In tabling comprehensive amendments to 14 of the first 16 draft articles of the constitution, Liberal spokesman Andrew DUFF has urged the Convention to adopt ‘plainer language and clearer thinking, always writing with the literate citizen in mind and not the high-brow jurist’.

Duff, who chairs the caucus of European Liberal Democrats in the Convention, has sought to eliminate the long strings of subordinate clauses that clutter up the existing EU treaties. He promotes liberty to the top of the list of the Union’s values (Article 2), and includes respect for regional as well as national identities. Regional and local authorities also feature in his revised Article 8 on subsidiarity.

In Article 3, Duff adds the provisions of the existing Article 13 of the Treaty of Rome on non-discrimination. He also inserts a reference to the practice of openness and good governance. As far as the Charter of Fundamental Rights is concerned, Duff proposes its installation within the Constitution in a second chapter.

Andrew Duff, who has a variety of co-signatories to his proposals including Lamberto DINI (former foreign minister of Italy) and Dimitrij RUPEL (foreign minister of Slovenia), expresses his concern at the excessively legalistic approach of the Praesidium to the delimitation of competences.

He suggests that the internal market, including the CAP but with the exception of fiscal policy, should be made a fully fledged ‘exclusive competence’ of the Union. Similarly, employment policy is promoted to being a ‘shared competence’. Duff and the Liberals have asked for a special task force to be established to settle the competence question.

Duff proposes important revisions to the articles on common foreign, security and defence policy (Article 14) to more faithfully reflect the reality.

Lastly, he flags up his concern at the Praesidium’s assumption that the so-called flexibility clause (which he renames ‘enabling’) could only be triggered by the Council acting unanimously.

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