European and External Relations Committee, 28 Feb 2006

Meeting date: Tuesday, February 28, 2006

Official Report 209KB pdf

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Sift

We move on to item 6, which is our regular sift of EU and European Community documents and draft legislation. At the Conveners Group meeting the other day, our European officer, Ian Duncan, explained to committee conveners the tracking system for European white papers, green papers, legislation and directives that we hope will eventually replace our current presentation of the sift document and will be more useful to the committee and others. I believe that the current sift is a revision of the previous, more cumbersome process, and we are trying to improve things all the time.

The first item that has been flagged up is a Commission communication on the results of the green paper consultation on defence procurement. We held this item over because we knew that Phil Gallie was interested in it, but was unable to attend the previous meeting. The committee also agreed to track the subject. Do members have any comments?

I am very grateful that the item has been held over. Although some interesting work has already been carried out, the committee faces quite a task if it wants to keep abreast of the matter. If Ian Duncan can do so, I would be much obliged to him.

We have already considered the second item that has been flagged up, which is the white paper on a European communication policy paper. I believe that members' comments on the matter were pretty definitive.

The third item, which concerns this committee and the Enterprise and Culture Committee, is a Commission communication to the spring European Council, setting out the progress on the EU Lisbon agenda for growth and jobs. Are members content with these referrals?

Members indicated agreement.