Implementation of Lisbon bedevilled ‘by paradoxes’
Belgian foreign minister looks back on presidency, says rotating presidency must avoid being ‘fifth wheel’
European Union institutions still have work to do to implement the Lisbon treaty properly, Belgium’s foreign minister has said.
In a preliminary analysis of his country’s six-month presidency of the Council of Ministers, which still has three weeks to run, Steven Vanackere said the European Parliament was “much more assertive”.
“The Parliament has become more powerful and has realised this and knows this and uses this,” he said.
But he warned that the Parliament had to understand better the role of the rotating presidency of the Council of Ministers, which could not always deliver what the MEPs demanded.
He said that the presidency could communicate with the other institutions only when it had achieved agreement between all 27 member states.
This, Vanackere said, had led to problems with the Parliament, which made too many demands on the rotating presidency.
He said that the Belgian presidency intentionally chose “not to partake” in issuing declarations and political statements, but instead focused on its role as a facilitator.
Vanackere said the Belgian presidency had taken account of the Lisbon treaty changes and had stepped up meetings and co-ordination with MEPs to help achieve agreement on legislation. “But I am sure the Parliament will always want more,” he said.
He said Belgium had devoted a lot of attention to how the EU’s institutions implemented the Lisbon treaty, which came into force in December 2009.
“People always say the devil is in the detail, but actually the devil is in the implementation,” he said.
“Lisbon is a bundle of paradoxes, because it creates and strengthens a lot of power sources in Europe,” said Vanackere.
Behind-the-scenes role
He said more effort was needed to avoid problems between the Council, the Parliament and the European Commission over how they interact with each other, and with the EU’s foreign policy chief and the permanent president of the European Council.
The Belgian presidency had decided to take a more behind-the-scenes role as a mediator or broker behind Catherine Ashton, the EU’s foreign policy chief, and Herman Van Rompuy, the Council president.
“What we didn’t want to be was a fifth wheel on the wagon. Our task was to make sure the four wheels were travelling at the same speed in the same direction,” he said. “I think this has been achieved.”
The Lisbon treaty changed the role of the country holding the rotating presidency so that it no longer chairs meetings of the foreign ministers or summits of government leaders. But Vanackere said that gave greater importance to its duties chairing the General Affairs Council (GAC). He said the priority for the GAC was not just to be a secretariat to the European Council but to ensure cohesion across all EU policy fields and proper implementation of agreements that member states made. “I introduced an innovation to the General Affairs Council, namely that we discuss the state of implementation of decisions made by our bosses,” he said, adding that it was the role of the GAC to “give a political impulse” to the direction of the EU.
He said that while it was too early for a full assessment, his country had already won agreements on several pieces of legislation, including financial supervision rules, regulations on hedge funds and a free-trade accord with South Korea. Vanackere also pointed to a deal with the Parliament on setting up the European External Action Service, which started its work on 1 December.
He acknowledged, however, that “more work is needed” to improve the EU’s common foreign policy as well as to ensure a sustainable economic recovery.
Vanackere said he regretted that the Belgian presidency had been unable to reach an agreement on the single EU patent, but was still hoping that a deal on a permanent mechanism to help countries with sovereign-debt difficulties could be reached at the European Council of 16-17 December.
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