Comparison of voting weights
Population in millions on 1st January 2006

Country	Population		Nice		Penrose
Germany	82m	16.7%	29	8.4%	9	9.3%
France	63m	12.8%	29	8.4%	8	8.2%
UK	60m	12.3%	29	8.4%	8	8.2%
Italy	59m	11.9%	29	8.4%	8	8.2%
Spain	44m	8.9%	27	7.8%	7	7.2%
Poland	38m	7.7%	27	7.8%	6	6.2%
Romania	22m	4.4%	14	4.1%	5	5.2%
Netherlands	16m	3.3%	13	3.8%	4	4.1%
Greece	11m	2.3%	12	3.5%	3	3.1%
Portugal	11m	2.1%	12	3.5%	3	3.1%
Belgium	11m	2.1%	12	3.5%	3	3.1%
Czech Rep.	10m	2.1%	12	3.5%	3	3.1%
Hungary	10m	2.0%	12	3.5%	3	3.1%
Sweden	9.0m	1.8%	10	2.9%	3	3.1%
Austria	8.3m	1.7%	10	2.9%	3	3.1%
Bulgaria	7.7m	1.6%	10	2.9%	3	3.1%
Denmark	5.4m	1.1%	7	2.0%	2	2.1%
Slovakia	5.4m	1.1%	7	2.0%	2	2.1%
Finland	5.3m	1.1%	7	2.0%	2	2.1%
Ireland	4.2m	0.9%	7	2.0%	2	2.1%
Lithuania	3.4m	0.7%	7	2.0%	2	2.1%
Latvia	2.3m	0.5%	4	1.2%	2	2.1%
Slovenia	2.0m	0.4%	4	1.2%	2	2.1%
Estonia	1.3m	0.3%	4	1.2%	1	1.0%
Cyprus	0.77m	0.2%	4	1.2%	1	1.0%
Luxembourg	0.46m	0.1%	4	1.2%	1	1.0%
Malta	0.40m	0.1%	3	0.9%	1	1.0%
EU	493m	100%	345	100%	97	100%

The procedures for Voting in the Council of the European Union are described in the treaties of the EU. The Council of the European Union was instituted under this name in the Maastricht Treaty. The voting procedures defined there were changed in subsequent treaties (Treaty of Amsterdam, Treaty of Nice and the treaties of accession) to accomodate the growing number of memberstates in the EU and are currently based on the Treaty of Nice. They are supposed to be superceded by the Reform Treaty. Treaty of Nice The Treaty of Nice is a treaty adopted in Nice by the European Council to amend the two founding treaties of the European Union: the Treaty on European Union, or Maastricht Treaty, which introduced the Euro and the 3-pillar structure of the EU; the Treaty of... The Penrose method is a method for allocating seats or votes in legislatures based on the square root of the population of the representatives district or state. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Germany. ... Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_the_United_Kingdom. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Italy. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Spain. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Poland. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Romania. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_the_Netherlands. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Greece. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Portugal. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Belgium_(civil). ... Image File history File links Flag_of_the_Czech_Republic. ... Motto (Czech) Truth prevails Anthem Czech Republic() – on the European continent() – in the European Union() [] Capital (and largest city) Prague Official languages Czech (de facto)1 Government Republic  -  President Václav Klaus  -  Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek Independence (formed 9th century)   -  October 28, 1918   -  January 1, 1993  Accession to the... Image File history File links Flag_of_Hungary. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Sweden. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Austria. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Bulgaria. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Denmark. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Slovakia. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Finland. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Ireland. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Lithuania. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Latvia. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Slovenia. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Estonia. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Cyprus. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Luxembourg. ... Image File history File links Flag_of_Malta. ... Image File history File links European_flag. ... The Maastricht Treaty (formally, the Treaty of European Union, TEU) was signed on February 7, 1992 in Maastricht, Netherlands after final negotiations in December 1991 between the members of the European Community and entered into force on November 1, 1993 during the Delors Commission. ... The Amsterdam Treaty (in full: Treaty of Amsterdam amending the Treaty of the European Union, the Treaties establishing the European Communities and certain related acts) which was signed on October 2, 1997, and entered into force on May 1, 1999, made substantial changes to the Treaty on European Union which... Treaty of Nice The Treaty of Nice is a treaty adopted in Nice by the European Council to amend the two founding treaties of the European Union: the Treaty on European Union, or Maastricht Treaty, which introduced the Euro and the 3-pillar structure of the EU; the Treaty of... In place of the EU Constitution, a Reform Treaty, to be drafted according to the 16-page IGC mandate agreed during the mid-2007 EU summit, amends existing EU Treaties The Reform Treaty (also known as future institutional settlement or legal basis, among others) is a proposed replacement for the...

Here is an overview of the currently used and proposed voting systems employed in the Council of the European Union. The following only appies to certain legislation while others require unanimity among all Council members.

Conditions to pass a vote

When the Council is not acting on a proposal of the Commission, a higher threshold is used to pass legislation.

Treaty of Nice

• Majority of countries (50% or 67%) and votes (74%) and population (62%)

This is the currently applicable voting system. According to the procedure, each member state has a fixed number of votes. The number allocated to each country is roughly determined by its population (see table below), but progressively weighted in favor of smaller countries. To pass a vote, both of the following conditions must apply to establish qualified majority voting (QMV) – the bloc's key way of decision-making in the absence of a consensus: Treaty of Nice The Treaty of Nice is a treaty adopted in Nice by the European Council to amend the two founding treaties of the European Union: the Treaty on European Union, or Maastricht Treaty, which introduced the Euro and the 3-pillar structure of the EU; the Treaty of... A supermajority or a qualified majority is a requirement for a proposal to gain a specified level or type of support which exceeds a simple majority in order to have effect. ...

• the proposal must be backed by a majority of member states (or two thirds in certain cases: see below);
• the proposal must be supported by 255 votes from a total of 345 — about 73.91% of the votes.

Furthermore, a member may^[1] request the verification of the following condition (which is then also required for the resolution to be adopted):

• the countries supporting the proposal must represent at least 62% of the total EU population.

(In practice, this third condition is almost always already implied by the condition on the number of votes. The rare exceptions to this happen in certain cases when a proposal is backed by exactly two of the five most populous member states but not including Germany, that is, two of France, UK, Italy and Spain, and by all or nearly all of the 22 other members.)

Furthermore, when the European Council is not acting on a proposal of the Commission, the qualified majority requires backing by two thirds (rather than a simple majority) of the member states^[2].

Note that mechanisms by which the Commission makes a proposal may not require weighted votes. For example, the Anti-Dumping Advisory Committee (ADAC) can approve a proposal to impose tariffs based on a simple, unweighted majority. Since this simple majority vote leads to a Commission proposal to the Council, the simple majority effectively requires a qualified majority to overturn it (because overturning the recommendation of the ADAC means voting against a Commission proposal). This greatly increases the power of small member states in such circumstances.

The declarations of the conference which adopted the treaty of Nice contained contradictory statements concerning QMV after the enlargement of the European Union to 25 and 27 members: one declaration^[3] specified that the qualifying majority of votes would increase to a maximum of 73.4%, contradicting another declaration^[4] which specified a qualifying majority of 258 votes (74.78%) after enlargement to 27 countries. But the treaties of accession following the Treaty of Nice clarified the actual required majority.

Reform Treaty

• Majority of countries (55% or 72%) and population (65%)

The Constitution envisaged the "double majority" system for the QMV which according to some countries better reflects the true size of populations and at the same time acknowledges the smaller member states' fears of being overruled by the larger countries. The reform treaty has adopted this method. In place of the EU Constitution, a Reform Treaty, to be drafted according to the 16-page IGC mandate agreed during the mid-2007 EU summit, amends existing EU Treaties The Reform Treaty (also known as future institutional settlement or legal basis, among others) is a proposed replacement for the... A double majority is the name given to a vote which requires a majority of votes according to two separate criteria. ...

Penrose method

• Majority of votes (61.4 %)

Poland proposed the Penrose method (colloquially called the "square root" system) which would narrow the weighting of votes between the largest and smallest countries in terms of population. The Czech Republic supported this method to an extent, but has warned it would not back a Polish veto on this matter. All the other states remained opposed.^[5] After previously refusing to discuss the issue, the German government agreed to include it for discussion at the June council.^[6]. The given percentage is the game theoretical optimal threshold.^[7] The Penrose method is a method for allocating seats or votes in legislatures based on the square root of the population of the representatives district or state. ...

Conditions to block a vote

Treaty of Nice

• Condition to pass a vote not achieved

Reform Treaty

• Condition to pass a vote not achieved and at least 4 countries against the proposal

The second condition of at least 4 countries against the proposal is to ensure that the most populous Member States cannot block decisions and is important in 10 different voting scenarios where legislation requiring QMV can be passed although the population requirement isn't fullfilled and all member states except:

• Germany and France and one of UK, Italy, Spain or Poland
• Germany and UK and one of Italy, Spain or Poland
• Germany and Italy and one of Spain or Poland
• France and UK and Italy

are for the proposal. In practice one has to take into account the political likelihood for each minority.

Penrose method

• Condition to pass a vote not achieved

Future provisions

One of the key sticking points before the European Council meeting in June 2007 was Poland's demand for a change in the proposed voting system in the Council of the European Union. After hard negotiations the European Summit eventually agreed on a compromise in the early morning of June 23, 2007. According to the compromise, the current Nice treaty voting rules remain in place until 2014. Between 2014 and 2017 a transitional phase is to take place where the new qualified majority voting rules apply (see above), but where the old Nice treaty voting weights can be applied when a member state wishes so. Also from 2014 a new version of the 1994 "Ioannina Compromise" will take effect, which allows small minorities of EU states to call for re-examination of EU decisions they do not like.^[8] The European Council, informally called the European summit, is a meeting of the heads of state or government of the European Union, and the President of the European Commission. ... Established 1952 Presiding Country Portugal President Luís Amado President in Office José Sócrates Members 27 (at one time) Political parties 7, including: European Peoples Party Party of European Socialists Meeting place Justus Lipsius, Brussels, Belgium, European Union Web site http://www. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into European Council. ... Qualified Majority Voting (QMV) is a voting procedure employed in the Council of the European Union for some decisions. ... The Ioannina compromise takes its name from an informal meeting of foreign ministers of the states of the European Union which took place in the Greek city of Ioannina on 27 March 1994. ...

Decisions requireing unanimity

At present, QMV is used to pass certain legislation while others require unanimity among all Council members. Under the proposed Reform Treaty, which has to be ratified by all member states before it can enter into force, decisions in about 20 more policy areas would have been taken using QMV, leaving only key, sensitive issues to be decided unanimously (including tax, social policy, defence, foreign policy and treaty revision).

Supporters argue this change will be necessary in order to streamline decision-making and prevent gridlock in a newly enlarged European Union. Others see the change as a loss of sovereignty from individual member states, as it effectively abolishes the national veto in many areas.

See also

• This entry is related to, but not included in the elections and voting series. Other related articles can be found at the Politics Portal.
• Treaty establishing a constitution for Europe
• Enlargement of the European Union
• Supermajority
• Voting

An election is a decision making process where people choose people to hold official offices. ... Voting is a method of decision making wherein a group such as a meeting or an electorate attempts to gauge its opinion—usually as a final step following discussions or debates. ... The constitutional treaty as signed in Rome on 29 October 2004 by representatives of the EU member states The Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe (TECE), commonly referred to as the European Constitution, was an international treaty intended to create a new constitution for the European Union. ... This article needs additional references or sources for verification. ... A supermajority or a qualified majority is a requirement for a proposal to gain a specified level or type of support which exceeds a simple majority in order to have effect. ... Voting is a method of decision making wherein a group such as a meeting or an electorate attempts to gauge its opinion—usually as a final step following discussions or debates. ...

External links

• Majority Calculator for Council decisions

• A detailed summary of qualified majority voting
• euireland.ie: Enlargement and institutional changes (voting schemes)
• drcwww.kub.nl: Introduction with details and links
• BBC: Background on the voting weights discussion
• Analysis and history of voting weights in the Council
• New winners and old losers. A priori voting power in the EU25
• Article at EUABC
• europa.eu.int: Full text of the Constitution - Title IV article I-25
• Completion of the 5-th enlargement and institutional changes (votes in Council and European Parliament including Bulgaria's and Romania's from 1 Jan 2007)

References

1. ^ Article 3 of the Treaty of Nice, passim.
2. ^ Article 205 of the EC Treaty and Articles 23 and 34 of the EU Treaty.
3. ^ Declaration 21 in http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/lex/en/treaties/dat/12001C/pdf/12001C_EN.pdf
4. ^ Declaration 20, ibid.
5. ^ James G. Neuger (18 June 2007). Merkel Sees Snags Over EU Treaty as Poland Holds Firm (Update1)]. Bloomberg. Retrieved on 2007-06-26.
6. ^ Renata Goldirova (20 June 2007). Germany gives ear to Poland in 'Reform Treaty' talks. EU Observer. Retrieved on 2007-06-26.
7. ^ http://th-www.if.uj.edu.pl/acta/vol37/pdf/v37p3133.pdf
8. ^ Honor Mahony (23 June 2007). EU leaders scrape treaty deal at 11th hour. EU Observer. Retrieved on 2007-06-26.