A joint debate between members of the European Parliament and national parliaments on the future of the EU was held in Brussels from 8 to 9 May. The involvement of national politicians and national MPs in European decision-making has long been seen as one of the missing links in European democracy.
Although most national parliaments have standing committees on the European Union, the influence of these committees is quite limited with one or two exceptions such as Denmark. These EU advisory committees cooperate in a body called COSAC, which meets twice per year. The quality of this cooperation in COSAC can be read from the under-developed websites of COSAC itself and its Interparliamentary EU Information Exchange (IPEX) site.
One concrete result emerging from the two-day joint conference was the setting up of a permanent working group to explore future options for the financing of the European Union. The future Finnish EU Presidency committed itself to hold another joint debate at the end of 2006.
Commission President Barroso announced that he intends to transmit directly all new policy proposals and consultation documents to the national parliaments for review and reactions.
During the debate, a majority of parliamentarians expressed their conviction that the moribund Constitutional Treaty should be saved although their was no consensus on how this should be done. "The philosophers' stone allowing us to find the perfect alternative solution ... has not yet beeen discovered", Austrian Parliament President Andreas Khol said.
The news that the Estonian Parliament ratified the Constitutional Treaty was widely applauded by the MEPs and MPS present. Estonia is the 15th member state to ratify.
