Single presidency the best compromise

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Thu 24th Apr 2003

Reacting to the publication of the Praesidium's proposals on institutions today, Andrew Duff calls for the enhanced powers of the European Council to be matched by a comparable increase in the powers of the Commission. He also repeated his earlier proposal for the eventual integration of the presidencies of the executive branch of the Council on the one hand and of the Commission, on the other. His proposal for a single presidency of the Union would require the complete separation of the law-making work of the Council from its governmental role.

Andrew Duff M.E.P, who chairs the Liberals in the Convention, said:

"The Praesidium's draft articles, inspired by the proposals of M. Giscard d'Estaing, have many elements which can be welcomed, such as the grounding of the European Council within the constitution and the creation of the EU Minister of Foreign Affairs.

"But they also institutionalise a potentially deadly rivalry between the presidencies of the Commission and the Council, a rivalry that can only be satisfactorily resolved by the integration of the two executive branches of the Union.

"The Convention must now concentrate on building bridges between the institutions and resolving the obvious cleavage between the larger and smaller member states. Integrating the presidency is the perfect compromise solution."