting attention from important issues such as the ongoing war in Ukraine. In other words, it is time to go back to the drawing board to ensure that any changes to the Treaty are transparent, based on the principles of sovereignty of nations and, most importantly, in line with democratic values.
Source: euractiv.com
