Meeting summary: Wednesday 16 July

The Committee took oral evidence from the Minister for Europe, Rt Hon David Lidington MP, about the Government’s handling of EU Scrutiny. It also considered the following documents:

Ukraine

The Committee reports on a number of European Union documents on Ukraine this week.  We scrutinise a Council Decision on establishing an EU civilian CSDP mission in Ukraine which will have an initial 12 month mandate.  Although we have no questions to ask on the aims of the mission, we remind the Minister that we look forward to receiving an update on the “benchmarking and exit strategy” exercise after the initial deployment as well as his promised update when the strategic review of progress and performance takes place in 12 months’ time. We also return to the Council Decisions on the EU’s signature and provisional application of the remaining provisions of the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement (the core political provisions have been debated and adopted). In our previous Report we granted a scrutiny waiver on these documents but asked that the Minister deposit them with an Explanatory Memorandum identifying where the EU was acting outside of its exclusive competence.  We now clear them from scrutiny but ask that the Minister provide this information on similar future proposals in good time. Lastly, we also report on Restrictive measures on goods originating in Crimea and Sevastopol. These instruments were enacted on 23 June following the March European Council meeting at which the Commission was asked to propose economic, trade and financial restrictions regarding Crimea, following the illegal annexation of Crimea and Sevastopol by the Russian Federation. We are clearing these measures but reporting them to the House given the widespread interest in the situation in Ukraine.

Strategic guidelines for EU Justice and Home Affairs to 2020

(For debate on the floor of the House)

These documents represent the Commission’s contribution to the development of a new five-year set of strategic guidelines on justice and home affairs policy. They are the only publicly accessible documents published in advance of the June European Council at which the guidelines were agreed. In our Report of 9 April, we recommended these Commission Communications — one covering justice matters, the other home affairs —for debate on the floor of the House to allow all Members, especially those on the Home Affairs and Justice Select Committees, to influence and inform the Government’s position before final discussions on the content of the guidelines took place.  This week we report a letter from Home Office and Justice Ministers inviting the Committee to "welcome" the Strategic Guidelines agreed by the European Council and to acknowledge that the Government has done its utmost to keep the Committee informed of developments. We are far from satisfied.  The debate we recommended has yet to be scheduled, despite repeated assertions of a commitment on the part of the Government to strengthen its engagement with Parliament¬—it is now too late for Members to influence the Government’s position on the strategic guidelines. We ask the Ministers to provide a detailed explanation for the three-month delay and to schedule a debate forthwith, failing which we will expect them to give their reasons in an oral evidence session before the Committee.

Proposing a candidate for President of the Commission

The Committee scrutinised the Council Decision proposing, to the European Parliament (EP), Mr Jean-Claude Juncker as the next Commission President.  On Tuesday 15 July, the EP voted to approve Mr Juncker’s nomination. We report the Minister for Europe’s comments that the UK Government asserts that where the Treaty on European Union states that “the European Council, acting by qualified majority, shall propose […] a candidate” more weight should have been given to consideration of a candidate who “commanded the support of every Member State” rather than being “constrained to consider only those candidates nominated by a European political party”. The Government welcomes a commitment in the Council Conclusions to reconsider the process of appointment once the new Commission is in place.  Although we welcome the Government’s stance on the role of the European Council, we question the wording in the conclusion that this will involve “respecting the European Treaties” as open to interpretation and note that a commitment to consider the current process is not a commitment to change it.  We continue to hold the proposal under scrutiny pending a response from the Minister.

Other documents reported

We are also reporting on documents relating to:

• Business, Innovation and Skills: Undeclared work; Reforms to the EU’s trademark regime; Earth observation satellite;
• Culture, Media and Sport: High-speed electronic communication networks; The Telecommunications Single Market;
• Foreign and Commonwealth Office: Minerals originating in conflict-affected and high-risk areas: an integrated EU approach; the EU and Georgia: the EU and Moldova;
• HM Treasury: European Globalisation Adjustment Fund; Financial management: investigations of fraud;
• Home Office: EU Internal Security Strategy.

The Committee’s Sixth Report will be published soon covering: Gender balance on corporate boards; Innovation in the Blue Economy; Regulatory fitness; Financial information on the European Development Fund; EU strategy on public security in Central America and the Caribbean; Common Foreign and Security Policy, including Common Security and Defence Policy; EU Special Representative for the Horn of Africa; Citizens’ dialogues; The EU and the Sahel: EUCAP Sahel Niger; The EU and Guinea-Bissau; Eurozone: Commission Report; European Central Bank: sanctions; Financial services: occupations funds; Civil aviation; The development of the second generation Schengen Information System—SIS II; European Investigation Order. The Seventh Report was published on 10 July covering: Detention and Supervision of EU citizens; and Taking previous convictions into account in new criminal proceedings.

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