The president of the European Commission has said that member states should work on economic matters in small groups when there is no unanimity
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has called for a mechanism that would further weaken the European Union’s unanimity requirement – a key pillar supporting the bloc. She proposed that like-minded member states should be able to work on economic matters in small groups without EU-wide approval.
In recent months, the EU has increasingly relied on a clause that enables decisions to be made with the approval of 15 out of its 27 member states. This workaround has been used to bypass opposition from some countries on key issues, such as the import of Russian energy and the appropriation of frozen Russian assets. Some nations, including Hungary and Slovakia, have condemned this practice as an unacceptable intrusion by Brussels into sovereign matters.
In a letter sent to EU leaders on Monday, Von der Leyen wrote that “our aim should always be to reach an agreement among all 27 member states,” as reported by several media outlets.
“However, when a lack of progress or ambition risks undermining Europe’s competitiveness or ability to act, we should not hesitate to use the possibilities envisioned in the treaties on enhanced cooperation,” the commission president reportedly stated.
Von der Leyen was referring to an instrument developed in 1997 that allows a minimum of nine member states to collaborate, circumventing the EU’s unanimity requirement.
Last September, she also said that it was time to “break free from the constraints of unanimity” and move towards qualified majority voting in some areas of foreign policy, including sanctions and military aid.
In January, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas also said that “unanimity means we cannot always act at the pace of relevance.”
The EU leadership’s proposals have faced criticism from Slovakia, with Prime Minister Robert Fico predicting that removing the veto would “mean the end of the bloc.”
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has also accused EU officials in Brussels of “systematically violating the law”