Editorial
| Author | Michael Adler |
| Date | 01 June 2005 |
| DOI | 10.1177/138826270500700201 |
| Published date | 01 June 2005 |
| Subject Matter | Editorial |
EDITORIAL
The European Council unanimously adopted the final text of the Constitutional
Treaty on 18 June 2004 and this was signed by all 25 Heads of State or Government on
29 October 2004. In principle, Member States then had two years in which to ratify the
Treaty. They were free to adopt whatever procedures for ratification they wished and,
in the main, adopted one of two approaches. Some Member States opted for
ratification by parliament, in which the appropriate parliamentary body would vote
on whether or not to adopt the text of the Treaty, while other Member States opted to
hold a referendum, in which citizens could vote directly on whether or not they were
in favour of the Treaty. Although these referenda were not necessarily binding on
governments, it was accepted that it would be very difficult for a Member State to
adopt the Treaty if it had been rejected in a referendum. There were some variants or
combinations of these two approaches, e.g. in those countries where ratification
entailed a prior adjustment to the national constitution. Only if and when the Treaty
had been ratified by all the signatory States could the Treaty come into force and
become effective.
Since all the Heads of State had signed the Constitutional Treaty and most of the
major political parties were in favour of it, it was always more likely that it would be
accepted by States that had opted for ratification by parliament. Conversely, it was
always accepted that, particularly in countries where there is less enthusiasm for the
‘European project’, there was a risk that it would be rejected by one or more Stat es that
had opted for ratification by referendum. This is how it turned out, although the
Member States that have so far rejected the Treaty (France and the Netherlands) were
not those in which ratification was thought to most at risk. They were both founder
members of the European Economic Community and countries that have played a
central role in the deliberations of its successors, the European Community and the
European Union.
In the event, 14 Member States opted for parliamentary ratification and, of these,
11 (Austria, Cyprus, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta,
Slovakia and Slovenia) have now ratified the treaty. In Belgium, ratification has been
approved by the lower house but still awaits approval by the regional parliaments; in
Estonia and Finland, ratification is still on the parliamentary agenda. 10 countries
(Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland,
Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom) opted for ratification by referendum and
referenda have been held in four of them. Spain was the first country to hold a
referendum. This took place on 20 February 2005 and, on a low turnout of 43%, 77%
European Journal of Social Security, Volume 7 (2005), No. 2 109
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