IGC talks build up to crescendo

Date: 15/05/1997

THERE is a striking similarity between the Intergovernmental Conference negotiations on reform of the European Union and Ravel's Bolero. Both start slowly and take a long time to come to their final climax.

But after almost two years of talks, in one form or another, on how the EU should make itself more efficient and increase its legitimacy while also preparing for enlargement, the IGC is now getting ready to reach its own crescendo.

A flurry of meetings is in prospect over the next few weeks as Union leaders, their foreign ministers and IGC representatives prepare for the final stages of the negotiations in the run-up to the mid-June Amsterdam summit.

The approaching deadline is introducing a note of urgency and the change of government in the UK earlier this month has injected a sense of liberation into talks which had become bogged down in detail and had deliberately avoided some of the most contentious issues.

Despite the mounds of paper which have been generated and the millions of words spoken during the negotiations, the process has now reached a stage where the essential outstanding questions centre on a handful of key issues.

EU member states have yet to decide how to streamline their decision-making procedures; how to improve their internal security; and how to strengthen their foreign policy and external security capacities.

All three involve changes to the complex pillar structure established by the Maastricht Treaty negotiated over six years ago.

Negotiators will also have to agree on how to give legal recognition to the new concept of 'close cooperation'. By formally allowing different groups of countries to move ahead together without the rest in some policy areas, acceptance of a new form of flexible integration could provide one of the biggest long-term changes to the existing Union.

“Each IGC seems to have its 'f-word'. In Maastricht, it was federalism. This time it is flexibility, but this time it is likely to cause far less controversy,” said one veteran of both negotiations.

The work of the earlier informal Reflection Group under the then Spanish European Affairs Minister Carlos Westendorp and the activities of the formal IGC negotiators launched in Turin in March 1996 have generally been greeted with indifference or incomprehension.

But in an unostentatious way, they have prepared the ground for agreement in a number of policy areas.

Although unlikely to be considered as of spectacular importance in their own right - and much will depend on the way they are implemented in practice - these are intended to put the Union on a surer and more realistic footing.

Employment policy is to be given a higher priority in EU policy-making. Non-discrimination on grounds of nationality will be extended to other areas. Wider understanding of EU decision-making should be possible through easier access to internal Union documents, the use of clearer language and the application of less complex procedures.

Certain existing policy areas, notably the environment, are being given a stronger legal presence in the revised treaty and, belatedly, the need for national parliaments to scrutinise their governments' handling of EU negotiations is being recognised, although the assemblies will have no formal input into Union decision-making.

With only a month to go to the Amsterdam summit, the shape of most 'fringe' issues has either been settled or is clearly identifiable - a notable success for the negotiating method of 'successive approximation' introduced by last year's Irish

EU presidency and continued by its Dutch successors.

“These negotiations have been very different from those on the original Maastricht Treaty. On that occasion, there could be anything up to six or seven texts on the table. This time there is just one and negotiators have to work from that,” explained one participant.

One area still wide open is the European Commission's demand that it should be given the right to negotiate international trade deals in services and intellectual property on behalf of the Union, just as it does now for goods.

While this is supported by a majority of member states, it has run up against the immovable opposition of some others, such as France.

But here again the change of government in the UK could be a determining factor, since the current Labour administration is considerably more receptive to the idea than its Tory predecessor.

In essence, therefore, the broad shape of the new treaty now exists, and the final institutional and security issues will be settled in a general trade-off at the Amsterdam summit, if all goes according to plan.

That climax will also be the occasion when governments will have to decide how far to humour each other in agreeing to add protocols on the particular hobby-horses almost all member states have tabled, ranging from the status of languages in the Union to the role of a European voluntary service. The recognition generally counts for little, but can be a useful flag to wave back home.

Three key events before Amsterdam will give a clear indication as to whether the timetable can be met.

The first will be an informal meeting of EU foreign ministers in The Hague on 20 May when governments will have their first opportunity to challenge the new treaty text drafted by the Dutch government.

Confirming in somewhat cryptic style that the plans were still on course, Dutch European Affairs Minister Michiel Patijn said last week: “I am not pessimistic that in one or two weeks the presidency will have an almost final text. How we will use it we still have to decide.”

Three days later, Union leaders will gather in the Dutch coastal town of Noordwijk for what is being billed as an informal summit.

In reality, the meeting will be little more than a six-hour session, followed by dinner - hardly sufficient to enter into serious negotiations.

Nor are they likely to, preferring to keep their powder dry for three weeks later.

But the occasion is an indispensable aperitif to Amsterdam. It will formally introduce British Prime Minister Tony Blair into the élite club, giving him a chance to meet those EU leaders he has not already encountered face to face and ensuring that no time is wasted on niceties at Amsterdam.

It will also give government leaders an early opportunity to test the waters for possible trade-offs.

The third event which could be crucial to success in Amsterdam will be the French elections on 25 May and 1 June. A change of government in Paris just two weeks before the summit could throw an 11th-hour spanner into the works.

But the odds are now shortening on a final deal emerging from Amsterdam, if only because of the lengthy agenda piling up in its wake: enlargement negotiations, future financing arrangements and arrival of the single currency.

As a contingency plan, however, the incoming Luxembourg presidency is investigating the possibility of holding an emergency summit towards the end of July to mop up any unfinished business. Either way, the bets are increasingly on negotiations reaching their climax before the summer.

But similarities between Ravel's Bolero and the Union's IGC can only be pushed so far.

When the music stops, the dance ends. But when the Intergovernmental Conference draws to a close, the EU show carries on. Governments gird their loins to try and ensure their painstaking work is safely ratified by parliaments and populace - and there are always new negotiations on the horizon.