Where do the lost Powers go?
The powers surrendered by Parliament are shared by three Community bodies, in only one Of which Britain has one — and only one — representative. The other two have British members, who are required not to think of themselves, or to act, as representatives, of their country. Changes made in recent years require some re-statement of the powers of these bodies.
The Commission consists, as always, of appointed members, each nominated by the Government of his country and in practice always accepted by the others. The Commission works by simple majority, which means that six of its thirteen members can be outvoted by the other seven. Proposals coming up there have, in the words of a high British civil servant, been "kicked around" in mixed committees of Community and national civil servants before they reach the Commission for decision, but there have nevertheless been occasions on which the urgent representations of important members have been ignored by the majority. One of those occasions led to the walk-out of General de Gaulle for six months in 1965-6, followed by what Mr Enoch Powell has accurately described as the "disagreement to disagree," which for some time curbed the Pretensions of the Commission. But that body still has very considerable rights of its own, and can return to the treaty provisions — never amended — if times change again. All political institutions go through phases of strength and Patches of weakness. (The Supreme Court of the US offers examples of such changes that are well known to all political scientists.) Moreover, the communiqué issued after the Nine's 'summit' conference of December 10-12, 1974 (article 8) expressly recommended giving more Power to the Commission.
As has been said, many of the Commission's decisions concern minor matters, but some are of great importance. It was, for instance, the Commission which decided to sell thousands of tons of butter to Russia at about 5p a pound — subsidised butter, paid for by Community citizens. The Commission can and does take governments to court, runs the Common Agricultural Policy, and decides about cartels and monopolies. When North Sea oil begins to flow, it will be the Commission that forbids us to sell it more cheaply here than in other Community countries and in general enforces the Community's free-market rules. The oil will be ours, but not to do as we like with. The Commission also has extensive powers of initiative and control as regards trade with non-member countries, and every one involves a limitation of our former freedom to live and trade as we wished.
The most important fact about the Council of Ministers is that it makes laws — laws which are binding in every member State and override anything that may conflict with them in the laws already passed by parliaments of the Member States. Unlike the parliaments of democratic countries, however, it is not a debating but a negotiating body. Its members negotiate with each other and with the Commission, whose proposals they have to consider. For that reason, and of necessity, it is the only body in the democratic world which Makes laws in secret. To make matters worse, the 'summit' of December 1974, decided that more decisions than hitherto should be taken in the still more secret meetings of the national Ambassadors to the Community, meeting as the Committee of Permanent Representatives, with no journalists in attendance to collect 'leaked' information. When parliaments make decisions we know at least what has been said, but to know why the Community Council has reached its decisions we have to rely on scrappy, self-interested and often contradictory 'leakages' from Ministers to journalists. The Council is most accurately seen as being less the organ of a united Community than a
meeting ground where ministers of national governments come together to further the interests of their own countries. For a time, these gentlemen saw themselves as required also to push the whole body forward tcokarcil something called 'ever greater unity.' But as time went on, and the less precise clauses of the treaties had to be filled in, it became more and more of a battle-ground. The people of every member state had been promised great advantages from 'unity', and the ministers representing them all came from political parties anxious to do well at the next general election in their respective countries. So the job of each Council member was to fight as hard as he could for the interests of his country as he, his government or his party saw them. Proposals come up to the Council from the Commission, and then the Council members, in what are reported as the words of a British Commissioner, Sir Christopher Soames, proceed each "to tear as much meat as each of them can from the bone." A fair description from a close observer who has been from the beginning an enthusiastic supporter of British membership.
Until 1965, the Council had three voting procedures. On a very small number of matters, it could use ordinary majority voting. On most matters, from January 1, 1966 onwards, it was supposed to go over to voting by weighted and, qualified majority. Since the accession of new members, 'weighted' has meant ten votes each for Germany, France, Italy and the United Kingdom, five each for Holland and Belgium, three each for Denmark and Ireland, and two for Luxembourg. 'Qualified' means that forty of the above fifty-eight votes are required to pass a proposal coming from the Commission, and the same number, with at least six members voting, on other proposals. The third method was decision by unanimous vote — i.e. the right of veto for each government. This applied to some decisions specified in the treaties and to all decisions on which the treaties lay down no voting rules.
When the quarrel marked by General de Gaulle's walk-out was settled in January, 1966, the other five members accepted in fact a French proposal which they had rejected in theory, and made decisions on most questions only if all were agreed, though weighted and qualified voting was still sometimes used. The Community Budget, for instance, can be voted by qualified majority, and it is said, probably with truth, that some governments want to be defeated on proposals which they dislike andtheir parliaments and people like, and the qualified majority offers a convenient get-out.
After the Paris 'Summit' meeting of December, 1974, it was announced that member countries considered it "necessary to renounce the practice which consists of making agreements on all questions conditional on unanimous consent:" Mr Callaghan has since said (Hansard, December 19, 1974, col. 1924) that, despite that statement, member states are free "to maintain their respective positions, what ever they may be or whatever they were In that sense, nothing has changed." M. Giscard d'Estaing, on the other hand, has said that something has changed, and Mr Wilson has seemed to agree. No doubt the truth will emerge in time. So also will the facts about the precise relationship between the new 'European Council,' which is not strictly a Community organ, but a meeting of Governments of Community countries with the President of the Community Commission present as an observer, and which appears to give orders in general terms to both Commission and Council.
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