On Thursday 27 and Friday 28 February, the Convention met in Plenary session at the European Parliament in Brussels to debate the first 16 draft articles of the Constitutional Treaty.
The first 16 draft articles were published during the previous Plenary Session of the Convention (6-7 February).
Then the Convention members had until the 17 February to submit their amendments. Due to the large number of amendments (1147 amendments) this deadline became just indicative and more amendments continued to be tabled right until before this Plenary Session (27-28 February).
In response to the huge workload generated by the amendments, the Plenary has decided to meet more often, adding two new dates to their official calendar, the 5th of March (to continue the debate on articles 8-16, chaired by Mr Amato) and the 26th of March (to continue the debate on articles 1-7, chaired by Mr Dehane).
Initial draft articles of the Praesidium (reference for the debate).
Summary of amendments to the draft articles by the members of the convention.
Results of the debate on articles 1-16 on the 27-28 February
Article 3: Objectives of the Union . Public Health was not included in the draft articles, however written amendments requested its inclusion.
Public Health was not mentioned by any of the speakers who talked about Article 3 on the Plenary session of 27-28 February.
Article 12 : Shared competences. Public Health was included in the draft articles as a shared competence. A few written amendments requested Public Health to be taken out of this category.
Public Health in article 12 was addressed several times during the live debate of the Plenary session of 27-28 February:
Mr David Heathcoat-Armory (Member of UK National Parliament, Conservative): requested that article 12 should simply be a clarification of what shared competences are and the reference to certain policy areas, amongst which Public Health was, should not be included here.
Mrs Lena Hjelm-Wallen (Representative of the Swedish Government, PES): requested that Public Health and health insurance areas should be (exclusive) national competences.
Mrs Pascale Andreani (Representative of the French Government, EPP-ED) and Mr William Abitbol (MEP, EDD) referred to Public Health as a very broad area with repercussions in different Union policies, these policies being sometimes exclusive competences, sometimes shared competences and sometimes supporting measures.
Mr Dick Roche (Representative of the Irish Government, UEN): he referred to his own written amendment requesting Public Health to be taken out of Article 12 and included in Article 15 (as a supporting measure) because he thought it fitted better there, but he stated that he did not think that was a downgrade from existing competence.
Mr Goran Lennmarker (Member of the Swedish Parliament, EPP-ED): referred to the right to health. Social Security could be a national, regional or even local competence, but if you are ill while travelling through Europe you must have the right to health care wherever you are.
Also, if you are on a waiting list for treatment in your country, you must have the right to health care in another European country. But this does not mean a unified European Social Security, we are talking about the right to health care wherever you are in Europe.
Mrs Danuta Hubner (Representative of the Polish Government, non-attached) requested that Public Health should be a shared competence, but we should not change article 152 of the EC Treaty.
Article 15 : Supporting measures. Public Health was not included here in the draft articles of the Praesidium. However, a few amendments requested that Public Health should be better in article 15 as a supporting measure rather than in article 12 as a shared competence.
Mr Dick Roche (Representative of the Irish Government, UEN): he referred to his own written amendment requesting Public Health to be taken out of Article 12 and included in Article 15 (as a supporting measure) because he thought it fitted better there.
New set of articles by the Praesidium: Draft Articles 24 to 33 of the Constitutional Treaty on the
Simplification of the legal instruments of the Union.
