Talk:Council of the European Union

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[edit] (old -2003- comments)

The system seems to be injustice, especially towards Germany. There is a question, why Germany first signed the treaty and only after a year demands the changes?

The Germans, as most European nations, realized that you can only build a community if you are willing to compromise. Nice was an improvment over the previous situation (where any country could veto any decision in order to bagain for national interests at the expense of the community). But you are correct that the Nice voting system is an injustice and not democratic. Worst of all, it is still too easy to block important decisions for purly egoistic interests.
The way to go, of course, is toward majority decisions in clearly defined fields of politics (as opposed to the current situation where the limits of responsibility of the EU are defined only fuzzily). 62.227.161.233 17:36, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)

[edit] European Council

What exactly is the difference between the council of the europen union, and the European Council. As far as I can see these two are both part of the same thing, representatives of member governments meeting to discuss and agree policy. The only distinction is that 'european council' is specifically heads of state? Even if There is a big difference between the two.

The Council of the European Union, is more commonly, and I believe more rightly called, the Council of Ministers, as it is the meeting of ministers from member states, so in the case of the UK, the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw is a member of the Council of Ministers.

The European Council, however, is the meeting of the heads of state. In academic litrature, the Council of the European Union is called the Council of Ministers, so as not to confuse it with the European Council. I suggest we cahnge the title to Council of Ministers, but acknowledge that it is also called the Council of the Euroepan Union.

It is also important to note that the Council of Europe and the European Council are different bodies.

According to the proper definition, as it can be deduced from the official europa.eu website, the Council of the European Union is made up of: The Council of Ministers plus The European Council. So, the term "Council of the EU" comprises all possible configurations (various kinds of ministers and/or permanent representatives, heads of state and/or government, etc.)
Luca Italy, 7 Feb.2007

[edit] The Council of the European Union

It was called until 1993 by its older name, Council of Ministers, but then in 1993 it was renamed. The older academic literature of course refers to it by the older name, but the post-1993 academic and non-academic sources only mention the older name and refer to it by its present name - The Council of the European Union. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 193.2.237.31 (talk) 10:34, 11 January 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Presidencies of the EU

It seems, although I am not absolutely sure, that the article is wrong in respect to the "President." The President of the Council is elected from and by the Council on 5 year terms (the length of the Council), as opposed to the 6 month rotating Presidency of the EU. If I'm wrong, let me know, otherwise we should probably change the article. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.68.155.43 (talk • contribs) . [1]

At the present time you are wrong. --Henrygb 01:01, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
That was the proposed new structure under the frozen European Constitution. —Nightstallion (?) 22:23, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] votes by countries

While the breakdown based on political parties is somewhat interesting it would be much more more important to have a list of votes by countries.

86.101.162.160 19:13, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Working Languages

>>> Luca Italy: Deleted German from working languages. Added reference to consilium.europa.eu webpage mentioning EN/FR as the working languages of the Council (link - see "ADVICE" section)

>>>Michael Zimmermann: revert, your cited statement "the working languages most frequently used at the General Secretariat of the Council are English and French" is not excluding German as the third working language!
>>>Luca Italy: As for that, it is not excluding Finnish either.... Why then not mention also Finnish as the 4th working language of the Council? :-)

[edit] Name of the Council in all official EU languages

According to these pages: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_the_European_Union#Official_languages_of_the_European_Union http://europa.eu/abc/european_countries/languages/index_en.htm Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Hungarian, Irish, Lithuanian, Portuguese, Romanian, Slovene, Swedish is missing from this list, i.e. 10/23 are missing. Changing it to "some official EU languages" since I sadly don't have the time to seek out all the phrases right now.

213.238.233.27 17:30, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Good Article nomination passed

GA review (see here for criteria)
  1. It is reasonably well written.
    a (prose): b (MoS):
  2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.
    a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):
  3. It is broad in its coverage.
    a (major aspects): b (focused):
  4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.
    a (fair representation): b (all significant views):
  5. It is stable.
  6. It contains images, where possible, to illustrate the topic.
    a (tagged and captioned): b lack of images (does not in itself exclude GA): c (non-free images have fair use rationales):
  7. Overall:
    a Pass/Fail:

Reasons for verdict and suggestions:

  • This article is a great example of a Good Article nomination. The prose is good and flows well, and the layout follows WP:MoS very well indeed. Citations are mostly excellent (with the exception of a few which I've noted below) and all sources are highly relevant. Broad in coverage without going beyond the topic in question, with good usage of images to illustrate the article, which all have fair use rationale. A very clear pass in my opinion
  • Only two things I noticed needed addressed. The statement that "with legislative power being officially distributed equally" in the powers and functions section is not attributed to a source (I couldn't find mention of it from reference #4). Also, it's stated in the article that "The Codecision procedure is the most common (about three-quarters of policy areas)". There are no references to support this statement, which should be addressed.
  • On the whole, another fine article. Good work everyone!

Mouse Nightshirt | talk 22:05, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! I've dealt with the points you've raised, hope that is okay. - J Logan t/c: 10:17, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] future name of the article

With the treaty, the name will become "Council of Ministers" or just "Council", the current name being dropped. The article name would of course also be changed. Council of Ministers would be the obvious one, I'm just wondering if we can take over the name from the disam page? This is a larger article and a more important institution than the others linking from the disam page so do you think we could take that page over and just have a link to a separate disam page? Other wise the article would be called "Council of Ministers of the European Union" which would be even longer than the current name. We could also call it "The Council", as that is the name used throughout the treaty - and infact if you look through the draft reform treaty "Council of Ministers" is hardly used. "The Council" is currently taken by a single, small, tv episode article we can budge. That's the options, any thoughts - we have plenty of time. - J Logan t: 17:01, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Further more, "European Council of Ministers"? Might it get confused with European Council? Again, a thought for the long run. - J Logan t: 20:36, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd be okay with occupying either Council of Ministers, The Council or Council (EU). —Nightstallion 12:42, 30 September 2007 (UTC)
Since we're supposed to write Wikipedia from a world view it seems like the title will have to include European Union or EU. There are a dozen Councils of Ministers already in the world, and I don't think it'd be appropriate to turn the existing page into a disambiguation. (a parallel situation with the U.S. would be House of Representatives) It would be better to have this article as The Council instead of a Star Trek episode, though my suspicion is that most council's in the world call themselves "the Council" on second reference. But surely the full legal name of the organization will be Council of Ministers of the European Union or European Union Council of Ministers, right? --JayHenry 22:47, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
Well I am having trouble finding out its legal name. In the treaties it just says "Council", in fact when I did a search I think it came up with no mention of "of Ministers" or "of the European Union". The website always said the same changed from of the EU to Ministers (website for constitution, don't think they've dropped the change though) but don't know anything beyond that. I think "Council of Ministers of the European Union" would be very very long winded while "European Union Council of Ministers" just doesn't seem like something anyone would say. Just having "European Council of Ministers" would of course get confused with European Council. Logicaly it should then be "Council of Ministers (EU)" but I hate those tag on endings.- J Logan t: 08:28, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
We still have some time to discuss this, but I have to agree that I think that the "of Ministers" and "of the European Union" appear to have been dropped in official references -- thus, the article should be at Council (European Union), with a redirect from Council (EU) for ease of use. —Nightstallion 09:52, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
Really, because I looked at the older treaties and it still lists it just as the "council". So in terms of treaties I think it is the same. - J Logan t: 16:39, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] PR comments

Just heard back from our peer review again, see second comments here. I have tried to deal with most of the issues he brought up but some I can't seem to sort right now. Issues I am finding annoying are the fact I can not find a single list of which areas are covered by QMV and which are not. Nothing. Reform Treaty texts say the number changing to QMV but do not say what they are! Ditto to some other issues, the Council just doesn't have good info - and isn't as well covered in the press - as the Parliament. If someone could take a look at the list and see if you can find answers I can't, it would help a lot. - J Logan t: 18:52, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] council of ministers as a general name

The term is also used for government of a state, may-be a small adition about that should be added.195.50.223.193 (talk) 10:18, 20 January 2008 (UTC)