It's time to get started

The first major act of the European Parliament this year will take place this month when a vote of confidence is taken on the European Commission enabling it to take up office.

As is now customary, prior to taking the vote of confidence, the European Parliament holds hearings for each commissioner-designate. Hearings are public sessions of three hours each during which MEPs have the opportunity to ask questions to the candidates and get impromptu replies. On the basis of these hearings, the European Parliament adopts a view on the suitability of each commissioner and, ultimately, on the entire Commission.

The European Parliament votes on the entire body of the Commission and not on individual commissioners. According to the Treaty, individual commissioners may only be removed if the Commission president asks them to do so. Nevertheless, the Parliament may threaten to withhold its consent on the entire team unless a candidate who fares poorly in the hearings is changed. This happened five years ago in the case of the Italian nominee, Rocco Buttiglione.

It is for this reason that hearings are not to be taken lightly.

The hearings will start on Monday at 1 p.m. with Catherine Ashton, who will occupy the double post of vice-president of the Commission and High Representative of Foreign Affairs. Baroness Ashton will be facing the Foreign Affairs Committee.

The hearings of all 27 commissioners-designate will continue throughout all of next week coming, ending the following week, on January 19.

The hearing of John Dalli, who will be responsible for health and consumer affairs, will take place on Thursday next week between 1 and 4 p.m. It can be followed live on the website of the European Parliament (www.europarl.europa.eu).

Mr Dalli will be facing three committees: the Environment Committee, which will take the lead, along with the Internal Market Committee (responsible for consumer affairs) and the Agriculture Committee (responsible for food safety).

In each case, one committee takes the lead. However, other committees may be associated if the portfolio extends to the competence of a second or even more committees, as is the case with Mr Dalli and a number of other candidates. Nevertheless, regardless of the number of committees, there is only one hearing of the same duration for each candidate.

Over the Christmas recess, the candidates have been preparing themselves for the hearings. However, ahead of the hearings, they have already submitted written replies to a set of questions put to them by Parliament. As such, MEPs should already have an idea of the overall vision of each candidate in his or her respective area of responsibility.

The actual hearings kick off with a short introduction from the commissioner-designate and will take the form of a ping-pong session, with one MEP taking the floor at a time to ask one question and the commissioner replying directly. The MEP may come back with a supplementary question.

The number of questions is established in advance and so is the order of speakers from each political group. Once the hearing is over, the crucial assessment starts.

Each parliamentary committee will be asked to prepare a written letter consisting of its assessment of the performance of the candidate and his or her qualities and suitability for the job. This letter is drawn up immediately after the hearing by a select group of MEPs from each committee and from each political group.

As the EPP MEP responsible for justice and home affairs, I will be involved in the drawing up of the letters for Commissioners Viviane Reding (responsible for justice, human rights and citizenship) and Cecilia Malmstrom (responsible for internal affairs, including immigration).

The letters are sent to the president of the European Parliament and will form the basis of the overall assessment that each political group must make on whether to support the entire Commission in the vote of confidence.

The vote of confidence will be taken on January 26 in a special plenary session that will be held in Brussels. However, if things are finalised in good time, there is still a possibility that the vote might be taken even earlier, on the previous Thursday. This has yet to be seen.

Should the Commission obtain the consent of the European Parliament, it will then be appointed by the European Council, acting by a qualified majority.

The appointment of the Commission sets off the work of the European Executive body for the next five years. This time round, the vote is being taken later than expected because of the delayed entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty.

Barring major upsets, I am inclined to support the Commission and I hope that it can get started as soon as possible.

Dr Busuttil is a Nationalist member of the European Parliament.

www.simonbusuttil.eu