Conciliation committee

Originally the Treaty of Rome required unanimous assent for a matter to be adopted, but the subsequent Treaties of Maastricht and Amsterdam have considerably modified the procedure. These Treaties introduced a co-decision procedure, shown diagrammatically in Figure 1.3, whereby the Council of the European Union (Council) and the European Parhament (EP) work on an equal footing and have to agree the text of proposed new EU legislation before it can be adopted. Where EP and the Council cannot agree, a Conciliation Committee has to be established to resolve any differences. 

The co-decision procedure involves up to three readings in EP and in the Council and, should there be disagreement between the two institutions, requires a Conciliation Committee (of Council members and a like number of Parliamentary representatives) to resolve it. The Commission takes the necessary initiatives to administer the procedure. 

If, within six weeks of its being convened, the Conciliation Committee approves a joint text, EP acting by absolute majority and Council acting by qualified majority each have six weeks in which to adopt the joint text when the proposal as amended is deemed to be adopted. If either of the two bodies fails to approve the joint text, the proposal fails. Figure 1.1.10 illustrates the co-decision procedure. 

This is of particular importance in several areas, including consumer health and environmental protection. Decision-making power is shared equally between the Parliament and Council (see Figure 23-2) and, where necessary, a compromise text is prepared by a conciliation committee. If agreement is not reached, the Parliament can reject the proposal. 

However it was not that the legislation was unimportant. The Conciliation Act (1896) and the Industrial Court Act (1919) provided the basis for a whole range of state agencies and services in the fields of conciliation, arbitration, mediation and inquiry, and these services were valued by the practitioners of their day. Yet the essence of these services were that they were largely voluntary, except of course for Committees and Courts of Inquiry where a certain minimum amount of compulsion was available if necessary, and whether or not people used the services or not was entirely up to the parties themselves. 

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