Doc. 10725

14 October 2005

Method for the amendment of the Assembly's Rules of Procedure

Motion for a resolution

presented by Mr Padilla and others

1.       As any set of rules governing the Organisation, the procedure and the functioning of deliberating or parliamentary Chambers, the Rules of Procedure of the Council of Europe's Assembly make provision for an amendment mechanism, in order to adjust the procedural provisions (and also the substantive or structural ones) to the changes that may be made necessary from time to time by circumstances. Thus, article 65, entitled "Revision of the Rules of Procedure", lays down a three-stage process:

-       tabling of a formal motion for amendment supported by at least 20 (twenty) Representatives or Substitutes;

-       reference of said motion to the Committee on Rules of Procedure and Immunities and drafting by the Committee of a report as generally provided in Article 49 (reports of committees);

-       finally, also according to article 49, in this case paragraph 2, last phrase, adoption or rejection of the Committee's report in the plenary sitting or in the Standing Committee.

2.       It clearly arises from the foregoing provisions that motions for amendment of the Rules of Procedure, in case they have been supported by the Rules Committee, are not necessarily passed (or turned down) by the whole House sitting as such, a single decision of the Standing Committee being sufficient for the purpose. This is not a simple theoretical or ideal assumption, but a device that has been often used in the last years. Let us just quote one recent example: the last partial revision adopted by the Standing Committee on 18 March 2005 (Resolution 1432 (2005)), providing inter alia, as far as the Sub-committee for election of judges to the European Court of Human Rights and the Monitoring Committee are concerned, for an exception to the general rule of Article 47.4, according to which "Members of the Assembly may attend meetings of Committees of which they are not members but without the right to speak or vote".

      Resolution 1432 (2005) of last March literally adds "However, only members of the Committee on the Honouring of Obligations and Commitments by Member States of the Council of Europe (Monitoring Committee) and members of the Ad hoc Sub-committee on the election of judges to the European Court of Human Rights may attend meetings of their respective committees".

      In other words this amendment explicitly proclaims a rule that is contrary (not to say absolutely opposed) to the general principle of open hearing of the possibility for all members of the Assembly without exception to be present at the meetings for its working bodies, i.e. its different committees.

3.       We do not deny the validity of the last amendment and so many amendments passed by the Standing Committee. From a formal point of view they are correct, for they have been decided on the basis of aforesaid Articles 65 and 49. They nevertheless run counter to the spirit of any parliamentary rules of procedure, inasmuch as they take away from the full House de facto if not de jure the power ultimately to decide (within the limits, it is true, of the Statute of the Council of Europe) on its own organisation and procedure for the committees as well as for the plenary sitting. Anything relating to or affecting the conditions and ways of functioning of a democratically elected Chamber must be the sole jurisdiction, apart from exceptional and urgent cases, of the House sitting in full, and cannot be left, from an institutional or political perspective (and also a legal one to a large extent), to the free will of a restricted body, where a genuinely parliamentary debate is almost impossible.

      The Standing Committee is – and must remain – a delegated body with strictly executive and operational powers and without law-making or regulatory ones (let us recall here mutatis mutandi the classical distinction between an Act as a general provision, which belongs in principle to Parliament and the implementing regulations of the Act which are left to the Executive Power).

4.       In conclusion, the Rules of Procedure of our Assembly ought to be amended as well on the general level, i.e. in what relates to the law making or regulations powers of the Standing Committee, as well as on the specific question of the prohibition for parliamentarians who are not members of the Monitoring Committee or the Sub-committee on election of judges to the European Court of Human Rights to attend the meetings thereof. Both proposals aim at enhancing the democratic nature of the Assembly and the principle of egalitarian decision-making power directly arising from it, by limiting to a reasonable extent the powers of a Standing Committee which often falls into the temptation of taking unto itself the full House's role.

      The undersigned members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe do hereby submit to the Bureau in view of the foregoing and on the basis of article 24.1.e of the Rules of Procedure, the following motion for a resolution.

1.       In article 49.2, at the end of the last phrase, delete the words "or the Standing Committee". Last phrase would therefore simple read: "Only these texts may be voted upon by the Assembly".

2.       Delete in sub-paragraph 2.b of said Resolution 1432 (2005) the words added to article 47.4 of the Rules of Procedure: "However, only members of the Committee on the Honouring of Obligations and Commitments by Member States of the Council of Europe (Monitoring Committee) and members of the ad hoc Sub-committee on the election of judges to the European Court of Human Rights may attend meetings of their respective committees". In other words we are proposing to restore the original wording of said article 47.4.

Signed ¹:

PADILLA, Julio, Spain, EPP/CD

AGRAMUNT, Pedro, Spain, EPP/CD

ARIAS, Miguel, Spain, EPP/CD

BARCELÓ Pérez, Miguel, Spain, EPP/CD

BATET, Meritxell, Spain, SOC

BOUSAKLA, Mimount, Belgium, SOC

de PUIG, Lluís Maria, Spain, SOC

ELO, Mikko, Finland, SOC

FERNÁNDEZ AGUILAR, Adolfo, Spain, EPP/CD

GUBERT, Renzo, Italy, EPP/CD

JÁUREGUI, Ramón, Spain, SOC

KUCHEIDA, Jean-Pierre, France, SOC

LINTONEN, Minna, Finland, SOC

LOBKOWICZ, Jaroslav, Czech Republic, EPP/CD

MEIMARAKIS, Evagelos, Greece, EPP/CD

PAPADIMITRIOU, Elsa, Greece, EPP/CD

PUCHE, Gabino, Spain, EPP/CD

RIGONI, Andrea, Italy, EPP/CD

TXUEKA, Iñaki, Spain, ALDE

VARVITSIOTIS, Miltiadis, Greece, EPP/CD

¹        SOC: Socialist Group

      EPP/CD: Group of the European People’s Party

      ALDE: Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe

      EDG: European Democratic Group

      UEL: Group of the Unified European Left

      NR: not registered in a group