Council of the European Union
The Council of the European Union forms (along with the European Parliament) the legislative arm of the European Union (EU). It contains ministers of the governments of each of the member-states of the EU.It is to be distinguished from the Council of Europe, which is a completely separate international organization, and the European Council, which is a separate (though closely related) EU institution. The Council of the European Union is sometimes referred to in official European Union documents simply as the Council, and it is often informally referred to as the Council of Ministers.
The Council is assisted by COREPER, which consists of representatives of the member-state at the level of diplomats or high-level civil servants. COREPER generally prepares the Council agenda, and negotiates minor and non-controversial matters, leaving controversial issues for discussion by the Council.
While legally speaking the Council is a single entity, it is in practice divided into several different councils, each dealing with a different functional area. The General Affairs Council is the most important of these, containing Foreign Ministers. Each council contains a different type of minister: e.g. the Agriculture Council contains Agriculture Ministers, and so on.
The Council has a President and a Secretary-General. The President of the Council is the Foreign Minister of the state currently holding the Presidency of the Council of the European Union; while the Secretary-General is a civil servant, the head of the Council Secretariat. The Secretary-General also serves as the High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP).
The countries of the EU own a different number of vote in the Council, dependent on the size of their population. This is the distribution of votes proposed in the European constitution:
| Coutry | population | votes | population per vote | relative weight |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Luxembourg | 0,4 | 4 | 100000 | 1.00 |
| Malta | 0,4 | 3 | 133333 | 0.75 |
| Cyprus | 0,8 | 4 | 200000 | 0.50 |
| Estonia | 1,4 | 4 | 350000 | 0.28 |
| Slovenia | 2,0 | 4 | 500000 | 0.20 |
| Ireland | 3,7 | 7 | 528571 | 0.19 |
| Lativa | 3,7 | 7 | 528571 | 0.19 |
| Lithuania | 2,4 | 4 | 600000 | 0.17 |
| Finland | 5,2 | 7 | 742857 | 0.13 |
| Denemark | 5,3 | 7 | 757143 | 0.13 |
| Slovakia | 5,4 | 7 | 771429 | 0.13 |
| Austria | 8,1 | 10 | 810000 | 0.12 |
| Portugal | 9,9 | 12 | 825000 | 0.12 |
| Hungary | 10,0 | 12 | 833333 | 0.12 |
| Belgium | 10,2 | 12 | 850000 | 0.12 |
| Czechia | 10,3 | 12 | 858333 | 0.12 |
| Greece | 10,6 | 12 | 883333 | 0.11 |
| Sweden | 8,9 | 10 | 890000 | 0.11 |
| Netherlands | 15,8 | 13 | 1215385 | 0.08 |
| Poland | 38,6 | 27 | 1429630 | 0.07 |
| Spain | 39,4 | 27 | 1459259 | 0.07 |
| Italy | 57,7 | 29 | 1989655 | 0.05 |
| France | 59,1 | 29 | 2037931 | 0.05 |
| United Kingdom | 59,4 | 29 | 2048276 | 0.05 |
| Germany | 82,0 | 29 | 2827586 | 0.04 |
In this table population is given in millions, population/seat measures how many inhabitants are represented by one seat, and relative weight measures how much a single inhabitant is represented relative to inhabitants from Luxembourg. E.g., a German citizen has only 4% as much influence as has someone from Luxembourg.
