Talk:Article 12: Competences

From Wikitution

16) A short article, but an important one. It underlines the standing of the nation state within the Union. Any transfer of power to tax should require not merely unanimity among governments, as for treaty changes, but a constitutional amendment, which demands also the direct endorsement of citizens through referendums.

(Original footnotes from "A constitution for the European Union": Oct 26th 2000 The Economist print edition ©2000 The Economist Newspaper Limited. All rights reserved.)

Added a whole chapter on competences which is a reduced form of Title III in the rejected constitution text.

Downgraded "shared" competences to areas of supporting action and coordination: now the primary responsibilty for those areas lies with the member states, and any action at Union level can be struck down easier by the safeguard body of the Congress of Member States. The key to building a successful federalist model is to leave many areas explicitly to the member states and to have the central European bodies focus only on where they are undeniably best. The constitution should have some clear elements where the erosion of national sovereignty is stopped.

Therefore I also added the old list of supporting, coordinating or complementary action and assigned them exclusively to the member states. The rejected text had no such chapter heading...