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Transparency

(Photo: EUobserver.com)

Being able to see through the decision-making process and have access to documents or meetings.

Most progress on transparency within the EU has been achieved by members of the European Parliament and the EU Court. The institutions have been forced to judge every document individually, instead of just rejecting applications on a wholesale basis. The progress established by the Court is now a part of the regulation on transparency adopted by co-decision and qualified majority on the basis of Art. 255 TEC.

Applications for access to documents must be processed by the institutions within 15 working days, but they often wait 10 days to register after they received a letter and can ask for 15 days more – and then refuse to answer. Individuals then have the right to send a new application to the institution asking it to reconsider its position, and finally, to go to the Ombudsman or the EU Court.

The institutions have improved their transparency by providing citizens with information via the internet. But, they still hide their internal deliberations on legislation from the public and even from the elected members of the national parliaments and the EU Parliament.

When the European Parliament Committees discuss law proposals it is often on the basis of completely outdated versions. Sitting behind the MEPs are assistants or students from the permanent representations, the EU Commission and the Council, with the updated versions from the last meeting of the relevant Council working group. There, the real law-making takes place.

According to the conclusions of the EU summit of Seville in June 2002, the Council meetings should be opened to the public. Yet many restrictions have been maintained. Under the Greek Presidency in 2003, for example, only 8 Council meetings out of about 170 were open to the public.

Future

The Lisbon Treaty puts forward openness in all official Council meetings discussing new EU laws. This has more or less been adopted by the European Council in June 2006. However, the Governments will not yet open the law-making committees and give citizens a real insight into how their laws are decided in these committees that adopt 85% of all EU-laws. In the European Parliament almost all committee meetings are open.

he Danish Committee on European Affairs opens from fall 2006 and onwards all its meetings. The Danish government can, however, ask the Committee to close the meeting under special circumstances. The former European Ombudsman, Jacob Söderman, has proposed a transparency and administrative reform.

The European Parliament has proposed that all meetings and documents be open unless a ⅔ majority decide otherwise. This proposal has assembled support from 200 members and substitute members of the Convention, including all the members of the national parliaments, but it was still not inserted into the EU Constitution by the Praesidium, nor in the Lisbon Treaty.

Links

A book with the many victories for transparency can be found at www.Bonde.com