[pp.int.general] Lissabon Treaty: very bad news

[Reinier Bakels]

> As I understand the constitution and the Lissabon treaty (essentially
> being the same), the second process will be scrapped and those issues -
> police cooperation, foreign policy and military cooperation - will be
> placed under the first process. This has been marketed as giving the
> parliament more power, which it does, at least a little. But really it
> gives the Commission lots of new power.

So you have objections against specific points. Which distinguishes you from 
most people who only object to ANYTHING called ir resembling a constitution. 
Specific objections can be the basis for improvements. The a-specific 
objections in NL and FR only were are reason to change the cosmetics.
>
> Faced with the choice of placing criminal law etc under the first or
> second set of decision processes, I prefer the second because that way
> fewer bad decisions will be made. Fewer good ones too, but I can live with
> that.

The other day a criminal law expert in my university told me that actually 
the governments of the memberstates want to strengthen the EU involvement in 
criminal law. It was a surprise for me. But I guess the logic is that 
policies in this field are made by criminal law experts in the ministry of 
justice who are criminal law fanatics anyway, even if perhaps isolated. If 
this is really true (and I have no reason to assume it is not), then people 
like ourselves should carefully watch what NATIONAL policymakers are doing 
because they may be the reason (or just the excuse!) for the EU to 
strengthen criminal law.