The conclusions of the Nice European Council assert that the completion of the Inter-Governmental Conference (IGC) "will place the Union . . . in a position to welcome those member-states which are ready from the end of 2002, in the hope that they will be able to take part in the next European Parliament elections" in June 2004.
Up to six applicant states may be ready to join by the end of 2002, and if adjudged by the European Commission to have successfully completed their preparations, and after ratification of their membership by the existing member-states during 2003, will be represented in the European Parliament to be elected in 3 1/2 years' time.
There will be divided views, however, on whether the reforms agreed at Nice are sufficient to ensure the smooth working of the union after enlargement. This meeting was bound to be a difficult one. Given the danger of future blockages through the use of the veto by one or other of 27 member-states in an enlarged community, it was necessary to move as many as possible of 40 decisions from unanimity to qualified majority voting. Almost three-quarters of these decisions - mainly, it has to be said, relating to relatively minor matters - are now to be transferred to qualified majority voting.
But to many people - including probably a majority of the European Parliament, and perhaps also a majority of members of the Belgian and Italian parliaments - this minimal progress in facilitating decision making in a larger European Community has been more than offset by increasing the percentage of votes needed for a qualified majority vote in an enlarged Community.
This percentage has now been raised from 71.3 to 73.4 of the total, and the member-states which secure this increased share of the votes must also in future contain at least 62 per cent of the current population of member-states - as against the figure of 58 per cent at present. An increased weighting has also been given to larger states. The voting power of the six largest states in an enlarged Community will be increased to 49 per cent, from a figure that would have fallen to less than 42 per cent. This is designed to compensate for the much increased proportion of smaller states in a wider community.
There should be no illusions about the determination of some large states to play a more dominant role in future - not so much, perhaps, through the Community decision-making system as through the development of inter-governmental decision-making on certain issues outside the Community framework.
One unexpected positive development at Nice was a last-minute decision in relation to future appointments of presidents and members of future commissions.
Given the decision to maintain the representation of all member-states on the Commission until membership of the union reaches 27 member-states, and with a view to avoiding the emergence of a hierarchy within such a large commission, which could adversely affect smaller states, the Commission is now to be strengthened by having the president nominated by a qualified majority vote of the council meeting in the format of heads of government. This means that it will in future be impossible for one state to veto a nomination, as Mr John Major did in 1994 in relation to Belgian Prime Minister Dehaene, as a consequence of which a weaker candidate, Prime Minister Santer of Luxembourg, became President.
At this prolonged Nice European Council the Irish stance was essentially defensive. The Government was primarily concerned with safeguarding our veto on taxation policy which had been challenged by Germany and France, which are unhappy at what they see as competition from us in relation to corporate tax rates.
In addition, there was Irish concern to ensure that our share of votes in the Council of Ministers would not be too drastically affected by the re-weighting in favour of larger states. Our Government also wanted to minimise the reduction in our membership of the European Parliament following enlargement. Here also we have been relatively successful, losing only three of our 15 seats.
At an earlier stage in the history of the Community the Benelux countries were a vital force in its affairs. They were joined by Ireland in the mid-1970s when, together, we and they ensured that the European Council would not become a de facto directoire of large states, but would play a positive role in the development of the Community.
But today it is Portugal, Sweden and Austria which appear most active in seeking to ensure that the union will not be unduly dominated by the larger states. It is now time for us in Ireland to apply our minds and to direct our diplomatic efforts more positively, by seeking to contribute in a constructive way to the future shaping of a democratic and progressive European Union.
For a new challenge faces us at the next IGC in 2004, the tasks of which will include a simplification of the bewilderingly complex treaty structure that has been built up piecemeal since 1957. In the first half of that year we shall find ourselves once again in the presidency of the Community, with the task of preparing for that crucially important IGC.
Simplification of the treaties could - and I believe should - be accompanied by a process of identifying which parts of these documents are genuinely constitutional elements that must be capable of alteration only by the necessarily cumbersome process of an IGC followed by ratification by all the parliaments of member-states, in conjunction with the electorates of some of them. The more purely legislative parts of the treaties could then become capable of amendment by some simpler process.
On such matters as this we in Ireland, with our distinctive constitutional tradition, must surely have something positive to offer. We should now get down without delay to preparing to make a constructive contribution to the 2004 IGC.
Finally, the organisation of that IGC should also be reviewed in good time. Everyone accepts that the Nice conference was badly prepared and run.
An IGC cannot satisfactorily be prepared by a series of largely fruitless weekly meetings of civil servants meeting in Brussels to go endlessly over the same ground, leaving a whole range of issues to be settled at a five-day meeting of heads of government and foreign ministers, required day and night on a treaty text without the presence of a single adviser.
A better procedure might in future be for the current presidency to make several rounds of all the parties, first to establish their positions on the various issues, and then to test out their reactions to a draft.
When, after this preparation, the heads of government and foreign ministers meet together at the final IGC meeting each country should then be permitted to have one adviser with them. In that way the absurd confusion that mars so many of these gatherings could be avoided.
gfitzgerald@irish-times.ie