Trialogue

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Trialogue or formal trialogue (from ancient Greek τρι- tri "three" and λόγος lógos "word" or "speech") is a tripartite meeting of the legislative institutions of the European Union (EU) - European Commission , Council of the European Union and European Parliament . The European Commission takes on a moderating role. Trialogue negotiations take place as a conciliation committee if the Council does not approve Parliament's second reading amendments.

The ordinary legislative procedure can, however, be shortened considerably by preparing the compromise finding at the first or before the second reading of a legislative proposal by means of informal trialogue negotiations before the respective reading. For this reason, a distinction is made between formal trialogue and informal trialogue :

While the formal trialogue procedure is regulated in the Treaties and is used, for example, within the framework of the Conciliation Committee , the informal procedure is used to avoid the need to convene the more time-consuming formal procedure between the Council and the European Parliament and to reach an agreement during the first or common) in the second reading.

Trialogue procedure in the contracts

  • Ordinary legislative procedure : If the Council does not agree to the amendments proposed by Parliament at second reading, a mediation committee is convened, made up of representatives from both the Council and Parliament. The commission participates observing. In order to avoid convening a conciliation procedure that was precisely timed (which was also provided for in the previous procedure, the co-decision procedure), more and more attempts were made to reach an agreement within the framework of the informal trialogue , an informal meeting before the impending convocation of the conciliation committee.
  • Budgetary procedure : If Parliament approves the Council's position on the annual budget with only amendments, a conciliation committee will also be convened.

Legal norms

  • Art. 294 (10) - (12) TFEU: Conciliation Committee
  • Joint declaration on the practical modalities of the new 2007 / C 145/02 co-decision procedure, Principle 7: "[…] the possibility of reaching an agreement at the first and second reading stages is significantly improved and [contributes] to the preparation of the work of the Conciliation Committee"
    • Informal trialogue procedures may take place in all phases of decision-making in accordance with Art. 294 TFEU
    • The joint declarations add a new stage to the process: "Stage of the common position", here another possibility for informal trialogues ("contacts")
    • According to Principle 9, no obligation to submit draft compromise texts in advance

Frequency of the shortened legislative procedure

In the current legislative period of the European Union, there is a tendency to adopt legal acts more and more frequently after the first reading: While the share of so-called first-reading agreements in 2000 was less than 20% of the total number of legal acts adopted, it was in the year 2008 80%. In order to enable such a smooth decision-making process, preparations are often made in advance in the context of informal trialogue negotiations.

  • 2009–2013: 81% of all bills passed in first reading
  • 2004–2009: 72% of all draft laws passed in first reading
  • 1999–2004: 33% of all bills passed in first reading
  • Mediation Committee: one of five procedures in the 4th and 5th legislative periods (1994-2004)

criticism

The European Ombudsman , Emily O'Reilly , opened an inquiry (OI / 8/2015 / FOR) on 26 May 2015 into the transparency of "trialogues". She reported on this in the European Parliament (EP) on September 28, 2015 and it was debated in the EP.

It was noted that the informal trialogue, which would affect around 85% of all legislative processes, would provide almost no information to the public. In principle, the efficiency requirement according to Art 13 TEU also applies to the trialogues and that this also includes public acceptance and information.

In this debate between the European Parliament on 28 September 2015 and the European Ombudsman , the lack of transparency in the Council working groups was also criticized. When it comes to official requests for documents, the European Parliament often only receives summaries of the discussions in the Council, which are also incomprehensible to people who did not take part. A reform of the trialogue procedure is necessary.

The Council of the European Union has on 15 September 2015 opinion (11873/15) on this investigation the Ombudsman issued and to examine the results and the legitimacy of the Ombudsman, certain questions in this regard, doubted.

Following a lawsuit by former civil servant Emilio de Capitani, the European Court ruled in March 2018 that the European Parliament must give access to documents from ongoing trialogues upon request under EU Regulation 1049/2001 .

Web links

literature

  • Fabio Franchino, Camilla Mariotto: Explaining negotiations in the conciliation committee In: European Union Politics. September / vol. 14, No. 3, 2013, 345–365
  • S. Petitjean, F. Paquay: Mixed reviews after 20 Years of Codecision In: Europolitics , November 6, 2013
  • C. Reh, A. Héritier, E. Bressanelli, C. Koop: The Informl Politics of Legislation - Explaining Secluded Decision-Making in the European Union , Washington 2010

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ "Guide to the work of Parliament as part of the legislative body" . European Parliament website. Retrieved April 4, 2014. p. 9; 13-24
  2. ↑ [1] Article 294 (ex Article 251 EC Treaty)
  3. ↑ [2] Joint declaration on the practical modalities of the new co-decision procedure (Article 251 of the EC Treaty), Principle 7, June 13, 2007
  4. ↑ T. Bunyan: Under a new agreement between the Council and the European Parliament the efficiency of decision-making is enhanced at the expense of transparency, openness and accountability . In: Statewatch bulletin vol 16 no 5/6, 2007, p. 5
  5. ↑ [3] Joint declaration on the practical modalities of the new co-decision procedure (Article 251 of the EC Treaty), Principle 8, 13 June 2007
  6. ↑ T. Bunyan: Under a new agreement between the Council and the European Parliament the efficiency of decision-making is enhanced at the expense of transparency, openness and accountability . In: Statewatch bulletin vol 16 no 5/6, 2007, p. 6
  7. ↑ T. Bunyan: Under a new agreement between the Council and the European Parliament the efficiency of decision-making is enhanced at the expense of transparency, openness and accountability . In: Statewatch bulletin vol 16 no 5/6, 2007
  8. ^ Sophie Petitjean, François Paquay: Mixed reviews after 20 years of co-decision . In: European Report 06 / Nov. 2013
  9. ^ "The Co-Decision Procedure [Article 251 TEU , Analysis and Statistics of the 2004-2009 Legislature (Status: August 2009)"]. European Parliament website. Retrieved May 1, 2014. p. 6
  10. ^ "The Co-Decision Procedure [Article 251 TEU , Analysis and Statistics of the 2004-2009 Legislature (Status: August 2009)"]. European Parliament website. Retrieved May 1, 2014. p. 6
  11. ^ F. Franchino, C. Mariotto: Explaining negotiations in the conciliation committee . In: European Union Politics . September / vol. 14, No. 3, 2013, p. 348
  12. ↑ Letter to the Council of the EU opening the European Ombudsman's own-initiative inquiry OI / 8/2015 / FOR concerning transparency of trilogues
  13. ↑ [4] (English)
  14. ↑ Upon a specific request, the European Parliament must in principle grant access to the documents on the ongoing trialogues. Retrieved January 23, 2019 .