The Commission presents a report on the implementation
of Regulation No 182/2011 laying down the rules and general
principles concerning mechanisms for control by Member States of
the Commission’s exercise of implementing powers (the
‘Comitology Regulation’).
The adoption of the Regulation, which entered into
force on 1 March 2011, was the result of amendments made in the
Treaty of Lisbon with regard to the framework for the conferral of
powers upon the Commission by introducing a distinction between
delegated and implementing powers.
Functioning of Regulation (EU)
182/2011: the report focuses on the
elements newly introduced by Regulation (EU) 182/2011 compared to
the Council Decision 1999/468/EC, as amended by Council Decision
2006/512/EC, which provided the framework applicable before
Regulation (EU) 182/2011.
Overall the figures indicate that the Regulation has
allowed a seamless continuation of the system. When
comparing the figures since 2011 to the years before the
application of Regulation (EU) 182/2011, both the number of
committees and their activity has remained stable. The number
of committees was at 266 in 2009 and at 287 in 2014. Similarly the
number of measures adopted was at 1808 in 2009 and at 1728 in
2014.
Building on experience, the Regulation introduced a
number of provisions linked to the working of the committees
that reflected common practice, but were not spelled out in the
legislation before. This includes provisions on:
- the use of the written procedure;
- an explicit requirement for the chair to find
solutions that command the widest possible support within the
committee ;
- the possibility of amending the draft acts prior to
the vote to take account of the discussions of the
committee.
These common provisions continued to be
effective and useful in ensuring a
proper functioning of the committees. The written procedure
is widely used and it is an efficient tool. The work of the
committees remains consensual: the overwhelming percentage
of opinions (well over 90%) are positive opinions, the majority of
these adopted by unanimous vote or by consensus of the committee
members, and there are hardly any negative and relatively few
negative opinions.
Main changes:
- the reduction of the number of committee
procedure : the old
regulatory and management procedures were replaced by the
examination procedure, while the advisory procedure was maintained.
The report states that the reduction of the number of procedures
has not raised particular issues;
- the creation of the appeal
committee: the Regulation (EU)
created a second layer to address issues on which the committee
could not find agreement. So far, the appeal committee has mainly
been convened in relation to one policy area, namely health
and consumer protection, and more specifically in relation to
genetically modified food and feed and plant protection products.
Overall the referral to the appeal committee has taken place with a
comparable frequency to the earlier referrals to the Council, which
are no longer permitted under the new institutional
framework;
- examination procedure: the Regulation introduced more flexibility for the
Commission in cases where there is no qualified majority in favour
or against the draft (referred to as a no opinion) in the committee
in the examination procedure. The report notes that even though it
has been used so far in few cases, the new flexibility allowed
the Commission to reassess the draft measure after the voting
results and the discussion in the committee had shown that it did
not enjoy the widest possible support within the
committee;
- criteria for the choice between the
procedures: the advisory
procedure applies in principle to all cases to which the
examination procedure does not apply. Overall, the choice of
procedure appears to have been uncontroversial. The examination
procedure is clearly the procedure applicable in the majority of
cases, and only about 10% of the opinions are adopted by
advisory procedure;
- the right of scrutiny for the European Parliament and
the Council regarding basic acts adopted under the ordinary
legislative procedure: right has
not been used by Council and used in only 4 cases by the European
Parliament by the end of January 2016. In one of these, the
European Parliament adopted a resolution
after the implementing act was adopted criticising the short
timeline between the transmission to the committee and the
adoption.
The report concludes that Regulation (EU) 182/2011 has
allowed, over the last five years, the effective use of the
Commission's implementing powers under the control of Member
States. The existing framework allows for an efficient and
constructive cooperation between the Commission and Member States.
At this point, the Commission has not identified issues that would
require or warrant a legislative proposal to amend Regulation (EU)
182/2011 at this point of time.