- Passerelle Clause
A Passerelle Clause (also known as an Escalator Clause) is a clause within
treaties of the European Union that allows the European Council to decide unanimously to replace unanimous voting in theCouncil of Ministers withqualified majority voting (QMV) in specified areas.Certain matters in the Council of Ministers are decided by unanimous voting and certain by
qualified majority voting . The distinction is laid down in treaties and cannot normally be changed without a new treaty. Under the passerelle clause, voting on certain areas can switch from unanimity to QMV if the European Council unanimously approves this. This decision cannot be later reversed without treaty change.There are currently four current passerelle provisions:
* The
Maastricht Treaty in 1992 on police and judicial cooperation
* TheTreaty of Nice in 2001 on immigration and asylum, social policy and the environmentIn 2004 the European Council used the passerelle clause to move to QMV on asylum and immigration
The unratified
European Constitution proposed passerelle provisions on:* The
Common Foreign and Security Policy [ [http://ue.eu.int/igcpdf/en/04/cg00/cg00086.en04.pdf Constitution] Art I-39 8 ]
* Thebudget [ Art I-54 4 ]
* All other policies except defense [ Art IV-7a ]In 2006 a
United Kingdom House of Commons committee caused protests by referring to the passerelle clause as the "gangplank clause" [ [http://euobserver.com/9/23045/?rk=1 MEPs in row with UK parliament over 'gangplank' report] , "EU Observer ",2006-12-07 ]References
External links
* [http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2006-07-10b.81900.h UK Parliamentary Reply]
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