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UK: Europol ratification process started

01 November 1995

On 8 December the UK government published the Europol Convention as a Command Paper (White Paper) and, under its constitutional arrangements, started the process of ratification. This move is bound to further exacerbate the row of the inclusion of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in the Convention. Since June the UK has been refusing to agree to the inclusion of the ECJ in opposition to the other 14 governments. As several parliaments, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and Germany at least, will not even start to look at the Convention until this question is settled. Most EU states have written constitutions which require full parliamentary debate on the ratification of international treaties like the one on Europol. In the UK the rules remain archaic. Under what is known as the "Ponsonby Rules" all the government now has to do, having published the Command Paper, is to put in on the "Order Paper" (listing of a day's parliamentary business) of the House of Commons and wait a minimum of 21 days before completing the ratification process. The only way there will be any debate is if even MPs demand a debate and manage to disturb the parliamentary timetable as agreed by the government and Labour opposition - this is most unlikely to happen. It is therefore possible that in January or February 1996 the UK will have completed the ratification process before any other parliament in the EU has ever begun to look at it - because on the UK's stand on the ECJ. The Convention is available from HMSO, Cm 3050, for ?6.10 or you can get the Statewatch pamphlet, "The Europol Convention" which includes the full text of the Convention, the full text of the Joint Action on the Europol Drugs Unit, Commentary, Analysis of the Provisions, Chronology and Bibliography for £5.00 from: Statewatch, PO Box 1516, London N16 0EW, UK.