Composition of the Bureau of the Assembly

Resolution 1105 (1996)

Author(s):

Parliamentary Assembly

Origin

See Doc. 7685, report of the Committee on Rules of Procedure, rapporteur: Mr Gjellerod. Text adopted by the Standing Committee, acting on behalf of the Assembly, on 7 November 1996.

Thesaurus

1. The Assembly considers that the composition of its Bureau needs to take account of the Council of Europe's enlargement and to make possible a greater continuity of the Bureau when it is renewed each year.

2. Consequently, the Assembly decides to modify the following provisions of its Rules of Procedure:

2.1 replace Rule 8, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure by the following text: "The Bureau shall consist of the President, of eighteen Vice-Presidents of the Assembly according to the system of apportionment of Bureau seats [(1) See appendix.]and the chairpersons (or their representatives) of the political groups. If, in accordance with the Rules of Procedure, the delegation to which the President of the Assembly belongs may propose a Vice-President, he/she shall speak and vote on behalf of his/her delegation. The President may, however, vote in the case of a draw";

2.2 in Rule 9, paragraph 6, of the Rules of Procedure, replace the word "seventeen" with the word "eighteen".

3. The Assembly decides that the new provisions shall enter into force at the opening of the 1997 session of the Assembly (27 January 1997).

Appendix

System for the attribution of seats in the Bureau for Vice-Presidents of the Assembly

1. Member states are divided into four categories:

group I:delegations with eighteen seats in the Assembly (France, Germany, Italy, Russian Federation, United Kingdom) will have five seats in the Bureau every ordinary session;

group II:delegations with between twelve and seventeen seats in the Assembly (Poland, Spain, Turkey, Ukraine) will have three seats in the Bureau every ordinary session;

group III:delegations with between five and eleven seats in the Assembly (Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Moldova, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Slovak Republic, Sweden, Switzerland) will have eight seats in the Bureau every ordinary session;

group IV:delegations with between two and four seats in the Assembly (Albania, Andorra, Cyprus, Estonia, Iceland, Ireland, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, San Marino, Slovenia, "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia") will have three seats in the Bureau every ordinary session.

2. Within these groups, seats in the Bureau are allocated for one ordinary session by following continuous English alphabetical order. Any new member state will be included in the relevant group and take its place according to English alphabetical order.As regards groups II, III and IV, the annual renewal will be partial in order to ensure a greater continuity in the composition of the Bureau. For groups II and IV, this renewal will take place annually for a third of the national parliamentary delegations of which it is composed. On the other hand, this renewal will take place for of half the group III delegations.

3. The President of the Assembly should be taken into account in all cases [(2) See also the possibility, under certain conditions, for the delegations to which the President of the Assembly belongs to propose an additional candidate to the Bureau, in accordance with the Rules of Procedure.].