Delegated and Implementing Acts: the New Worlds of Comitology – Implications for European and National Public Administrations

The Treaty of Lisbon (TFEU) significantly changes the theory and practice of the delegation of executive powers to the European Commission, powers which resulted in 14,522 legally binding implementing measures during the sixth legislature under the Barroso I Commission (2004-2009) (in comparison to only 454 legislative acts). The Treaty of Lisbon fundamentally alters the way this system works, and in turn the way everyone works with it, especially European and national public administrations. From obscure and informal beginnings in the field of purely technical agricultural markets in the 1960s, the Lisbon Treaty has in fact made the so-called ‘comitology’ system (and the name) partially redundant. Following the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon on 1 December 2009, there are now two new legal bases; Delegated Acts (Article 290) and Implementing Acts (Article 291). This means that the ‘comitology’ world has been split into two.

This short article attempts to address the key changes and questions. Based on the institutions’ Common Understanding on Delegated Acts and the new ‘Comitology’ Regulation 182/2011/EU, which entered into force on 1 March 2011, the authors present the two new avenues and highlight all the important changes. They conclude with our considerations of the practical implications of the new Lisbon system for European and national public administrations.

[Article forms part of 30th Anniversary Special Issue of EIPASCOPE]

EIPASCOPE: Archive http://www.eipa.eu/en/eipascope/archive/

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