“The JHA Council’s approach of 7 June represents a slap in the face of parliamentary democracy”

If the euro crisis wasn’t enough of a concern for supporters of the European Project, the attempted reform of Schengen is causing another headache. 

The European Parliament has now suspended co-operation with the European Council on five draft bills connected to border security “until a satisfactory outcome is achieved on Schengen governance.”

The Conference of Presidents also decided to remove from the July plenary session agenda the Carlos Coelho report on a proposal for a Schengen Evaluation and Monitoring Mechanism and the Renate Weber report on the Reintroduction of Border Controls.

Martin Schulz, the President of the European Parliament, stated:

“It is without precedent that in the middle of the legislative process, one colegislative chamber excludes the other. The JHA Council’s approach of 7 June represents a slap in the face of parliamentary democracy and is unacceptable to the directly elected representatives of European citizens.  This is why the Conference of Presidents is forced to take these severe measures”. [added emphasis]

Denmark are being blamed.  Again.

The BBC report has some of the important detail

A meeting of the Council’s justice and interior ministers on 7 June decided to change the legal basis for evaluating how the Schengen agreement is working, from Article 77 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU to Article 70.

Stripped of the right to block Schengen legislation, parliament can now effectively only delay it by procedural means.

The Council also decided to empower Schengen states to restore frontier checks temporarily in the event of surges of illegal immigrants. [added emphasis]

[Full speed ahead, and damn the torpedoes political trilemma! – Ed]  Indeed.