French Socialist presents European Constitution
By Lisbeth Kirk
The former president of the French Constitutional Council, Robert Badinter, today reveals in Le Monde a full proposal for a European Constitution in 84 paragraphs.
Mr Badinter is a Socialist member of the French Senate and alternate member of the European Convention, where he intends to hand in his proposal.
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Mr Badinter insists he is not proposing the setting up of a European Federation.
The European Union is built on two sovereignties; the member states and the peoples and this must be reflected in a balanced form in the European constitutional architecture.
The French Socialist would like the future European Union to be built on four main institutions: The Summit, where EU heads of states take the most important decisions, with an elected president having functions similar to the German president, mainly of a representative kind.
A new prime minister, elected by the heads of states and approved by the European Parliament, should replace the EU Commission President and head the Council meetings. Under this new prime minister the Commission should be turned into a purely executive organ.
A new consultative body of four members from each national parliament should be set up to advise the EU and the fourth institution would then be the Court of Justice, according to the the proposal presented by Mr Badinter.
With a stronger council lead by a Prime Minister, the role of national parliaments would become weaker in the European decision-making structure, as presented by Mr Badinter. In his constitutional set up, the national parliaments are to be represented by a new consultative body. With four seats offered to each country, only the main parties in the member states would be represented.