Barnier calls for stronger Commission

Date: 06/07/2000

By Simon Taylor

THE European Commission should be given stronger powers to boost its political credibility - including the right to dissolve the European Parliament - according to the man responsible for pressing the institution's case at the EU treaty reform talks.

Michel Barnier also suggests that the Commission president should be directly elected and says the Union's High Representative for foreign policy should become a Commission vice-president to strengthen the administration's political legitimacy.

Barnier's ideas are out-lined in an internal document drawn up as the Commis-sion's contribution to the ongoing debate over the EU's future. The report staunchly defends the Commission's role and argues for continuing the Community model of development which, says Barnier, has been responsible for the past 50 years of European integration.

He also warns against the growing tendency to boost the Council of Ministers" power at the expense of the Commission, questioning whether the Council could defend the Union's interest in the way the EU executive has done.

"Only a legal institution independent of the member states and the Council would be capable of taking over the vital task of acting as the "guardian of the treaties" which has hitherto been performed by the Commission," he insists.

Barnier's comments come as French President Jacques Chirac has launched the greatest threat ever to the Commission's role by calling for the creation of a new secretariat which would rival the administration's powers in ensuring that any new forms of cooperation did not clash with existing treaty rules.

Barnier admits that the existing arrangements have "limitations", but argues these can be addressed by his institution's political legitimacy. "The European Commission will one day need direct democratic, not delegated legitimacy, if it is to push ahead with the building of Europe," he insists, adding that "serious thought" should be given to the idea of electing the president.

He says the Commission should also be given the right to dissolve the Parliament to balance the assembly's right to censure the Commission. This could be done on the basis of a proposal from the president with approval from EU governments.

Barnier adds: "The logic of this system would eventually require the High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy to become a member of the Commission, inevitably taking the position of vice-president."

The Commissioner nevertheless accepts the argument for a stronger role for national parliaments in EU affairs and supports the call for new forms of cooperation to allow groups of member states to move ahead in key policy areas.

But Commission President Romano Prodi told MEPs this week that the EU's institutions should be strengthened and insisted that it was wrong to believe that the existing gradual approach to deeper integration could be replaced by ad hoc arrangements.

The European Commission should be given stronger powers to boost its political credibility, including the right to dissolve the European Parliament, according to the man responsible for pressing the institution's case at the EU treaty reform talks.