Back in the late 1990’s, the first question the MEPs I worked for asked the Commission lead official was
“What do you want me to re-table that you lost in inter-service consultation”
It is a smart thing to do. You got to strengthen a proposal that had likely been neutered by other Directorate-Generals or Commissioners. You saved yourself a lot of time and work. The Commission Services just give you their hard work. You get the legislative language and technical justifications for the amendment. It’s a good tool for getting legislation through quickly.
Sure, it by-passed what the Commission originally intended, but the job of a MEP, especially when they are the Rapporteur, is to get the new proposal into the Official Journal. You don’t care so much what the Commission want.
A rules based system
Secretary-General Catherine Day wised up to this. The Secretariat-General put a system in place to limit officials going rogue.
Officials from the Secretariat-General started to turn up to the negotiations. Their job to make sure red lines were not crossed. Red line that Commission Departments found easier to cross.
The introduction and then formalization of Better Regulation helped systemize the steps officials needed to take. They are after all laid out in detail in the Manual of Procedure. Today, too many officials seem to be unaware of the Guidelines and toolbox, but that is another matter.
And, the Secretariat-General kept tables on all initiatives that each Commission Department had in the pipeline and were going to publish.
Inter-Service Consultation and political validation by the Vice-President and First Vice President is there to make sure that ‘political direction’ rather than civil service zeal sets political direction/
A flash back
Yet, even today, the system, whilst much tighter than it was was in the 1990s, shows recidivist tendencies.
MEPs ask and receive amendments from officials that were either rejected in inter-service consultation or indeed never even considered.
Making it work
Can Commissioners sleep at night knowing that their political will is being implemented?
It’s going to be hard to have an official from the Secretary-General attend every meeting and call with a MEP. After all, the exchange between MEPs and Commission officials is vital.
The Commission, when altered to such cases, are going to find it hard to withdraw ‘the Commission tabled amendment’. They can instead simply make clear from the start that they’ll require unanimity on that amendment.
The lead Vice-President and 1st Vice-President and their Cabinets can more carefully police their own system.
Under Catherine Day the system was more effective. Secretariat_General assigned a point person l to each Directorate-General to track their work. That official had a list of all initiatives, legislation or upcoming proposals, being dealt with by that Directorate-General. Today, no-one official has the oversight on a Directorate-General. This makes it easier for ‘non-validated’ ideas to slip by.
Over time, that will be provide the signal to follow the system, and help Commissioners know that officials are going rogue.