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5.4.1. How has it been prepared and approved?

The Charter of Fundamental Rights is a declaration adopted on the 7th of December 2000 at a meeting of  the European Council in Nice.

This Charter is the result of an innovative procedure without precedent in the history of the European Union, which can be summarised as follows:

• The meetings of the European Council in Cologne (June 1999) and Tampere (October 1999) instructed a working group, which proclaimed itself a Convention, to write a draft.  Set up in December 1999, it adopted its draft on the 2nd of October 2000.
• At a meeting in Biarritz (in October 2000) the European Council gave its unanimous approval to this draft and forwarded it to the European Parliament and the Commission.
• The European Parliament and the Commission gave their approval on the 14th of November and the 6th of December 2000, respectively.
• On behalf of their institutions, the Presidents of the European Parliament, of the Council and of the Commission signed and proclaimed the Charter on the 7th of December 2000 in Nice.   

5.4.2. What are the main points of this Charter?

The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union encapsulates in a single document, for the first time in the history of the EU, all the civil, political, economic and social rights of European citizens, as well as of everybody living within the territory of the Union.

The wording consists of 54 articles preceded by a short preamble.  The rights are organised into six big chapters:

• Dignity
• Freedom
• Equality
• Solidarity
• Citizenship
• Justice

These six chapters are followed by a seventh containing the final provisions.

They are based in particular on the fundamental rights and freedoms recognised by:

• the European Human Rights Convention (instrument of the Council of Europe),
• the constitutional traditions of the member states of the European Union,
• the European Social Charter  of the Council of Europe and
• the Community Charter of the fundamental social rights of workers, as well as other international conventions to which the European Union or its member states subscribe.
• However, the Nold ruling of the  Court of Justice of the European Community on  the 14th of May 1974 already affirms that fundamental rights such as those recognised in national rights are part of Community law and must be defended by the latter (the Community).

5.4.3. How is this Charter different from the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Man?

Article 51, 1st paragraph, states that “this charter is addressed only to the institutions and bodies of the Union in observance of the principle of subsidiarity”.

For the member states, the charter applies to them only when they are implementing EU law.  This charter applies right across the three European pillars.

Article 52 states:  “In observance of the principle of proportionality, limitations may be brought in only if they are required and effectively meet the aims of general interest recognised by the Union or the need to protect rights and freedoms of others.”

It should be pointed out, however, that this Charter has been criticised particularly because some people fear that it will, in reality, reduce the rights recognised by the Universal Declaration of December 1948.

As far as this is concerned, it is worth reading the work of Roland de Bodt “Les Quinze contre des Droits de l’Homme”
(“The fifteen against the Human Rights”), published by Editions Luc Pire, Brussels, 2001.

5.4.3. What is current legal status of the Charter and its place in the Constitutional Treaty?

Following discussion in the Convention on the Future of Europe (February 2001-July 2003) the Charter has finally been incorporated into the Constitutional Treaty (Part II).

However, since this Treaty has not yet been brought into force, the present legal status of the Charter (in April 2007) is the same as it has been ever since its solemn declaration on the 7th of December 2000.

At present (April 2007), the incorporation of the Charter into the Constitutional Treaty has re-emerged as one of the difficulties to be overcome in the crisis. The UK, in particular, is making efforts to ensure that the Charter is no longer incorporated into any treaty.

This matter is crucial: it effectively governs what place the rights set forth in this Treaty must occupy in Union law. Will they be added to the rights of European citizens or not?  (see 5.1.6.)    

5.4.5. Why are some countries opposed to the insertion of the Charter into the Constitutional Treaty ?

(provisional wording still to be approved by various responsible groups).

Some countries, mainly those championing a ultra-liberal economic culture, have come out against the insertion of the Charter into the Treaty because it would thus acquire a legal value which would enable citizens, through the European Court of Justice, to avail themselves of rights and advantages going against what the companies consider as their prerogative in order to guarantee their competitiveness on a world market where they find themselves in competition with companies whose workers do not enjoy these rights. Nevertheless, all the member states of the European Union have signed the Constitutional Treaty providing for this insertion.  It is true that they have also signed the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Man, the universal application of which remains the stuff of dreams rather than a reality; but this doesn’t seem unduly to trouble the citizens of the countries where these rights are widely respected and they appear to be unaware of their responsibility for making this declaration apply equally in the countries where the Declaration is not applied.