Qualified majority voting and the ordinary legislative procedure

SUMMARY OF:

Article 294 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union on procedures for the adoption of legal acts and other rules

WHAT IS THE AIM OF THE ARTICLE?

Article 294 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) sets out the rules governing the European Union’s (EU) decision-making process. The Treaty of Lisbon, which entered into force on 1 December 2009, sought to modernise and improve the decision-making process of the EU, the membership of which had grown from 15 to 27 Member States in the previous decade.
The treaty extends voting by qualified majority in the Council of the European Union and in the areas in which the European Parliament acts on an equal footing with the Council regarding the adoption of legislative acts (regulations, directives and decisions) on a proposal from the European Commission (ordinary legislative procedure).

KEY POINTS

New policy areas subject to voting by qualified majority

Voting by qualified majority is now the most common form of voting in the Council, and is used for most of its decisions. With the Treaty of Lisbon, a qualified majority replaces unanimity in a number of new areas:

measures on external border controls, asylum and immigration;
judicial cooperation in civil matters and harmonisation in the area of criminal law in defining, for example, criminal offences and sanctions in particularly serious areas of crime (e.g. terrorism, human trafficking, the sexual exploitation of women and children, drug trafficking, money laundering);
police cooperation;
the creation of European intellectual property rights to provide uniform protection of intellectual property rights throughout the EU;
The European research area and EU space policy;
energy;
humanitarian aid;
measures to promote sport and culture;
certain aspects of the EU’s trade policy (i.e. in the areas of cultural and audiovisual services; social, educational or health services; and the adoption of internal rules).

Unanimity remains, however, the general rule in sensitive areas such as:

adoption of the EU’s multiannual financial framework;
tax harmonisation (direct taxes);
social security and social protection;
cross-border aspects of family law;
the common foreign and security policy.

Moreover, the accession of new countries to the EU and revisions to the treaties need to be agreed upon by all Member States.

Greater use of the ordinary legislative procedure

The Treaty of Lisbon adds a further 40 legal bases (policy areas that have a basis in treaty articles) – particularly in the fields of justice, freedom and security, and agriculture – to the scope of the ordinary legislative procedure, formerly known as the co-decision procedure. That procedure now applies to most subjects where the Council decides by qualified majority.

Changes

The scope of qualified majority voting has seen some changes, particularly in the field of judicial cooperation in criminal matters (Articles 82 and 83 TFEU) and on the social protection of migrant workers (Article 48 TFEU).

In these areas, the Treaty of Lisbon introduced brake clauses to deviate from the ordinary legislative procedure, if a Member State considers that the fundamental principles of its social security system or its criminal justice system are under threat from legislation that is in the course of being adopted.

The treaty also introduced passerelle clauses to ‘pass’ from a unanimous vote to a vote by qualified majority for the adoption of an act in a given field.

BACKGROUND

For further information, see:

Law (European Union website)
Voting system (Council of the European Union).

MAIN DOCUMENT

Consolidated version of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union – Part Six – Institutional and financial provisions – Title I – Institutional provisions – Chapter 2 – Legal acts of the Union, adoption procedures and other provisions – Section 2 – Procedures for the adoption of acts and other provisions – Article 294 (ex Article 251 TEC) (OJ C 202, 7.6.2016, pp. 173–175).