Speed of EU legislation: Audiovisual Media Services Directive

In the comments section of a blog post of his, Julien Frisch mentioned ‘the speed of legislation’. This tied in nicely with the Grahnlaw series on the birth of the AVMS Directive 2007/65, a fairly typical legislative process in the European Union, I would say.



The blog post EU Audiovisual Media Services Directive proposal: Structure and essentials (6 January 2010) described how the Commission’s proposal was constructed and related the main substance of the proposed amending Diretive.



The Commission proposal COM(2005) 646 final tells us that the first consultation round was launched in 2003, followed by a Communication and hearings, leading to the 13 December 2005 proposal.



The web page of the procedure file COD/2005/0260 on Oeil, the Legislative Observatory of the European Parliament, tells us that the legislative process contained i.a. committee work and a first reading position by the EP, a modified proposal by the Commission and a common position by the Council, followed by a Commission communication on the common position, which paved the way for the Parliament’s second reading position.

The final amending Directive was adopted 11 December 2007 and published in the Official Journal 18 December 2007.

However, this was not the end of it. The EU member states were given two years from publication to adopt the necessary measures to turn the AVMS Directive into national law; the so called transposition date was 19 December 2009.

This was not a groundbreaking legal act, but an amending Directive. From launch to effect, the legislative procedure(s) lasted between five and six years, almost the time it takes a human to progress from womb to school.




Ralf Grahn



P.S. Jon Worth may be young of age, but in the euroblogosphere he is one of the grand old men, debating European issues across national borders. His professionally designed blog is listed among the more than 500 great euroblogs on multilingual Bloggingportal.eu, a useful one-stop-shop for fact, opinion and gossip on European affairs, i.a. politics, policies, economics, finance and law.

History of EU Audiovisual Media Services Directive (Following a legislative procedure)

Believe it or not; it is just like Dinner for One.




The Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMS Directive) 2007/65 covers audiovisual services (including on-demand services) in the digital age. The AVMS Directive renamed and amended the Television without Frontiers Directive (TVWF Directive) 89/552, as amended by Directive 97/36.



Legislative history



Using Simple search on Eur-Lex, we find the AVMS Directive by year 2007 and number 65, which leads to a page with the name and publication of the Directive. Clicking on Bibliographic notice, we arrive at a page, which offers us the Procedure number COD(2005)0260 as well as a direct link to the European Parliament’s Legislative Observatory Oeil.




The Oeil page on the co-decision procedure COD(2005)0260 offers us enough material to keep us going for quite a while. In fact, all the official stages of the legislative process are there.

In addition, the page contains a summary of the Directive, with enough information to satisfy a casual observer, as well as links to summaries of all the previous stages. Further, the Oeil page offers a link to a Factsheet (FII/2005/0260), which summarises the Commission’s impact assessment.


However, let us not be content with this, but act as if we were doing serious research. Our natural starting point is the Commission’s original proposal (and even Green Papers etc. leading up to it).



Commission proposal COM(2005)0646



The Oeil page offers a link to the Commission’s original proposal, which leads to an Eur-Lex web page with access to all the available language versions and document formats of COM(2005) 646 final (as well as mentioning the accompanying documents).




Having chosen the English pdf version, we arrive at our goal, which after a bit of reordering looks like this:


Proposal for a DIRECTIVE OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL AMENDING COUNCIL DIRECTIVE 89/552/EEC on the coordination of certain provisions laid down by law, regulation or administrative action in Member States concerning the pursuit of television broadcasting activities (presented by the Commission); Brussels, 13.12.2005 COM(2005) 646 final (29 pages)

As we see, the front page contains other useful information (although we already know it): the procedure number 2005/0260 (COD) as well as references to the accompanying documents SEC(2005) 1625 and SEC(2005) 1626 (which can be accessed either through the Oeil page, or on Eur-Lex, Preparatory acts, choosing SEC documents).



Legislative Observatory Oeil




In a corresponding manner, the procedure number COD/2005/0260 is the key, and the web page of the European Parliament’s Legislative Observatory Oeil offer is the “control room” for every step of the law-making process, although I leave it to you to follow the steps.



It is like Dinner for One, by Laurie Wylie: The same procedure as last year, Miss Sophie?

The same procedure as every year, James!


The moral of the story is that legislative procedures in the European Union are not totally impenetrable. The same keys to the control room exist for other legal acts. It requires a certain amount of dedication to follow the process, but it is doable.




Ralf Grahn



P.S. Read the defence oriented Bruxelles2 blog, by Nicolas Grosverheyde, and other great euroblogs listed on multilingual Bloggingportal.eu, our common “village well” for fact, opinion and gossip on European affairs.