Although two-thirds of our laws come from Brussels, many of us know very little about how the EU actually works. This guide answers the questions we’re normally too embarrassed to ask.

Q. What established the European Union?
A. The Treaty of Rome established an economic bloc which set up an area of free trade in certain manufactured goods. It also established a highly protected agricultural system which shut out cheap agricultural products from outside the bloc.

It set up the EEC (now the EU) institutions: the Commission, the Court, the Council of Ministers, and the Parliament. And they were given supranational powers (powers greater than national powers) over the states in certain areas. In other words, the laws (directives and regulations as they are called) issued by the EEC to enforce the rules set out in the Treaty are legally binding on the member states and their systems. So side-by-side with industrial free trade and a protected agricultural system, institutions were set up to run this new bloc of member states and to enforce the Treaty.

Q. What is the European Commission?
A. The Commission is the civil service of the community at one level. It administers the agricultural policy which has always been highly centralised and it enforces the rules of the Treaties. If a state, firm or individual doesn’t abide by the rules of the European Community, it can take them to the European Court of Justice and initiate a prosecution.

But its principal power is that it has the monopoly of the proposal of all EU laws. It doesn’t make the laws - it proposes them to the Council of Ministers on the basis of the European treaties. So every law in the EU starts as a Commission proposal. These proposals are made by the Commissioners, an unelected, select committee who are appointed by each country. Currently, each country can appoint one Commissioner but this will change if the Lisbon Treaty passes, e.g. Ireland will only have a Commissioner for 2/3 of the time.  Moreover, the Commissioners take an oath to represent the Commission first and not look out for the interest of their own country.

Q. What is the Council of Ministers?
A. The Council of Ministers consists of representatives of the twenty-seven governments of the EU members. There’s a different council each time it meets. If the issue is agriculture, then it consists of the agricultural ministers and so on. Most decisions are made by the Council, with each country having a different number of votes – this is called qualified majority voting. After Lisbon, this would be primarily on the basis of population size, which means the smaller states like Ireland will automatically lose out. The function of the Council of Ministers is essentially to make EU laws on the basis of the proposals of the Commission.

Q. What is the European Parliament?
A. While it is called a parliament, the EU Parliament is very unlike a national one. The main function of a national parliament is to propose, initiate, and make laws, but the European parliament doesn’t do this. It can debate anything under the sun - and it does - and it can make recommendations - and it does - and it produces endless mountains of paper. It cannot however propose a single European law.

There are 750 elected members of the European parliament, of which Ireland has twelve. The European Parliament can make proposals for amending a law, but they can’t impose an amendment which the Council or Commission don’t agree with. They really have very little power. It can have some influence on the legislative process by making recommendations, but it cannot impose changes on EU legislation; so its powers are secondary. They have one power though: they can block a law with an absolute majority – a number greater than half of 750. They also cannot initiate any item of expenditure

Q. What is an EU Directive?
A. Directives are the main means of harmonising laws within the EU, but when a directive is passed it is not immediately put in place in each country. The implementation of a directive will vary from country to country because each country’s structure of law will differ quite a bit. The idea is there should be non-discrimination in the free movement of goods, capital, and labour.

So for instance, we might have a directive that students must be treated equally as European citizens. In that case a Portuguese student studying in Ireland cannot be discriminated against and he must get the same supports and services as an Irish student. But if an Irish student goes to Portugal he will get the support due to a Portuguese student studying in Portugal. It doesn’t make a single standardised system for students throughout the EU, but it does stop discrimination that would hinder the free movement of people.

Q. What’s the difference between an EU directive and an EU regulation?
A. An EU regulation is directly applicable in relation to such policies as the agricultural policy. It is a form of EU law, but it deals with specific situations. A directive is more a broad instruction that you must do some large thing; for instance, there must be free movement of workers, or there must be no discrimination against foreign workers by such and such a date. They require all sorts of detailed specifications in national legislation and they require the national legislature to incorporate them into the national legislation.

Q. What is the European Council?
A. The EU runs summit meetings where the Prime Ministers and Presidents of State get together and discusses strategy. They don’t make laws; it’s a strategic committee which gives a push to the whole enterprise.

Q. When was the European Central Bank founded?
A. In 1998, with headquarter in Frankfurt, Germany. It replaced the European Monetary Institute by virtue of the Maastricht Treaty. If you have a currency you have to have a bank to run it, to fix interest rates, to issue banknotes, decide how much to issue etc.

Q. So, who runs the EU?
A. The Commission has the monopoly on proposing laws, the Council of Ministers decides EU laws, and the Court of Justice implements them and can order national governments and businesses to be fined if they fail to obey them. So power is spread between these institutions. The Council of Ministers makes the laws but then the Commission has vast powers because only they can propose the laws.

Q. There are two headquarters of the EU, one in Brussels and one in Strasbourg. Why is that?
A. The main meetings of the EU Parliament are held in Strasbourg because when the parliament first met, it was in Strasbourg in France. They (the French) decided that it was very good for business and tourism and they wanted to keep it in France and resisted the move to Brussels. Every month the Parliament move lock, stock and barrel for one week to Strasbourg for formal sessions but most of their business is done in Brussels. The French insist on this move and it’s in the Treaties so it must be done. The European Parliament shuttles between Brussels and Strasbourg and a very expensive shuttle it is, but it keeps the taxi men in Strasbourg happy.

Q. There is a term that has become synonymous with debates on the EU now, ‘The Democratic Deficit’ - can you explain that term?
A. The democratic deficit means that this outfit is undemocratic by normal standards. You have the Commission, an unelected body appointed by governments, who have the monopoly of proposing all laws. The laws are made by twenty-seven people on the basis of weighted votes and there’s only one person from each state on each of these bodies. We have one Commissioner who is supposed to put the interests of the EU before the interests of Ireland.

It’s undemocratic in one sense in that with a democracy you need a ‘demos,’ a people, but who are the people? There is no common identity of a European people, except in a statistical sense, comparable to an ‘Irish People’ or a German, French, or Danish People. So there is no ‘we,’ and for democracy you need a people who feel solidarity and mutual identification with one another, so that they are willing to obey majority rule on that basis.
So democracy is not just majority rule but majority rule on the basis of a community where people are willing to obey majority rule freely because it’s their majority, belonging to their national community.

Two-thirds of our laws come from the EU nowadays. Traditionally, a democracy was a place where the people made their own laws through the people they elected. The democratic deficit refers to the fact that there is very little popular input to this law-making system.

Q. So, in short, does the term refer to the fact that the Commission proposes the law and the Commission isn’t elected, or does it refer to the fact that the people don’t really identify with the EU.
A. It refers to all these really, and the solutions being offered are very different. Federalists say we should give more power to the European Parliament and less power to the national states, and those that say that democracy can only exist at the level of the national community say we need to take more power back to the level of the national state, where people elect their own representatives and can change laws they do not like by changing the people they elect, which is impossible at EU level.

With thanks to the Irish Family Press