The role of national parliamentary committees in European scrutiny: Reflections based on the Danish case1

Abstract

This paper deals with the European Affairs Committee of the Danish Folketing. It endeavours to situate the committee within the Danish parliamentary system, giving historical background and information about procedures and powers. The European Affairs Committee is a powerful committee. It issues binding mandates to ministers before negotiations in the EU Council of Ministers. As the process of European integration led to increased functional scope of EU legislation a need emerged for involving the various sector committees in the Folketing more in parallel with the European Affairs Committee. An important factor explaining the Danish system of scrutiny is the fact that Denmark usually has minority coalition governments. Such governments need to know what agreements can be accepted at home. Calls for increased transparency have had some effect, but mandates are still negotiated behind closed doors.