Coreper paves the way for political harmony

Date: 02/05/1996

A SIMPLE acronym camouflages the single most important body of national officials in the EU.

The group is at the heart of Union activity and enjoys an unusually broad policy overview in an increasingly compartmentalised bureaucratic world. Its 15 members shun the limelight, but are frequently seen caught in its rays either walking alongside government ministers, or just one step behind.

The 15 are their country's permanent representatives to the Union, more popularly referred to as EU ambassadors. Traditionally, they meet every Thursday to set and prepare the agenda for the following week. In Brussels shorthand, they are simply referred to by their French acronym, Coreper.

The group is the final forum where national interests come into stark relief, after issues have worked their way through the system but before they are finally handed over to ministers.

When the system works well, most differences between member states - especially technical ones - are settled by the ambassadors and only political decisions are passed upwards. But it is not unusual for matters of detail such as South African oranges or Moroccan cut flowers to defeat Coreper and be passed on to ministers because of the wider political consequences involved.

One ambassador describes the difference between Coreper's role and that of ministers as follows: “We do not want to face ministers with deciding which article in the treaty should provide the legal base for an international agreement. But it is they who should determine whether we conclude a free trade agreement with South Africa or include an evolutionary clause with Albania.”

Precisely because Coreper is the penultimate stage in a process which leads to the Council of Ministers, its members share a joint purpose in ironing out as many of the wrinkles as possible before a proposal reaches the politicians.

“The strength of the group is that it can become very tense when it is a matter of defending national interests. But it is also a kind of club that has to make things work. To put it more crudely, there is a sort of shared interest which encourages plotting,” says one official.

One former member with six years' experience of Coreper - the UK's Sir Michael Butler - divides the committee's work into three broad categories: it is a forum for permanent negotiation on a wide range of issues; it can act as a legislature; and it can behave like a senior board of directors taking many of the day-to-day policy decisions facing the Union.

The club atmosphere which prevails in Coreper meetings was briefly threatened when the Council of Ministers moved from its old Charlemagne headquarters to the new Justus Lipsius building. The original meeting room set aside for the ambassadors in the new premises (with its octagonal table used by ministers) was felt by ambassadors to be too formal, so they moved to the smaller, slightly less austere rectangular room they now use.

Even so, with 15 national delegations, the presidency, aided by the Council of Ministers' secretariat and the Commission usually led by its Deputy Secretary-General Carlo Trojan, a normal meeting can involve between 80 and 100 people.

Such crowded gatherings are hardly conducive to secret negotiations.

For that, the ambassadors rely on the lunch which punctuates the morning and afternoon sessions. It acts as a useful safety-valve, and as one participant explains: “It is informal and you can say things you cannot say in Coreper.”

But the group does not rule supreme. It has to share key policy issues with a range of other senior bodies staffed by national officials: the Political Committee (PoCo), the Monetary Committee, the K4 Committee on interior and judicial issues and the 113 committee on international trade.

Some see a permanent tension between the ambassadors and the national political directors on the PoCo who are responsible for much of Union foreign policy. “Coreper is not specialised in the day-to-day business of analysing foreign policy developments. Nor do its members enjoy the access political directors have to government ministers, since the two frequently travel together. But Coreper's strength is that it takes decisions with financial and legal consequences. The Political Committee does not,” explains one official.

The atmosphere in both is equally informal, but, as one senior official reveals, the styles are different.

“In Coreper, you are defending specific interests, making specific requests and getting specific satisfaction. In the Political Committee, if you manage to get a word in the joint statement, that is your contribution.”

Similar arm wrestling can take place with the equally powerful Monetary Committee. Interestingly, Coreper members met together for 90 minutes before their recent lunch with committee chairman Sir Nigel Wicks.

“They wanted to be prepared for the meeting to tackle Wicks and give him the message: 'You can discuss monetary matters, but some of the issues have institutional implications and we know better than you how to handle institutional matters',” explained one official.

In one way, Coreper is a misnomer. In fact it is made up of two committees, each of which has its own responsibilities and style.

The more senior - Coreper II - is more political, handling foreign affairs, economics and the budget. The business is serious, but the atmosphere is relaxed and remarkably informal.

“In the 1960s, it was very formal and the ambassadors made a clear distinction between meeting in Coreper and meeting socially. That distinction is now much less marked,” explains one official, recalling those early days.

Some participants also indulge in somewhat risqué remarks behind closed doors which would cause a storm elsewhere. Recently, one ambassador referred to “Our Turkish friends”, only for another mischievously to intervene with “There are no Turkish friends”.

It helps that the members of this club meet so regularly on both the business and social circuits. That familiarity can provide useful diplomatic oil to grease the wheels of Union activity.

But at least one ambassador insists that other factors determine the degree of Coreper's success. “The fact that we see each other regularly helps to get results. But we should not overestimate this. A lot depends on the presidency and how it handles things. It also depends on our instructions and the degree of influence we have in our national capitals,” he explains.

Its junior partner - Coreper I - made up of deputy ambassadors, usually meets on Wednesdays, although under the Italian presidency it has been convened three times a week. This committee is more concerned with the nuts and bolts of Union business.

“It is much more businesslike. They are like a legislative committee. They are people who understand the mechanics. Assisted by highly-qualified experts, they do a good job drafting very complex legislation,” explains one observer.

But that is not to say that humour is totally absent. One member recounts the story of the British representative who turned up to a meeting where the social chapter, from which the UK has an 'opt-out', was on the agenda and ostentatiously spent the time reading his newspapers, all of which were in French.

Each Coreper now has its own preparatory body. The first to be created, in 1975, was the Antici group, which saw the light of day under an Italian presidency. Its first chairman, now immortalised in EU terminology, was Paolo Antici, who later became Italian ambassador to the Council of Europe.

It was not until 1993 that Coreper I was given its own foot soldier in the shape of the Mertens group, named after Vincent Mertens de Wilmars, a Belgian official from one of the country's long-established families whose government held the Union presidency at the time the group was formed.

An unwritten requirement for Coreper membership is proficiency in either English, French or German. Unlike many other Union fora where up to 11 of the Union's official languages may be used, EU ambassadors and their deputies are limited to just three.

The restriction does not cause any real problems for high-flying career diplomats, although many concede it is easier to make jokes and dominate discussions in one's own language.

One ambassador puts the linguistic regime into perspective. “The standard joke is that we all speak in English and French, and listen to the interpreters in German.”