What are the Members of the Commission called?

At the head of the Commission are 27 Commissioners, each with responsibility for a particular policy area. When the Commission takes decisions it does so collectively – in other words, the whole Commission takes responsibility for a decision, for example, to present a proposal for a directive on the environment, although it is the Commissioner for the environment who is responsible internally in the Commission for drafting the proposal.

Currently all 27 Member States have a Commissioner, but the number of Commissioners is a politically sensitive subject. Previously all the Member States had a Commissioner and the five large ‘old’ EU countries, Germany, France, Spain, Britain and Italy , had two Commissioners each.

With the Treaty of Nice, it was decided that there should be one Commissioner per country, but that the number of Commissioners will be less than the number of Member States when the EU has 27 Member States.

The Commission of Romano Prodi of Italy was to have been replaced by a new Commission on 1 November 2004. This Commission would have held office from 1 November 2004 to 1 November 2009. However, the whole Commission has to be approved by a vote of the European Parliament before it can take office and, on 27 October 2004, when Parliament should have voted on the Commission of José Manuel Barroso of Portugal , a majority lined up against that Commission.

Mr Barroso therefore withdrew his proposal for a Commission, and the vote was postponed in the hope that a composition of Commissioners and distribution of portfolios between them could be found which Parliament would approve.

Parliament was particularly opposed to the Italian Commissioner candidate Rocco Buttiglione. Parliament has a hearing with each individual candidate for membership of the Commission before approving the entire Commission and, in the course of Mr Buttiglione’s hearing, he was found to have made a range of statements on homosexuals and women which aroused outrage and resentment among Members of Parliament. Several of the other candidate Commissioners were also unpopular with Members. Parliament has to approve the entire Commission and cannot impose a veto on individual Commissioners. The Commission of Romano Prodi therefore continued its work until Mr Barroso had made changes such that Parliament would be willing to accept his Commission, which happened on 17 November 2004.