Parliament moves to broaden committee system 

The changes, approved by political group leaders on Friday (20 March), primarily concern the operation of committees and inter-parliamentary delegations. 

The new procedures, which are also expected to ensure that the composition of committees better reflects that of the Parliament as a whole, were thrashed out in meetings of the Parliament's conference of presidents on 12 and 19 March. 

From now on, complex legislative dossiers that cross committee boundaries, such as climate change legislation, will be dealt with in joint meetings between several committees – although a lead committee will still be designated - in order to make sure that parliamentary reports better reflect the whole Parliament's views. 

The move is significant as "joint meetings will vote together on certain dossiers for the first time," a Parliament spokesperson told EurActiv. 

But he was quick to stress that the changes had been adopted as a "decision of principle" and expected that joint votes would be "quite rare", explaining that "there will still be lead committees and opinion-giving committees". 

"We'll have to wait and see how it all pans out in practice," the spokesperson added, explaining that the "exact implications" of the changes would become clearer after the Conference of Presidents had updated the Parliament's rules of procedure after the elections in June. 

All this represents a major evolution from the current system, which saw MEPs in the EU assembly's environment and industry committees fight for control over key dossiers such as climate change, for example. 

To help avoid such conflicts in future, the reforms also "make it mandatory for the Conference of Committee Chairs to give a recommendation to the Conference of Presidents on how to resolve any conflict of competences between committees," according to a Parliament press statement . 

Political group leaders hope the reforms will "generally increase cooperation between committees, notably by enhancing the role of opinion-giving committees" and "increasing the involvement of inter-parliamentary delegations in the role of committees and vice-versa". 

'Progressive proposals blocked' 

But the Green group in the Parliament slammed the reforms for not going far enough, accusing the three biggest political groups – the centre-right EPP-ED, the Socialists and the Liberals (ALDE) – of "blocking all of its progressive proposals" to boost the debating and initiative capacity of committees. 

Green members were particularly irked that joint meetings of several committees will vote on key reports "instead of the competent committee alone". "This will certainly complicate the legislative procedure, multiply conflicts between committees and draftspersons and undermine the coherence of Parliament's negotiating powers as an institution," the group stated . 

'De-neutralising' committees 

At present, MEPs can only be full members of one committee at a time, although they can serve as substitutes on up to two others. 'Neutralised' committees, like the budgetary control and women's committees, do not count towards this limit. 

Last week's reforms saw the 'de-neutralisation' of certain committees, including petitions and fisheries, meaning that it is no longer possible for MEPs to sit as a full member of both. 

Finally, the Greens had wanted to see the sub-committee on human rights upgraded to full committee status as proposed by the report, but EPP-ED and Socialist MEPs had been reluctant to agree to this for fear of causing embarrassment, particularly regarding alleged CIA abuses on European soil, according to press reports. 

Commenting on the adoption of the package, European Parliament President Hans-Gert Pöttering said the latest round of reform "continues the key process of modernising the Parliament's procedures and practices". 

"As co-legislator with the Council of Ministers in very many policy areas, we are determined to exercise our powers with maximum efficiency and effect," Pöttering added. 

Last week's decisions "clearly show that the European Parliament is sliding towards political conformism and control freakery," according to the Greens / European Free Alliance group. 

"The leadership of the larger political groups and the administration are installing themselves as an elite to run Parliament according to their own political interests, […] to the detriment of transparency, citizens' access, committees' capacity of initiative, individual MEPs and smaller political groups," the Greens / EFA said in a press release . 

The group further stated: "The only approved reforms are backward steps: it is no longer possible to table amendments or debate 'own initiative' reports."