European Union

Talks will continue in November, when the co-legislators will meet for the fifth trilogue on a mechanism to link EU funds to respect for rule of law.
Committee on Budgets
Committee on Budgetary Control

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

The eerie quiet of negotiators, um, negotiating means we’ve seen very little of the Future Relationship process of late: everyone’s too busy trying to work up texts and compromises to brief outsiders. Which makes it a good time to consider an aspect of the ratification problem that’s not been much seen so far: what happens if there’s a deal, but ratification can’t be finished by the end of 31 December? So far, we’ve tended to think about things as a case of there being a deal or not and then sticking to that as a binary. But clearly, this isn’t the case: as we know, a collapse of the Future Relationship process still leaves the door open to future efforts to address each sides’ interests. And it’s also true that if the current talks do produce a treaty that each side wants to ratify, then failure to do so by the end of the year doesn’t kill it. This is because while the transition period – with the UK following all elements of EU membership, bar representation and voting – runs until New Year’s Eve, there is no such time limit on the negotiating mandate of either side. Yes, both are committed to ‘best efforts’ to hit the deadline, for a seamless jump from one arrangement to another, but as we know from earlier discussions about this, it was both practically and legally impossible to make that an obligation. So the possibility of a gap exists. Broadly speaking, we could see this gap in one of two variants. The first is the ‘half a mo’ version, where ratification is underway, but someone just runs out of time to complete their processes (the IfG have a good run-down on this): if we have to go down a route of EU27 national ratifications, this is a distinct possibility, even if Christmas closures do leave some margin for extra sitting days for legislatures (I leave you to ponder how sympathetic parliamentarians might feel to that, especially given everything else on their plate). In this scenario, the gap is likely to be small and everyone’s pretty obviously on board with the programme. This points to a short window when no arrangement would be in legal effect, but the rapid arrival of the new deal would give much leeway to let everyone neglect to enforce the full weight of a no-deal scenario. Given that there’s been much discussion in EU circles about progressive introduction of controls post-January in the latter scenario, this could be an extension of that principle, knowing that things would be on a firmer footing shortly. In brief, here we might see a short period of soft-pedalling, which itself might be used as a way of demonstrating good faith. Which is also why we might think it less likely than the second variant of the gap: the ‘err, hang on chaps’ model. Precisely because the first version is grounded in some genuine procedural problem, we have to imagine that both sides would know this was coming and would seek to avoid it at all: better to have no gap than even a small one, especially if we’re trying to rebuild trust. However, as we’ll recall from 2018-20, ratification is not only about your relationship with the other negotiating party, but also your domestic constituency. To take the obvious case, will Number 10 be able to carry the backbenches on a wave of a ‘world-beating’ deal, at speed and without rebellion? Particularly given that some of the scales might have fallen from their eyes now that they’ve had time to consider whether the Withdrawal Agreement was actually what they thought/said it was? One consequence of that saga is that the EU will be pushing for more explicit language about dispute settlement and governance, which even the less assiduous readers of treaty texts might pick up on. And the sailing might be no easier on the EU side, especially if the concessions made fall too obviously on any one member state (e.g. France and fisheries): clear problems for one might be enough to put the brake on and to send Barnier back to try again. Again, the calculation here might be that the UK needs this more than the EU, so the former will have to cave in. However it goes, big problems on any side are liable to mean that we’re back into that territory of renegotiation, and that would be occurring through the end of transition. Here it would be much harder to sell the gap as brief or underpinned by rebuilding trust, which in turn makes it harder to keep everyone on board. Indeed, if it turns out that the world doesn’t fall apart on 1 January, some in the UK might decide that it’s actually not so bad after all and pack it in (even though that would be partly because of that progressive re-introduction of controls mentioned earlier). At the very least, this kind of gap would be one that contained much more potential to collapse the process of negotiation, and to see the full effects of no-deal occur. Even if a deal could be patched up and pushed through, the experience would do little to improve the quality of the relationship between the EU and UK. All of which might be a long way to say that if you want a deal, you also should really not want a gap.

The post Gaps to a new deal appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

"In the context of the exponential growth of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), the President of the European Parliament has announced a number of measures to contain the spread of epidemic and to safeguard Parliament's core activities.

The current precautionary measures adopted by the European Parliament to contain the spread of COVID-19 do not affect work on legislative priorities. Core activities are reduced, but maintained to ensure that the institution's legislative, budgetary, scrutiny functions are maintained.

The meetings will be with remote participation for Members (being able to view and listen to proceedings, ask for the floor and intervene in the meeting). Other participants are invited to follow the meeting through webstreaming.

Following these decisions, the next ordinary AFET Committee meetings will take place on 9 and 19 November (via videoconference).

New Calendar 2020
Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

Veselības ministrija
Social security for migrant workers
The refusal by a patient’s Member State of affiliation to grant prior authorisation for the reimbursement of cross-border healthcare costs when effective hospital treatment is available in that Member State but the method of treatment used is against the insured person’s religious beliefs brings about a difference in treatment indirectly based on religion

Commission v Italy and Others
State aid
According to Advocate General Tanchev, the Court should dismiss the appeal of the Commission against the judgment of the General Court on support measures adopted by an Italian consortium of banks for the benefit of one of its members

InvestEU aims to be a fund that provides support to EU investors by integrating and simplifying the financing, offered under a single budgetary guarantee scheme.
Committee on Budgets
Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

InvestEU aims to be a fund that provides support to EU investors by integrating and simplifying the financing, offered under a single budgetary guarantee scheme.
Committee on Budgets
Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

EP’s negotiators made a breakthrough proposal on Wednesday on the critical issue of how to count the costs of common debt in the next long-term EU budget. Council has rejected it blindly.
Committee on Budgets

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

EP’s negotiators made a breakthrough proposal on Wednesday on the critical issue of how to count the costs of common debt in the next long-term EU budget. Council has rejected it blindly.
Committee on Budgets

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

The main focus of the 2021 budget should be to mitigate the effects of the pandemic and support the recovery, building on the Green Deal and digital transformation.
Committee on Budgets

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

The main focus of the 2021 budget should be to mitigate the effects of the pandemic and support the recovery, building on the Green Deal and digital transformation.
Committee on Budgets

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

AMENDMENTS 1 - 317 - Draft report Human Rights and Democracy in the World 2019 and the European Union’s policy on the matter - annual report 2019
Committee on Foreign Affairs
Isabel Santos

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

Length of video : 124'

Disclaimer : The interpretation of debates serves to facilitate communication and does not constitute an authentic record of proceedings. Only the original speech or the revised written translation is authentic.
Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

Length of video : 143'

Disclaimer : The interpretation of debates serves to facilitate communication and does not constitute an authentic record of proceedings. Only the original speech or the revised written translation is authentic.
Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

Length of video : 120'

Disclaimer : The interpretation of debates serves to facilitate communication and does not constitute an authentic record of proceedings. Only the original speech or the revised written translation is authentic.
Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Détermination des taux des péages pour l'utilisation d'autoroutes)
Taxation
Traffic police-related costs cannot be taken into account in the calculation of tolls for the use of the trans-European road network by heavy goods vehicles

The talks by the EP and Council will continue on Thursday when the co-legislators will meet for the fourth trilogue on mechanism to link the EU funds to the respect of rule of law.
Committee on Budgets
Committee on Budgetary Control

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

The talks by the EP and Council will continue on Thursday when the co-legislators will meet for the fourth trilogue on mechanism to link the EU funds to the respect of rule of law.
Committee on Budgets
Committee on Budgetary Control

Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP

The Subcommittee on Security and Defence will discuss the continuing global threat from Daesh and its affiliates, on 28 October. In spite of its drastic loss of territory in Syria and Iraq, the group remains undoubtedly dangerous, as shown by the recent tragedy in France. The debate is expected to focus in particular on the danger of Daesh propaganda and the problems of infiltration and disinformation within the European Union.

meeting agenda and documents
Live streaming
EU Fact Sheets: Security and defence
Source : © European Union, 2020 - EP