Attached is a copy of the Articles of the amended directive. Read Article 2 (a, b, c, & d) for a smile.
So now the proposal goes to the Council of Ministers. They can do three things:
a) They can accept the pre-amendment directive
If this happens, the procedure ends. No more voting, the (bad) directive gets adopted.
This would kill us. We have to make sure the Council don't do this. The Council is made up of one Minister from each country. The Minister is not a set position, the country chooses a relevent one for each meeting, so we don't know who are minister will be. Brian Crowley is the only Irish member of JURI. I reckon he has a good chance. He's very anti-swpat so it would be great if it's him.
b) They can accept the directive with all amendments
If this happens, the procedure ends. No more voting, the (good) directive gets adopted.
This is highly unlikely since after 78 amendments were adopted, the directive contradicts itself in places.
c) accept the directive with some amendments
If this happends, the semi-amended directive will return to the plenary for a "Second Reading". This is likely to happen but we must make sure it does happen. In the Second Reading, the plenary cannot suggest new amendments, it can only defend the ones it had already.
Q: Why does the Council of Ministers have so much power? A: To prevent large states out voting small states.
Ciaran O'Riordan