KNOWLEDGE OF THE ASSEMBLY

THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY ORGANISATION & OPERATION
 

(July 2001 – partial update : 26/07/2004 and 11/10/2005) 

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National Assembly Secretariat-General
The text of this brochure was drafted by

Messrs. Michel MOPIN and Jean-Louis PEZANT

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ALL RIGHTS RESERVED - This publication cannot be digitised, optically stored or photocopied, nor reproduced or transmitted by electronic, mechanical or other means, without the prior authorisation of the National Assembly.

Copyright National Assembly - July 2001

National Assembly. This name became part of French history on 17 June 1789, when the deputies of the Third State were looking for a name to mean that they represented the whole Nation. 

This brochure is the first of a collection, ‘Connaissance de the Assembly – Knowledge of the Assembly’ aimed at explaining the National Assembly and building awareness of its role.

 It gives a very general presentation of the Assembly, its organisation and its operation: 

 1.- What is a deputy ? How is he elected ? What are his service rules ? What means are available to him ? What bodies may he be called on to participate in ? These are the main questions answered in the first part.

 2.- How are statutes passed ? How does the public sitting take place ? What are the key moments of the legislative procedure ?  What role does the Assembly play in this respect in a bicameral Parliament ? This is the aim of the second part.

 3.- The third part is devoted to the scrutiny and information role, the importance of which has not ceased to grow in the recent period.

 Readers wishing to know more about the various aspects of the Assembly’s organisation and activity can consult the other brochures in the Knowledge of the Assembly collection, the titles of which are given below and which are referred to systematically. 

FIRST PART
ORGANISATION AND PLAYERS

The text of the Constitution defines, in general terms, the role of the National Assembly among the institutions. On the other hand, it is silent or almost so as regards its very organisation, which is covered by other provisions—external to the Assembly such as institutional or ordinary Acts, or internal to the Assembly such as the Rules of Procedure.

After having recalled the general framework into which the institution fits (I), a brief description is given of the election method of its members, deputies (II), then of the main elements of their service rules (III), before reviewing the principal bodes set up within it (IV, and then listing the various means made available to its players (V).

I – General framework

§ 1. A BICAMERAL PARLIAMENT

According to Article 24 of the Constitution, Parliament shall comprise the National Assembly and the Senate. The National Assembly was first created in 1789 and has sat at the Palais-Bourbon for two centuries. The second chamber—which has not always existed in the various successive constitutions since 1791—sits at the Palais du Luxembourg. The two assemblies differ by their political role and by their legislative role.

- 1. Political role

· The two assemblies do not have the same electoral body: direct universal suffrage for the National Assembly, corresponding to some 40 million registered voters; universal suffrage, but indirect, for the Senate, whose electoral college comprises approximately 150,000 persons.

THE PALAIS-BOURBON

It was on 18 September 1795 that the Palais-Bourbon was assigned to a political assembly (the Council of the Five Hundred) and on 21 January 1798 the first sittings hall was inaugurated there. Since then, the mansion and the assemblies it has housed under various names (Legislative Body, Chamber of Deputies, National Assembly), have shared a common history. But the history of the mansion goes back as early as the first part of the 18th century.

Princely mansion

The Palais-Bourbon was built from 1722 to 1728 for Duchess de Bourbon, daughter of Louis XIV and Madame de Montespan, on a plot bought by her in 1720. With its style reminiscent of the Grand Trianon in Versailles, the mansion was considered in the 18^th century as ‘the city’s greatest embellishment, second only to the royal houses.’

After the death of Duchess de Bourbon, the mansion was purchased by Louis XV who sold it in 1764 to Prince de Condé. The latter carried out layout and enlargement work here, which was finished in 1788, but a year later he fled the Revolution and was not to return to France until twenty-five years later.

First Republican assembly

The mansion was confiscated in 1791 and declared national property. In 1794 it housed the future Ecole polytechnique before being assigned in 1795 to the Council of the Five Hundred. The architects Gisors and Lecomte were tasked with building here a hemicycle-shaped chamber which was used, unaltered, until 1829. Of this first chamber, only the President’s desk and the speaker’s rostrum remain. 

In 1806 the decision was taken to add, on the Pont de la Concorde side of the building, a twelve-column peristyle atop a flight of thirty steps, which mirrors the Eglise de la Madelaine on the other side of the Seine.

From the Restoration to our days

At the time of the Restoration, Prince de Condé wanted to get his property back. But he was forced to rent it for use as the Chamber of Deputies until the State became the definitive owner in 1827. For five years—the inauguration was to take place on 21 November 1832—the architect Jules de Joly directed the transformations which were to give the building its present appearance. Among these transformations, mention can be made of the creation of three salons alongside the chamber and the building of the library. The decoration of the ceilings of the latter, as well as that of one of the salons, was entrusted to Eugène Delacroix.

Work undertaken in the XX^th century has for the most part affected only the internal layout, either to free up additional work space (conversion of the attics), or to meet modern-day requirements (installation of an electricity plant; creation of meeting rooms, of car parks, and of an audiovisual control room; and wiring work…). The National Assembly employs some 3,000 people who work at the Palais Bourbon and also in three other parliamentary office blocks close by. 

Further information:

L’Assemblée nationale et le Palais-Bourbon d’hier à aujourd’hui The National Assembly and the Palais Bourbon, from yesterday to today - Collection Connaissance de l’Assemblée no. 10.

 · The two assemblies have a different renewal rhythm. The Senate is a permanent assembly which cannot be dissolved: its members, now elected for six years, are renewed by half every three years. The deputy’s mandate, which is normally for five years, can be interrupted by the dissolution of the National Assembly; on five occasions, since 1958, the President of the Republic has used the power of dissolution granted to him by Article 12 of the Constitution, in 1962, 1968, 1981, 1988, and 1997. The lifespan of an assembly is called a ‘term’, in other words the period between the time it is constituted and the time it ceases to exist, either by expiry of the mandate of its members or by dissolution.

 · Owing to its election method, which makes it the direct expression of popular sovereignty, the National Assembly forms the linchpin of what is called the majority regime: through legislative elections, voters choose the political party of the team which, under the authority of the Prime Minister, will form the Government whose action will therefore be supported by the majority of deputies.

 · The National Assembly may raise an issue of the Government’s responsibility according to procedures in the Constitution to be examined later.

 - 2. Legislative role

 An instrument becomes law only after having been successively considered by each assembly—this is the shuttle—and, normally, passed by them in the same terms. The Constitution however sets forth in several points the specific nature of the National Assembly:

 · Article 39, paragraph 2, lays down that social security finance bills shall be presented first to the National Assembly.

 · Article 45, paragraph 4, lays down that in cases where, despite the implementation of a conciliation procedure in the form of a joint committee composed of an equal number of members from each assembly, the two assemblies do not succeed in adopting a common text, the National Assembly may be asked to make a final decision. 

 However, in two fields, this right to have the final say cannot apply: first, as regards institutional Acts relating to the Senate which must be passed in identical terms by the two assemblies (Article 46, paragraph 4, of the Constitution); second, as regards Acts amending the Constitution, Article 89, paragraph 2, lays down that ‘A government or a Member’s bill to amend the Constitution shall be passed by the two assemblies in identical terms.’

 § 2. MANDATE

 The parliamentary mandate has two main characteristics:

 · Deputies have a nationwide mandate. This was already affirmed in the first French Constitution (3 September 1791): ‘Representatives appointed in the departments shall not be representatives of a specific department but of the Nation as a whole, and cannot be given a specific mandate.’ This means that the disappearance of the constituency did not affect the mandate, as seen in 1871, and also in 1962 after the proclamation of the independence of Algeria.

 · They are independent. ‘Any binding instruction shall be void’ (Article 27, paragraph 1, of the Constitution). This ban of a legal nature does not prevent deputies from making commitments to their voters, nor respecting voting instructions imposed by their political group. But these commitments and instructions have only a political scope. 

 A provision of the Rules of Procedure strengthens the independence of the mandate: ‘No group which binds its members shall be formed in the National Assembly (…) for the purpose of representing private, local or occupational interests  (Article 23, paragraph 1).

  § 3. PARLIAMENTARY LAW

 The Rules of Procedure [French] [English] precedents form the two main sources of parliamentary law. 

 -1. Rules of Procedure

 The Rules of Procedure of an assembly are aimed at organising its internal operation, the procedures followed in its deliberations and discipline as regards its members.

The Rules of Procedure and the amendments made thereto are adopted in the form of a motion for a resolution. These may be tabled by one or several deputies. Such motions for a resolution are frequently submitted to the Assembly by its President himself, who, most often, has obtained the agreement of the political group chairmen on the text he is tabling. Drafted by the Committee tasked with Rules of Procedure questions (the Legislation Committee), or by a special committee, the motion for a resolution is then the subject of deliberations at the Assembly, before being submitted to the Constitutional Council.

 The constituents of 1958 indeed strove to establish the primacy of the Constitution over the Rules of Procedure. They did so in two ways.

 The first consisted in constitutionalising, therefore protecting against over frequent amendments, part of the traditional matters for regulation. The following have therefore become part of the constitutional field: the number of standing legislative committees, shuttle procedures, fixing of the agenda…

 At the time of their adoption, and for each of their amendments, the Rules of Procedure are now previously referred to the Constitutional Council which rules on their conformity with the Constitution, according to Article 61, paragraph 1, of the Constitution. ‘Rules of Procedure and amendments thereto adopted by either assembly are transmitted to the Constitutional Council by the President of the Assembly’ (Article 17, last paragraph, of the institutional ordinance no. 58-1067 of 7 November 1958 on the Constitutional Council).

 If the Constitutional Council declares a provision of the Rules of Procedure is contrary to the Constitution, this provision cannot be implemented (Article 23, last paragraph of the above-mentioned institutional ordinance). It can also accompany its decisions with clarifications concerning the procedures according to which such or such a provision must be implemented. Therefore the case law of the Constitutional Council contributes significantly to the formation of parliamentary law.

-2. Precedents

 These compensate for the over general nature of written rules. Precedents result from the deliberations of the Assembly or from the decisions taken by some of its bodies, and aim to clarify the implementing procedures of rules, interpret them, complete them, amend them or derogate from them. Parliamentary tradition has always made written law and non-written norms (precedents, ‘Chamber’ tradition, case law of the internal bodies, …) co-exist.

II – Election

  § 1 – ELECTION OF DEPUTIES

 Four main differences distinguish the election method of deputies from that of senators.

National Assembly deputies are elected by direct universal suffrage, and senators by indirect suffrage (Article 24, paragraphs 2 and 3 of the Constitution).

 The Constitution lays down that an institutional Act shall determine the length of the mandate of parliamentarians. In its most recent drafting, the institutional text sets forth that ‘the powers of the National Assembly shall expire on the third Tuesday of June of the fifth year following its election.’ The effective length of a term can be shortened by dissolution; depending on the date of the dissolution, the following term can also be shortened. Senators have a six year mandate.

 The National Assembly is renewed fully; the Senate is renewed by half every three years.

The President of the Republic can dissolve the National Assembly, but not the Senate.

 -1. Electoral system

 The V^th Republic has returned to the dominant electoral system of the III^rd Republic, a two-ballot majoritarian system in single-member constituencies, there being between two and twenty-four constituencies per department depending on its population.

The electoral Act currently in force, which reintroduced the majoritarian system in single-member constituencies, after a proportional episode, is Act no. 86-825 of 11 July 1986. There are 577 deputies broken down as follows:

Metropolitan France  555

Overseas departments 15 (French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Réunion)

Overseas territorial units 2 (Mayotte, Saint Pierre and Miquelon)

Overseas territories 5 (New Caledonia, French Polynesia, Wallis and Futuna)

 · The French of both sexes, over 18 years old and enjoying their civic rights, can vote. The age of electoral majority was fixed as 18 by the Act of 5 July 1974.

 · The French of both sexes, aged at least 23, are eligible. 

 At the same time as the candidate, a ‘possible alternate’ must also stand, as he will be required to replace the candidate in a certain number of cases.

 -2. Election

· To be elected in the first ballot, a candidate must receive the absolute majority of the votes cast and a number of votes equal to a quarter of the number of registered voters. 

The second ballot takes place on the Sunday following the first balllot.

· To be a candidate at the second ballot, one must have: been a candidate at the first ballot and obtained a number of votes equal to 12.5% of the registered voters.

· At the second ballot, a relative majority suffices.

 -3. Alternates

 The duties of member of the Government shall be incompatible with the exercise of any parliamentary office pursuant to Article 23 of the Constitution. This has required the establishment of a system of alternates. 

 Articles L.O. 176-1 and L.O. 319 and 320 of the electoral code set forth that parliamentarians whose seat becomes vacant following their appointment to the Government are replaced until the expiry of their mandate by persons appointed for this purpose. An alternate also steps in if the holder of the seat dies, is appointed to the Constitutional Council or pursues a governmental assignment for more than six months, but not if he resigns, as this leads to a partial election. 

 Once the alternate has become a parliamentarian he cannot run against the former holder of the seat when the assemblies are renewed.

  § 2. CONTESTED ELECTIONS

 The Constitution of 1958 withdrew from the assemblies their validation of the election of their members and tasked the Constitutional Council not with ‘verifying the powers’ of all elected representatives, unlike under the previous system, but with ruling only on contested electoral operations.

Only adjudicative, the powers of the Constitutional Council are less broad for legislative elections than for presidential elections and referendums, regarding which it must not only rule on complaints but also ensure the proper conduct of electoral operations and declare their results. 

 -1. Petitions

 Petitions must be sent by a voter of the constituency or by a candidate, to the exclusion of a representative of the State or of an association. They must be sent ‘within ten days following the declaration of the election results’, either to the Secretariat-General of the Constitutional Council, or to the Prefect, or to the representative of the State in the case of an overseas territory. Petitions must state the cancellation grounds advanced; most of them are based on the way electioneering is conducted.

 Petitions do not have any suspensory effect and do not prevent the exercise of a mandate. As long as the Constitutional Council has not ruled, the implementation of the rules on incompatibilities and limitations on multiple mandates is deferred. 

 The settlement of contested elections is not limited by any timeframe.

 -2. Scope of decisions

 Article 41 of the institutional ordinance no. 58-1067 of 7 November 1958 on the Constitutional Council sets forth two types of decision on contested elections. The Constitutional Council can declare a contested election void or reverse the declaration made by the electoral returns committee and declare elected the validly elected candidate. However the Constitutional Council has never made use of this possibility to substitute another candidate for the one declared elected.

Without cancelling or substituting, the Council can limit itself to rectifying the results.

 § 3. TERMINATION OF MANDATE

 A mandate can be terminated during a term because of: 

 Death. When a deputy dies, the minister for the interior sends a letter to the President of the Assembly stating the date on which the seat became vacant, as well as, if applicable, the name of the person called on to replace the deceased parliamentarian.

Acceptance of incompatible duties, such as governmental duties or the post of a member of the Constitutional Council.

A parliamentarian appointed a member of the Government is deemed to have opted for this post if he has not expressed the opposite desire within one month from his appointment (Article L.O. 153 of the electoral code). During this period, he cannot take part in any election. In case of appointment to the Constitutional Council, the option period is eight days (Article L.O. 152).

Prolongation beyond six months of a temporary assignment entrusted by the Government. The seat is considered vacant from the time of the prolongation decision (Article L.O. 144).

The cancellation of an election pronounced by the Constitutional Council, materialised by the decision being notified to the Assembly.

Voluntary resignation, which can be effective only for a deputy whose election is not contested.

Disqualification noted by the Constitutional Council, on a reference from the Bureau of the Assembly or from the Minister of Justice, when a cause of ineligibility appears after election (Article L.O. 136).

Compulsory resignation pronounced by the Constitutional Council on application by the Bureau of the Assembly or by the Minister of Justice, pursuant to the rules on parliamentary incompatibilities (Article L.O. 151). The Constitutional Council also requires the compulsory resignation of any candidate declared elected who has not filed his statement of patrimonial situation or else that of his campaign account or who has exceeded his electoral expenditure ceiling (Articles L.O. 128, L.O. 135-1 and L.O. 136-1).

Election of a deputy to the Senate. However, in the event of a contested election, the vacancy of the seat is not declared until after the Constitutional Council’s decision confirming the election. Should an election be declared void, the initial mandate is restored.

When a seat becomes vacant, a partial election has to take place to fill it. Exceptions to this rule arise in two cases:  no partial election is held in the twelve months preceding the expiry of the powers of the National Assembly (Article L.O. 178, paragraph 2); or when, a solution already mentioned, an alternate has to replace a parliamentarian (in the event of death, appointment to a ministerial post or to the Constitutional Council, or prolongation beyond six months of a temporary assignment entrusted by the Government).

§ 4. FUNDING AND SCRUTINY OF ELECTORAL EXPENDITURE

The funding of electoral campaigns, like that of parties, is framed by legislation which has been progressively strengthened.

-1. Bans

The law bans a certain number of electoral expenses. The Act of 11 March 1988 banned political advertising on radio and television. The Act of 15 January 1990, on the limiting of electoral expenditure and on the clarification of the funding of political activities, banned during the three months preceding an election ‘the use for electoral propaganda purposes of any kind of commercial advertising in the press or by any audiovisual communication means’ (Article L.52-1 of the electoral code). The same applies to telematic or phone marketing (Article L.50-1).

 -2. Expenditure

 With reference to legislative elections, expenditure comprises in the first instance propaganda expenditure. This is directly covered by the State (cost of paper, printing of ballot papers and of election posters, billboard expenditure). The expenditure ceiling is set at €38,000 increased by €0.15 per constituency inhabitant. This ceiling is updated every three years to take account of the evolution of the cost of living.  It was multiplied by a coefficient of 1.12 by decree no. 2002-350 of 14 March 2002.

 -3 Income

 - Private funding

The Act of 19 January 1995 on the funding of politics banned gifts by legal persons (i.e. mainly companies). A ceiling of €4,600 is placed on gifts from natural persons and any gift over €150 must be made by cheque. In addition, the global amount of gifts in cash must be lower than or equal to a fifth of the authorised expenditure ceiling.

 - Public funding

The Act of 11 March 1988 added a lump-sum reimbursement to the traditional reimbursement of propaganda expenditure by the State. In 1988, the lump-sum reimbursement was set at 10% of the amount of electoral expenditure. To compensate the effects of the ban on funding by legal persons, the Act of 19 January 1995 increased the reimbursement to 50% of the ceiling.

 To be entitled to this reimbursement, it is necessary to obtain at least 5% of the votes cast at the first ballot. Apart from candidates who have not obtained this 5%, the following are excluded from reimbursement:  those who have exceeded the ceiling; those who have not respected the provisions on campaign accounts (see below); those whose account has been rejected; and those who have not filed their personal assets statement, whereas they were obliged to do so.

 -4. Obligation to keep a campaign account

 Each candidate is obliged to keep a campaign account detailing, according to their nature, all the income received and the expenditure made by himself or on his behalf during the year preceding the election.

 To collect funds with a view to funding his campaign, the candidate appoints a single financial  representative  who opens a bank of post office account centralising all the campaign financial operations in the manner laid down by ordinance no. 2003-1165 of 8 December 2003 on administrative simplification in electoral matters.

 The campaign account—of the elected and of the defeated—is sent within two months to the National Committee of Campaign Accounts and Political Funding, which reaches a decision within six months. It approves, rejects or rectifies the account.

 Three types of sanctions are planned: pecuniary (non-reimbursement by the State of the reimbursable share); penal (fine); and electoral. In this latter case, the candidate declared a deputy loses his seat and is declared ineligible for one year by the Constitutional Council if the latter, on a reference from the National Committee of Campaign Accounts, observes that he has not presented his campaign account or that this account has been legitimately rejected by the Committee. The Council can declare ineligible, for the same duration, any candidate who has exceeded the legal ceiling of electoral expenditure (institutional Act of 10 May 1990).

 -5. Statement of personal assets

 According to Article L.O. 135-1—introduced into the electoral code by an institutional Act of 11 March 1988 and amended by another institutional Act of 19 January 1995—each deputy declared elected is obliged to establish a statement of his patrimonial situation, sworn to be exact and sincere, concerning the totality of his own property and, possibly, that of the community or the property deemed in joint ownership pursuant to Article 1538 of the Civil Code, in other words all property concerning which the  declarant has a power of administration, of enjoyment and of free disposal or of joint disposal. 

 A first statement must be filed by the deputy with the Commission pour la transparence financière de la vie politique—Committee for the Financial Transparency of Politics within two months following his appointment. A further statement must be filed two months at the earliest and one month at the latest before the expiry of the deputy’s mandate or, in the event of the dissolution of the Assembly or of the termination of the deputy’s mandate for a reason other than death, within two months following the end of his duties. However, this new statement is not required if the concerned party has already filed, in another respect, a statement of his patrimonial situation since less than six months.

 The Committee for the Financial Security of Politics brings before the National Assembly Bureau any case of a deputy who has not fulfilled his obligation to file one of the two patrimonial statements laid down by Article L.O. 135-1. The Constitutional Council, on a reference from the National Assembly Bureau, notes, where applicable, the case of ineligibility—a sanction which, pursuant to Article L.O. 128, lasts one year—and, by the same decision, declares, where applicable, the deputy’s compulsory resignation. Should the Committee note, after the concerned party has been given the possibility to present his remarks, changes in the patrimonial situation for which it is not supplied with explanations, it transmits the file to the public prosecutor’s office.

 o-o-o

From 1871 to 1940, legislative elections were the only means of expression of the popular will. Since 1958, they have coexisted with two other universal suffrage consultation modes: the referendum (either constituant or legislative) and the election of the President of the Republic (from 1965). Therefore the whole electoral body is led to vote frequently nationwide. 

 In the event of a presidential election or of a referendum occurring during the session period, parliamentary work is generally suspended so that deputies can participate in the campaign prior to the vote. This is also the case on the occasion of municipal elections.

 III – Service rules

§ 1 - IMMUNITIES

-1. Freedom from arrest or molestation

‘Freedom from arrest or molestation forms not a personal privilege enjoyed by parliamentarians, but a protection for Parliament so that it can operate correctly, which would be likely to be hindered by abusive proceedings initiated against its members by the executive or by private individuals.’ While recalling the  raison d'être for parliamentary freedom from arrest or molestation, the explanatory memorandum of the draft constitutional amendment adopted by the Congress on 31 July 1995 noted that it ‘infringed the principle of equality before the law.’ It was therefore necessary to modify its rules. It was also necessary to take into account the judicial scrutiny procedure and the range of semi-custodial measures it comprises which were instituted in 1970, in other words after the 1958 Constitution. This was the aim of the constitutional amendment of 4 August 1995, which amended Article 26 of the Constitution by putting forward the following rules:

 - The initiation of prosecution is still possible, even when Parliament is in session;

 - Any arrest or any custodial or semi-custodial measure is subject to the authorisation of the Assembly Bureau, with which it does not lie to judge the deputy in question but only to give a ruling on the ‘serious, loyal and sincere nature of the request it receives’; 

 - The authorisation of the Bureau is not required in the case of a serious crime, other major offence committed flagrante delicto or a final sentence.

 The detention, subjection to custodial or semi-custodial measures, or prosecution of a Member of Parliament, shall be suspended for the duration of the session if the Assembly so requires. The suspensory effect is limited to the duration of the session during which it is decided.

 -2. Freedom of speech

 Unlike the rules of freedom from arrest or molestation, the freedom of speech rules have not been amended since 1958. ‘No Member of Parliament shall be prosecuted, investigated, arrested, detained or tried in respect of opinions expressed or votes cast in the exercise of his duties (Article 26 of the Constitution, paragraph 1).

 This immunity is aimed at ensuring freedom of expression for parliamentarians. This explains why it is never-ending and continues after the expiry of the mandate, and covers all acts of parliamentary duties (reports, speeches, voting) but them alone, to the exclusion of acts and speech which are not directly related to these duties. Also, freedom of speech cannot be extended to acts accomplished by a deputy as part of an assignment entrusted by the Government (Constitutional Council decision no. 89-262 of 7 November 1989). Freedom of speech protects parliamentarians from both civil and criminal actions. 

 § 2 - INCOMPATIBILITIES

Incompatibility is a manner of protecting the parliamentary mandate which, unlike ineligibility, intervenes after the election and not before. An ineligible person cannot be a candidate; an ‘incompatible’ person can be elected. Incompatibility, the scope of which is therefore only relative, imposes choosing in a short length of time between the mandate and the activity declared incompatible, either by the elected representative himself or by the competent bodies.

 -1. Incompatibility with a public activity

· Institutional activities

The parliamentary mandate is firstly incompatible with the duties of President of the Republic—although this is not set forth in any text—member of the Government, of the Constitutional Council, or of the Economic and Social Council.

 The principle of the separation of powers has been invoked to justify these incompatibilities. It is temporarily set aside for temporary assignments the Government entrusts to deputies pursuant to Article L.O. 144 of the electoral code: so that the incompatibility rule is not circumvented, these assignments must not last more than six months; in the event of prolongation, the President of the Assembly notes the termination of the mandate.

 · Non-elective public duties

Incompatibility between the parliamentary mandate and non-elective public duties can be explained by the memory left by the deputies-cum-officials of the July Monarchy whose career depended on the Government which they were deemed to scrutinise. Incompatibility has been extended to management and advisory duties in companies and public establishments. The main exception concerns higher education professors, a category of public agents who escape the suspicion of dependence with respect to the political power.

 Officials who have become parliamentarians are placed in a position of secondment. During their mandate they continue to acquire retirement credits and enjoy advancement by seniority.

 -2. Cases of incompatibility with private activities

 Unlike public duties, private activities are theoretically compatible with a parliamentary mandate. Limits have however been laid down: in particular it is banned to concomitantly hold duties of responsibility in companies, establishments, and undertaking having financial ties (subsidies, interest guarantees, offering of shares) with public corporations. The same applies to companies having real estate activities.

 It is also banned for parliamentarians to allow their name and position to appear on an advertisement for a financial, industrial or commercial company, or, if they are barristers, to plead for or to give advice on behalf of the above-mentioned companies. Similarly, the barrister-deputy cannot plead criminal cases against the State.

 -3. Sanctions

 Deputies who find themselves in a case of incompatibility at the time of their election must opt between their mandate and the incompatible activity, within a period which, generally speaking, is thirty days long.  They disclose within the same timeframe any professional activity or any activity in the general interest which they envisage keeping. The National Assembly Bureau rules on the compatibility of this activity with the mandate. During the mandate, any changes affecting the deputy’s situation with respect to the rules governing incompatibility must also be brought to the attention of the Bureau.

 In case of doubt or a dispute, the matter is brought before the Constitutional Council either by the Bureau, or by the Minister of Justice, or by a parliamentarian himself. The Council decides at its discretion. If it gives a ruling of incompatibility, the concerned party must regularise his situation within thirty days following notification of the decision; failing this, the Constitutional Council pronounces his compulsory resignation from his mandate.

 § 3 – LIMITING OF MULTIPLE MANDATES

 The concomitant holding of a parliamentary mandate with one or several  local mandates has always been practised in France. It had spread widely since 1958. A first set of legislation aimed at reducing multiple mandate situations, was  instituted by two Acts of 30 December 1985. It was amended and strengthened by two Acts—including an institutional Act—of 5 April 2000.

 The institutional text lays down the principle of the incompatibility of the mandates of deputy (and senator) and that of a member of the European Parliament. The deputy’s mandate has been made incompatible with the exercise of more than one of the following electoral mandates: member of a regional council (conseiller régional), member of a departmental council (conseiller general), municipal councillor of a commune of at least 3,500 inhabitants, councillor at the Corsican Assembly, member of the Paris city council.

 A deputy who, after his election, obtains another mandate placing him in a banned multiple mandate situation must, within a period of thirty days, relinquish one of the previously held mandates.    

IV – Main bodies

 § 1 - BUREAU

 The Bureau is the collective body which, under the authority of the President of the Assembly, manages internal matters and directs National Assembly work.

 -1. Composition (present composition)

 The Bureau comprises 22 members: the President; 6 Vice-Presidents; 3 Quaestors; and 12 Secretaries.

The President (see hereafter), subject to annual reelection from 1875 to 1958, is now elected for the length of the term (Article 32 of the Constitution).

 All the other members are elected each year at the commencement of the ordinary session, in October. According to Article 10, paragraph 2, of the National Assembly Rules of Procedure, the composition of the Bureau shall strive ‘to reflect (…) the political make-up of the Assembly’, without strict proportionality being required. When there are as many candidatures as posts to be filled, which is most often the case, their appointment does not entail a ballot.

 -2. Functions

 Two functions are directly defined by the Constitution:

 · Article 26, paragraph 2, subjects to its authorisation any arrest of a deputy or any custodial or semi-custodial measure taken against him.

 · Article 89, paragraph 3, sets forth that in the event of an amendment of the Constitution, the Bureau of the Congress shall be that of the National Assembly.

 The Bureau has general management powers over the Assembly. ’It shall have power to arrange the deliberations of the Assembly and to organise and direct its departments’ (Article 14, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure). Some functions are exercised individually: Vice-Presidents stand in for and represent the President; Quaestors (see hereafter) are tasked with administrative and financial management; Secretaries take care of voting operations.

 Collegially, it lies with the Bureau to represent the Assembly at external events, interpret and apply the Rules of Procedure, settle major sitting incidents, and ensure fair treatment with regard to audiovisual communication. The organisation of the departments and the staff regulations of the Assembly’s personnel are settled by the Bureau’s deliberations.

 -3. Bureau delegations

 To prepare some of the Bureau’s decisions, it has become customary to set up delegations within it.

There are currently six delegations

During the XII^th legislature these delegations were tasked with :

- Application of the deputy’s service rules,

- Communication,

- International activities,

- Questions concerning parliamentary offices,

- Consideration of the financial admissibility of Members’ bills,

- Study groups.

During the XIII^th legislature the delegations are relating to the following fields :

 Each of these delegations is presided over by a Vice-President who reports his delegation’s conclusions to the Bureau.

 The Bureau meets approximately once a month. Each meeting give rise to the publication in the Feuilleton (internal bulletin) and on the Assembly’s website, of a list of decisions, some of which are published in the Journal officiel (Official Gazette).

 § 2 - THE PRESIDENT OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY

 The Constitution of the V^th Republic granted length to the mandate of the President of the National Assembly by having him elected for the five years of the term (Article 32 of the Constitution), whereas under the IV^th Republic, he was elected at the beginning of each annual session. While he has lost some of his prerogatives—in particular during the interim period between Presidents of the Republic, to the benefit of the President of the Senate—the President of the National Assembly has replaced the latter as President of Parliament convened in Congress in Versailles in the event of a constitutional amendment. The two Presidents share several constitutional prerogatives: power of appointment, right of referral; and in some cases they must be consulted

 · The two Presidents each appoint three members of the Constitutional Council (Article 56, paragraph 1, of the Constitution); they each also appoint a prominent citizen to sit at two sections of the Higher Council of the Judiciary (Article 65, paragraph 3, of the Constitution).

 · The Presidents are empowered to refer to the Constitutional Council Acts of Parliament before their promulgation (Article 61, paragraph 2, of the Constitution) or an international treaty that may contain a clause contrary to the Constitution (Article 54 of the Constitution). The V^th Republic has therefore entrusted the Presidents of the assemblies with a new role of defenders of the Constitution, which has broadened the scope of their posts. 

 · The Presidents of the two assemblies must be consulted in the event of dissolution of the National Assembly (Article 12, paragraph 1, of the Constitution), when the President of the Republic decides to implement Article 16, as well as in the case laid down in Article 28, paragraph 3, when the Prime Minister decides the holding of additional sitting days. 

 The President of the National Assembly is also responsible for the internal and external security of the Assembly (Rule 13, paragraph 2, of the National Assembly Rules of Procedure).

 As President of the Bureau and of the Chairmen’s Conference, he alone is empowered to ‘make National Assembly communications’ (Rule 13, paragraph 3, of the Rules of Procedure), particularly by authenticating the result of its deliberations, establishing an overall assessment of each session and defending the Assembly’s prerogatives. 

PRESIDENTS OF THE ASSEMBLY

Since the appointment of its first President, Jean-Sylvain Bailly, on 17 June 1789, the National Assembly has seen some 240 personalities follow one another at the ‘perch’, to use the word commonly designating the presidential desk. 

This high figure can be explained by the practice of the revolutionary assemblies which had deemed it fitting to replace the incumbent every fortnight: that way the Constituent Assembly, Legislative Assembly, Convention, Council of the Five Hundred and the Legislative Body saw 188 Presidents follow one another in the fifteen years of their existence.

The opposite approach was chosen by the constituents of the V^th Republic. They set forth that the Assembly elects its President at the beginning of the term for its whole length, in other words normally five years. Therefore the President of the Assembly, to whom the Constitution grants considerable powers, enjoys a stature which, apart from the power of influence resulting from his duties, grants him a specific role in the operation of the institutions.

Among the incumbents, many famous names can be quoted, such as, apart from Bailly, Talleyrand, Siéyès, the Abbot Grégoire, Mirabeau, Condorcet, Danton, Robespierre, Saint-Just, Lazare Carnot, Cambacérès, Chénier, Lucien Bonaparte, Royer-Collard, Gambetta, Edouard Herriot...

Since 1958, the following have successively occupied the seat: Jacques Chaban-Delmas (December 1958-June 1969), Achille Peretti (June 1969-April 1973), Edgar Faure (April 1973-April 1978), Jacques Chaban-Delmas (April 1978-May 1981), Louis Mermaz (July 1981-April 1986), Jacques Chaban-Delmas (April 1986-May 1988), Laurent Fabius (June 1988-January 1992), Henri Emmanuelli (January 1992-April 1993), Philippe Séguin (April 1993-April 1997), Laurent Fabius (June 1997-March 2000), Raymond Forni (29 March 2000-18 June 2002), Jean-Louis Debré (25 June 2002-4 March 2007), Patrick Ollier (2007), Bernard Accoyer (since June 2007). 

Former Presidents of the National Assembly

In the conduct of the debates, the President—replaced, whenever necessary, by one of the Vice-Presidents—plays a role the scope of which can be measured by Rule 52 of the Rules of Procedure: ‘The President shall open the sitting, control debate, enforce these Rules and maintain order; he may at any time suspend or adjourn the sitting.’  

 The Presidents personify and represent the National Assembly in the outside world. The share of international relations in their activities has increased over the past fifteen years or so.  They receive many foreign personalities and delegations. Since June 1993, resuming a tradition interrupted since the reception in 1919 of Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States, foreign heads of State and government are received not only in the Hôtel de Lassay and the Palais-Bourbon, but also in the hemicycle where no President of the French Republic has entered since 1875. The Constitution of 1958 moreover bans the President of the Republic from directly addressing the assemblies; he communicates with them by messages which are read for him and which do not give rise to any debate (Article 18).

  § 3 – THE CHAIRMEN’S CONFERENCE

 The Chairmen’s Conference, created back in 1911, mainly intervenes in setting the Assembly’s work schedule. 

 Unlike the Bureau, it does not result directly from a vote by the deputies. The following are members by right: the President of the National Assembly, who convenes the Conference and presides over it; the six Vice Presidents; the Chairmen of the six standing committees and, where applicable, of a special committee; the chairmen of the groups who, in the event of a vote, are allocated ‘a number of votes  equal to the number of members of the group’ (Rule 48, paragraph 7, of the Rules of Procedure); but voting is rare at the Chairmen’s Conference. In addition there is the general rapporteur of the Finance Committee and, since 1995, the Chairman of the Delegation for the European Union, a sign of the influence acquired by this body. The Government is represented on the Chairmen’s Conference by one of its members, customarily the minister tasked with relations with Parliament.

 At first sight, since 1958 the Conference’s role has no longer been more than executory. At its weekly meeting, ‘it examines the Assembly’s order of business for the current week and the two following weeks.’ In this respect it is notified through its President, ‘of requests made by the Government for business to be given precedence on the Assembly’s agenda.’ (Rule 48, paragraph 4, of the Rules of Procedure). For the rest, it limits itself to making proposals ‘in addition to debates given precedence at the Government’s request’, which forms the complementary agenda.

 The constitutional amendment of 4 August 1995 set forth a monthly sitting reserved by priority for an agenda set by the Assembly. The Chairmen’s Conference chooses the date of these sittings and sets the rules for their sharing between all the political groups.

 It also lies with the Conference to set the date of the debate of motions of censure when any are moved, and to determine speaking time in the discussion of legislation and in debates, as well as the organisational rules and the detailed schedule of the budget ‘marathon’. It also determines the weekly sittings devoted to questions for oral answer, of which it organises the conduct.

Lastly, the Conference decides on the organisation of certain ‘formal’ public ballots which are postponed to the time most favourable for participation of the deputies (Rule 65-1, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure).

 The Chairmen’s Conference is a place of meeting and even of negotiation between the representatives of the groups and of committees and the Government. Apart from matters concerning the agenda, its meeting is an opportunity to evoke and solve all the immediate problems which the operation of the Assembly can cause, particularly in the exercise of its deliberative duty. In this respect it plays an important and growing role in the operation of the Assembly.

  § 4 - QUAESTORS

 The term and the post date back to the Senatus-consulte of 28 Frimaire year XII (20 December 1803). Since the Third Republic, there have been three Quaestors. Traditionally two of them belong to the majority and the third to the opposition. ‘The Quaestors shall be responsible for financial and administrative matters, pursuant to guidelines laid down by the Bureau. No new expenditure shall be incurred without prior consultation with them.’ (Rule 15, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure). The National Assembly appoints them at the beginning of each term and, like all other members of the Bureau, except the President, renews them each year in October, at the opening of the session (Rule 10, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure).

 The three Quaestors deal collegially with the administrative and financial management of the Assembly. Management of the personnel, equipment, fleet of cars, buildings, restaurants and cafe, social security regimes, and pensions… are their responsibility. Their role is particularly important in the budgetary sphere: they prepare and determine the Assembly’s budget—in a formation where they sit with the Quaestors of the Senate and under the presidency of a chamber president at the Audit Court—and they commit expenditure. As the assemblies are financially autonomous, Quaestors commit expenditure without being subject to the visa of a financial comptroller, an official of the executive branch of government.

On the authority of the President, the Quaestors ensure security at the Palais-Bourbon. In this respect they organise and check the means of access and circulation in the Palais. This is an especially delicate task in view of the ‘open doors’ policy applied by the Assembly in recent years.

  § 5 - POLITICAL GROUPS

 The Constitution, in its Article 4, deals only with political parties and groups and not with parliamentary groups which form the organised mouthpiece of parties within the Assembly. Groups have existed since their creation in 1910 at the Chamber of Deputies. Today, the Rules of Procedure, which devote a chapter to them (Chapter V, Rules 19 to 23), define them as the meeting of deputies sharing ‘political affinities’.

 To form a group, two conditions must be met: a minimum number of deputies, set at 30 in 1959 and then 20 in 1988, must be brought together; and the formation of the group must be accompanied with a ‘political statement’ signed by its members and moved by the chairman they have appointed.

 at the beginning of each term, after the formation of groups, the President of the Assembly convenes their chairmen to divide the floor of the chamber into as many sections as there are groups. 

 Groups freely define their organisation, meeting and voting procedure, and their Rules of Procedure. They are given premises and a secretariat. Their functions and powers have expanded along with the progression—unequal depending on parties—of party discipline. Groups therefore play a role in many fields concerning the organisation and operation of the Assembly; the numerical size of each group is taken into account for some appointments (Bureau, committees, delegations and offices). The same applies for the allocation of speaking time in debates, the allocation of questions for oral answer or, lastly, explanations of vote.

 Group chairmen, who are ex officio members of the Chairmen’s Conference—within which, in the event of a vote, they have a number of votes equal to the number of members of the group they chair—also have a great number of prerogatives in the conduct of the legislative procedure and in the holding of the public sitting. They can, for instance, themselves request, or via a member specially appointed for this purpose, a suspension of a sitting or a public ballot. They can also request a verification of the quorum, but this right must be exercised personally. They also have certain powers of initiative for the inclusion on the agenda of some instruments: resolutions to create a committee of inquiry or on draft Community instruments, and Members’ bills debated at the monthly private members’ sittings.

Access to the political groups of the XIII^th legislature

  § 6 – PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEES AND DELEGATIONS

 (See Second Part, I, §2: -1. Intervention of committees and Third part, II, §2 and III) 

THE ASSEMBLY AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

While, among French institutions, the major role in international relations is assigned to the executive, there is nevertheless scope for the assemblies to intervene, particularly through what is sometimes called ‘parliamentary diplomacy’. Their role in this sphere has increased in recent years. 

The Assembly intervenes firstly within the framework of its institutional powers: authorisation to ratify treaties and international agreements (see Third part); debate of the appropriations for the ministry of foreign affairs and for the ministry of cooperation, which debate gives rise to the European Union levy; and debates organised following governmental declarations on France’s foreign or European policy, which can also give rise to questions to the Government. It can be said that the Foreign Affairs Committee is permanently delegated by the Assembly to follow all matters in the sphere of international relations. 

A whole series of specific activities by the various Assembly bodies are to be added to this permanent activity: the President of the Assembly is often led to receive, at Hôtel de Lassay, Heads of State and Heads of Government whom he also meets during his official trips abroad, alone or accompanied by members of the Bureau; the standing committees have frequent contacts with their foreign counterparts by sending fact-finding missions;  and friendship groups allow systematic and close relations with the members of Parliaments of nearly all countries.

There are also international parliamentary assemblies whose meetings are attended by National Assembly delegations: Inter-Parliamentary Union, Parliamentary Assembly of Francophonie, parliamentary assemblies of the Council of Europe, of the Western European Union (WEU), of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO).

In recent years, new forms of intervention have developed: interparliamentary cooperation activities—sometimes called ‘democratic engineering’—consisting for the  Assembly in providing technical aid for the operation of Parliaments desiring its support; election observation missions in foreign countries, carried out by members of the Bureau.

Within the Bureau, a delegation is tasked with coordinating all the Assembly’s international activities. Symposia under its aegis are organised on some aspects of international relations. 

 Further information :

L'Assemblée nationale et les relations internationales - The National Assembly and international relations - Connaissance de l'Assemblée nationale n° 11.

V – Means

From the viewpoint of its administrative organisation, the National Assembly—like the Senate moreover—

differentiates itself by implementing what forms the principle of the autonomy of parliamentary assemblies. This is based on the principle of the separation of powers and results in financial and administrative regimes which are quite singular even if this is tending progressively to diminish. Referring to material means, and particularly the use of data processing and new communication techniques, the approach is resolutely innovative. 

  § 1 – FINANCIAL REGIME

 -1. Financial autonomy

 The National Assembly‘s financial regime is defined in Article 7 of ordinance no. 58-1100 of 17 November 1958 on the functioning of the parliamentary assemblies. Its first paragraph confirms the traditional principle of the financial autonomy of each assembly. Although the assemblies do not have legal personality, their financial operations do not come under ordinary law. The management of the appropriation included in the Finance Act (common costs budget) escapes, once paid, the general rules of public accounting (decree no. 62-1587 of 29 December 1962). The assemblies manage their budget as they see fit and do not come under the jurisdiction of the Audit Court. There is no a priori control of the fairness of accounts exercised by an official coming hierarchically under the Minister for the Budget. The National Assembly Treasurer is a parliamentary official, who comes under the Quaestors.

 The draft budget, prepared each year by the Quaestors, is debated within a ‘joint appropriations committee’, composed of the Quaestors of the two assemblies (six in all) convened under the presidency of a chamber president at the Audit Court assisted by two assessor magistrates who have no vote. Whatever the role effectively played by this chamber president during the debates, the fact that budget proposals by the assembly authorities must be submitted to personalities outside Parliament may have been perceived as a decline in Parliament’s financial autonomy.

The joint committee limits itself to determining the amounts of the appropriations deemed necessary for the assemblies to operate. It lies with the Quaestors to allocate the appropriations between the various expenditure headings. The annual Finance Act comprises, in the form of an appended document, a report on the budgets of the parliamentary assemblies drawn up by the joint committee, which gives indications on the amounts of expenditure, its variation from one year to another, and its planned use.

 A special committee tasked with verifying and clearing the accounts, composed of 15 deputies, examines each year the accounts of each closed year (Rule 16 of the National Assembly Rules of Procedure) and gives a discharge to the Quaestors in respect of their management. Since 1994, it has drawn up a report that is published at the end of each financial year.

 -2. Material situation of deputies

 Updated figures can be consulted on the National Assembly website :

(http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/connaissance/indemnité.asp ).

 Parliamentary allowance

The allowances allocated to deputies were defined by ordinance no. 58-1210 of 13 December 1958. The basic allowance is calculated ‘with reference to the salary of officials occupying State posts classified in the so-called outside the pay scale category. It is equal to the average of the lowest salary and the highest salary of this category’, which corresponds to the salary of a senior member of the Conseil d’Etat  who has worked for less than one year as such. Deputies also receive the residence allowance, like officials, at the rate of 3%. According to Article 2 of the above-mentioned ordinance: ‘The parliamentary allowance is completed by a so-called function allowance’; the amount of this allowance is equal to a quarter of the amount of the parliamentary allowance (parliamentary allowance strictly speaking increased by the residence allowance). 

 Various mandatory withholdings are deducted from this allowance: contribution to the pensions fund; exceptional solidarity contribution; generalised social contribution; contribution for the repayment of the social debt; and contribution to the income guarantee fund. The basic parliamentary allowance increased by the residence allowance, and excluding the function allowance, is taxable according to the rules applicable to salaries and pay.

 According to the institutional Act no. 92-175 of 25 February 1992, a deputy holding local mandates or exercising local electoral duties cannot add the allowances related to these mandates or functions to his basic parliamentary allowance except within the limit of one and a half times of the latter. 

The family benefits received by deputies are equivalent to those of the general wage earners scheme.

 Secretariat and mandate costs

To meet the various expenses related to the exercise of their mandate which are not directly covered or reimbursed by the Assembly, deputies receive an allowance covering mandate costs, the amount of which is revalued like the salaries of civil and local-government service, and which allows them in particular to pay one or several secretaries. 

 Staff appropriation

Each deputy is allocated an appropriation assigned to the payment of his staff. The staff, also known as parliamentary assistants, are hired by a deputy under a private law contract managed by the National Assembly and paid from a specific appropriation allocated by the Assembly to each of its members. These assistants exercise their activity either in a deputy’s constituency or in Paris.

 The corresponding appropriation allows a staff of three to be paid;  it can however be paid, according to the deputy’s wish, to a number of persons varying from one to five. The deputy acts in the capacity of employer: he recruits, fires, and determines the work conditions and salary of his personnel. The appropriation set aside in this respect for each deputy is revalued like the salaries of those in civil and local-government service. In the event of non-use of the totality of the appropriation, the available share remains acquired by the National Assembly budget or can be transferred by the deputy to his political group for the payment of the employees of this group.

 Travel facilities

- Travel throughout the national territory by rail: the National Assembly issues a nominative card granting free access to all the SNCF network in first class, as well as to couchettes and sleeping cars for travel within the borders of metropolitan France. 

 - Travel in Paris and the Paris area: the National Assembly has a fleet of some twenty vehicles assigned by priority to the travel of official delegations and to travel required by legislative work. The fleet also meets, as far as possible, the travel requirements of deputies related to their other obligations in Paris and takes them to the airports. Taxis are called when the fleet cannot meet all requests. 

 - Air travel: the National Assembly pays each year:

* For deputies in metropolitan France: forty return trips between Paris and the constituency when it is served by a regular airline (eighty ‘constituency’ trips); six return trips in metropolitan France other than to the constituency; 

 * For overseas deputies: an annual appropriation equal, for deputies from the overseas departments, to the cost of twenty-six single flights in business club class between Paris and the constituency and, for deputies from the overseas territories and territorial units,  to the cost of sixteen single flights in first class between Paris and the constituency, and four return trips in metropolitan France.

 Social security and pensions

It is mandatory for deputies to join the National Assembly social security fund, a special regime created by the National Assembly Bureau in 1948 and managed by a management committee composed of three Quaestors and a representative of each of the political groups. This fund provides benefits in kind for illness and maternity and allocates a death benefit or allowances in the event of death.

 The deputies’ pensions fund, created by a resolution of the Chamber of Deputies of 23 December 1904, is funded by a contribution deducted from the parliamentary allowance and by a subsidy provided for in the Assembly’s budget. Pensions are calculated according to the number of years of contribution, and it should be pointed out that deputies pay a double contribution during the first fifteen years of their mandate. Deputies are normally entitled to a pension at age 55.

 Various facilities

* Means of communication

Telephone calls to all the metropolitan network from a telephone installed in the deputy’s office at the Palais-Bourbon are paid by the National Assembly.

 Deputies can also be granted, on request, a global communication sum covering: telephone service subscriptions for a maximum of four telephone lines in their name, among which two can be mobile lines; a subscription to an Internet service provider; and the cost of calls within the limit of the global sum. 

 Mail of a parliamentary nature, in other words required to accomplish the legislative mandate, is franked at the expense of the National Assembly. On the other hand, postage is not paid for mail of a private nature, or mail presenting a general or collective nature (invitations, announcements, visiting cards, printed matter, handouts, calls for subscriptions, newspapers…).

 Deputies are also granted an appropriation to buy data processing equipment.

 * Catering

Deputies can choose between two restaurants. One is strictly reserved for their use, whereas they can also invite guests to the other. The provision of meals is a service paid by deputies.

 * Housing

The National Assembly allocates loans to buy housing or premises to be used as an office or committee rooms, either in Paris or in the constituency. The average amount of loans granted to deputies amounts to approximately €76,225 (length 10 years, rate 2%).

The Assembly owns a building, near the  Palais-Bourbon, used as a hotel where parliamentarians can reserve a room at their expense.

  § 2 – ADMINISTRATIVE REGIME

 -1. Administrative autonomy

 Under the previous Republics, actions of the assemblies, i.e. parliamentary actions, came under the regime of Government action, in other words judges declared they lacked jurisdiction to rule on them.

 Article 8 of ordinance no. 58-1100 of 17 November 1958 on the functioning of the parliamentary assemblies made a first exception to this regime of jurisdictional immunity by laying down the rule that ‘the State is responsible for damage of all kinds caused by the departments of the parliamentary assemblies.’  Further exceptions were made by the Act on disputes implicating agents of the assemblies, and particularly the Act of 13 July 1983 on the rights and obligations of officials in its Article 31.

 New restrictions to this regime of jurisdictional immunity also result from jurisdictional decisions, one of which, formed by an assembly decision of the Conseil d'État of 5 March 1999, is of major importance and contributes to drawing closer to the ordinary law regime disputes concerning actions of parliamentary assemblies. Drawing the consequences of this evolution, the Assembly Bureau adopted in February 2001, an order regulating the Assembly’s public supply contracts (Journal officiel – Official Gazette - of 23 February 2001).

 -2. National Assembly officials

 Their regime applies the principle of autonomy since Rule 17 of the Assembly Rules of Procedure lays down that ‘the Bureau shall lay down rules to govern the organisation and operation of departments of the Assembly, the application, interpretation and implementation, by the several departments, of the provisions of these Rules, staff regulations and relations between the administration of the Assembly and staff associations.’  

 Governed, on these bases, by an order of the Bureau laying down rules on the organisation of the departments which set forth the staff regulations of the National Assembly personnel, the some 1,300 Assembly officials are split between the legislative departments and the administrative departments, under the administrative authority of two secretaries general: nearly half of the personnel is assigned to reception, supervision, security and current maintenance tasks executed by ushers, agents and guards-supervisors; secretarial work occupies nearly a fifth of the staff; deputy administrators (administrateurs-adjoints) are tasked with applying the procedural rules and management rules; conception and technical assistance work is rather a matter for administrators (administrateurs) and  councillors (conseillers), managed by directors (directeurs); and debate secretaries and debate drafters (see p. ) are tasked with drawing up reports of the debates in the hemicycle.

 The staff regulations of assembly agents are characterised by the fact that permanent posts are exclusively held by parliamentary officials. These officials are State officials but are not covered by the general staff regulations of civil and local-government service. They must be recruited by competitive examination, and must comply with specific obligations as regards their neutrality and availability.

 As a rule, Assembly officials spend their whole career at the Assembly. There are however possibilities of secondment or loan.

  § 3 – TECHNICAL ENVIRONMENT

 -1. Data processing at the Palais-Bourbon

The first computer specialist was recruited by the National Assembly in 1969 at the time of the implementation of the Plan Calcul aimed at making the country independent as regards large computer systems. In 1975 the first two computers were installed (Bull 6160 machines) and the management data processing division, then part of the financial affairs department, was also created at the same time. The departments were progressively equipped with personal computers from 1986 on. 

Then, shortly before 1990, the data processing activity was structured by the creation of a data processing department. It covers the main aspects of the Assembly’s data processing needs and has been setting up since 1995 an information system composed of networked databases.

In 1990 an annual data processing equipment appropriation was granted to deputies.

The next step entailed the recruitment of specialised executive technicians and the implementation of medium-term planning. 

A change in scale occurred with the advent of the Internet: in 1996 the Assembly’s website was created. Since 1997, demand at the Assembly for Internet connections has become generalised and the political authorities have used their best endeavours to transform the Assembly website into a documentary instrument for broader dissemination of parliamentary work.

Since 1998, an Intranet - Extranet site has been available to deputies and their staff. The departments can also use an Intranet site.

Since June 2002 and the beginning of the 12th term, each deputy has had a computer terminal with an Internet connection and email in his office at the National Assembly.

Deputies and the departments now have broad access to new technologies, both in terms of sources of information and work means.

The Assembly’s website ( http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr ) allows the public to access a very wide range of information. In particular, all parliamentary documents can be consulted on-line (government and Members’ bills, reports, instruments adopted…). The summary record of the debates of a sitting can be consulted approximately three hours after it has been adjourned. The site also features biographical notes on the deputies, states the composition of the various parliamentary bodies and Assembly departments, and presents many texts and illustrations on the Palais-Bourbon and the operation of the National Assembly.

 -2. Dissemination of work

Disclosure is an essential element of parliamentary debates and was already enshrined in the Constitution of 3 September 1791. Sittings are brought to public notice firstly by the presence of the public and by the dissemination of written reports of the Assembly’s work. Similarly, work by the committees and other Assembly bodies give rise to the publication of written documents which the public can buy or consult on the Internet  (see Annex p. ).

Apart from this direct information, the National Assembly has a policy of being open to the written and audiovisual press, whose role has become essential in informing the public. More than 350 French journalists, representing nearly one hundred national or local press organs, are accredited to the Palais-Bourbon where they mingle with forty or so of their foreign colleagues, representing 40 newspapers or agencies from twenty countries. 

Accredited journalists from the written press have been attending the debates for a long time. Galleries are reserved for them. They can also make use of two newsrooms in the immediate vicinity of the chamber.

The first radio broadcast of the debates dates back to 1947. At the time, radio broadcasts were very important but over the years audiovisual broadcasts have taken over from them. 

 In the same way that it publishes verbatim reports of the sittings, the Assembly has also ensured ‘full audiovisual coverage’ of the debates in public sitting, since 1993, by means of six cameras situated in the chamber. Also two rooms are equipped to record the public hearings of committees and delegations, as well as of some symposia organised by the Assembly.

These images are televised via internal television and made available free of charge to television channels. Until spring 2000, they were also televised by cable and satellite via the ‘Canal Assemblées’ channel which also televised the work by the Senate.

 Created by Act no. 99-1174 of 30 December 1999, the Chaîne Parlementaire has taken over from this ‘simple’ broadcast of the debates. According to the terms of this Act, the Chaîne Parlementaire ‘pursues a mission of public service, information and awareness-raising of citizens regarding public life, by educational and civic parliamentary programmes.’  For this purpose it broadcasts, with equal on-air time, the programmes of two independent companies, LCP-Assemblée-nationale (LCP-AN) and Public-Sénat, which are bound to each of the assemblies by an agreement setting forth in particular the financial participation which they receive. 

In accordance with the constitutional principle of the separation of powers, the two companies are not subject to the audiovisual regulatory authority, the Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel (Higher audiovisual board). Similarly, although in receipt of public funds, they do not come under the jurisdiction of the Audit Court, pursuant to the principle of the financial autonomy of Parliament. Under the supervision of the Bureau of each assembly, the companies must comply with the regulations applying to thematic television channels and meet the requirement of programme impartiality imposed by law.

LCP is televised from 7:30 a.m. to 1:00 a.m. on all the cabled networks and satellite bouquets pursuant to a provision of the Act of 30 December 1999 which obliges operators to make the channel programmes available to their subscribers free of charge. The channel can also be accessed on the Internet on the National Assembly and Senate websites.

Directed by two president and chief executive officers, the two components of the Chaîne Parlementaire each have an editorial staff of some fifteen journalists and enjoy the technical facilities existing at the two chambers. Direct broadcast of debates in public sitting and in committee is preferred, subject to alternate Assembly-Senate programming in the daily schedule of programmes. 

Also the fact that they can make use of production studios and production control rooms allows them to film stage programmes.

As regards more specifically LCP-AN, the priority granted to parliamentary work strictly speaking is accompanied by information rendezvous, debates and magazines. Two news programmes are produced every day at lunchtime and in the evening, as well as debates based on political and parliamentary current events.  Also weekly magazines complete this programming which takes account of all aspects of parliamentary activity.

The two sittings of questions to the Government, on Tuesdays and Wednesdays of each week, are also televised direct by France 3 and have been translated since 1999 into sign language and feature teletext type subtitling for the deaf and hard of hearing. Lastly, the public sitting and some meetings of committees open to the press are televised direct on the Internet, via the National Assembly website.

SECOND PART:

LEGISLATIVE ROLE

Parliament votes all laws, except for those adopted by referendum. The Government may ask Parliament for authorisation to take measures by ordinance that are normally a matter for statute  (Article 38 of the Constitution).

According to Article 39, paragraph 1, of the Constitution, the Prime Minister and deputies and senators alike shall have the right to initiate statutes. Pursuant to the right of amendment, they can also amend texts under debate. 

More Acts result from government bills than from Members’ bills. But government bills are often amended many times between their tabling with the Bureau of either assembly and the time they are voted on to make their text final, before possible referral to the Constitutional Council and promulgation by the President of the Republic.

There are several steps to the legislative procedure (I). It is characterised, in the 1958 Constitution, by a certain number of important prerogatives the Government is acknowledged to have (II). There are Acts which, owing in particular to their subject, are somewhat different from the others (III).

Before examining the various steps of the legislative procedure, it is necessary to recall the framework and the principles according to which the Assembly’s activity takes place, both from the viewpoint of its legislative role and its scrutiny role. 

I – Legislative procedure and steps

§ 1 – FRAMEWORK AND PRINCIPLES

-1. Session

The session is the period of the year when Parliament meets validly to deliberate in plenary sitting.

The 1958 Constitution (Article 28) had laid down two ordinary sessions, of approximately three months each, the first in autumn, and the second in spring, separated by intersessions. The opening of the ordinary April session was the reference point used for the beginning of the new term, save dissolution (‘The powers of the National Assembly expire at the opening of the fifth ordinary April session following its election.’)

Since 1958, the number of sitting days at the National Assembly has increased almost constantly. The average was 90 days from 1959 to 1970, reached one hundred in 1971, and exceeded 150 in 1982. The narrowness of the time framework imposed by the Constitution has led to recourse to compensatory measures or practices, such as night sittings, and above all the multiplication of extraordinary sessions, nearly all convened on request by the Prime Minister (Article 29 of the Constitution).

The reform proposals led to the vote by Congress meeting in Versailles on 31 July 1995 of the following text: ‘Parliament shall convene as of right in one ordinary session which shall start on the first working day of October and shall end on the last working day of June.’ (Article 28, paragraph 1, of the Constitution amended by the constitutional Act no. 95-88 of 4 August 1995).

The new Article 28, in its paragraph 2, fixes a maximum number of one hundred and twenty sitting days, yet states in its third paragraph: ‘The Prime Minister, after consulting the President of the assembly concerned, or the majority of the members of each assembly, may decide to meet for additional sitting days.’

As a result of the continuity of the session, the 1995 amendment has allowed the assemblies better to master the rhythm of their work. The fact that ‘The sitting weeks shall be determined by each assembly.’ (Article 28, paragraph 2), allows them to decide the weeks when public sittings are interrupted—during major holidays or election campaigns. Also, ‘The days and hours of sittings shall be determined by the Rules of Procedure of each assembly.’ (Article 28, paragraph 4): the provisions set in place endeavour to group the holding of public sittings on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, in order to leave the rest of the week for activities by parliamentarians in their constituencies.

-2. Agenda

According to Article 20 of the Constitution, ‘The Government shall determine and conduct the policy of the Nation.’ As this policy leads in particular to the elaboration of legal rules in the form of government bills, it follows that the Government should be able to submit these bills to the assemblies at the time it deems opportune, depending on the adoption schedule of its legislative programme. Hence Article 48, paragraph 1, of the Constitution: ‘… precedence shall be given on the agendas of the assemblies, and in the order determined by the Government, to the debate of government bills and of Members’ bills accepted by the Government.’

The priority agenda is transmitted to the Chairmen’s Conference, which normally meets once a week on Tuesday morning. Following the Conference, the agenda is transmitted to the Assembly at the first public sitting that follows. This agenda applies ‘… for the current week and the two following weeks.’ (Article 48, paragraph 4, of the Rules of Procedure). By a mere letter or by an oral communication in a sitting, the Government can alter the initial priority agenda. Its prerogatives also imply a steering power over the parliamentary procedure: conduct of the shuttle process; declaration of urgency, which allows the possible meeting of a joint committee of seven deputies and seven senators after only one reading in each assembly; withdrawal of a text from the agenda or decision to suspend its debate…

Further, committees cannot prevent the consideration of a priority bill by delaying the tabling of their conclusions.  Failure to publish a committee report on a bill cannot form an obstacle to its debate. This results from a decision by the Constitutional Council (no. 84-81 of 10 and 11 October 1984) that debate in public sitting can commence, with or without a report, once the bill has been examined in a committee and the right of amendment has been able to be exercised.

Precedence as determined by the Government is however sometimes limited or framed. According to Article 46, paragraph 2, of the Constitution, a bill of an institutional nature shall not be debated in the assembly in which it was first introduced until fifteen days have elapsed since its introduction.

Debate of motions of censure (Article 49, paragraphs 2 and 3, of the Constitution) shall take place at the latest on the third sitting day following expiry of the constitutional period of forty-eight hours after the introduction of the motion. This date is determined by the Chairmen’s Conference. ‘The closing of ordinary or extraordinary sessions shall be postponed by right in order to permit the application of  Article 49, if the case arises. Additional sittings shall be held by right for the same purpose.’

Pursuant to Article 48, paragraph 2, of the Constitution, some sittings shall be devoted to questions from deputies and to answers by the Government (see Third part). 

The constitutional Act of 4 August 1995 added a third paragraph to Article 48 of the Constitution according to which ‘At one sitting a month, precedence shall be given to the agenda determined by each assembly.’ Most of these sittings—known familiarly as niches parlementaires—have been devoted to the consideration of Members’ bills. This opening up to parliamentary initiative is added to the possibilities offered by the supplementary agenda, which is the agenda that the Assembly can  introduce in addition to the priority agenda, on proposal by the Chairmen’s’ Conference. In actual fact this possibility is rarely used and many Members’ bills debated under the V^th Republic have been set down on the priority agenda. By using this new possibility offered by Article 48, paragraph 3, of the Constitution, Parliament has been able to adopt, on its initiative, a higher number of Members’ bills and on important matters (PACS [civil solidarity pact], criminal responsibility of public decision makers, palliative care…), as well as examining Members’ bills set down on request by groups in the opposition.

The priority agenda is frequently negotiated rather than imposed. Prior contacts enlighten the Government on the limits which committees can accept in view of their workload. When the assemblies consider their workload is heavier than what is reasonable they do not fail to state so. The number of bills passed each year by Parliament—bills whose importance naturally varies—is more or less constant: a hundred or so on average.

Also, since October 1995, the Government has informed the Chairmen’s’ Conference, at the opening of each session and then at the beginning of March, of the business it intends to ask to be set down on the Assembly’s agenda and the envisaged period for its debate. 

-3. Disclosure of debates

One of the most serious French political crises began when, in the morning of 16 May 1877, the President of the Republic, Mac-Mahon, had a letter carried to Jules Simon, Head of Government, in which the first sentence read: ‘Mr Président du Conseil (title of Head of Government under the III^rd Republic), I have just read in the Official Gazette the report of yesterday’s sitting.’ There followed a series of reproaches which brought about the resignation of Jules Simon, then the dissolution of the Chamber of Deputies and, a few months later, to elections which, with the victory of the Republicans, led to the advent of the III^rd Republic. The rule on the disclosure of debates had been the primary cause of the incident. 

Article 33, paragraph 1, of the Constitution lays down: ‘The sittings of the two assemblies shall be public.’ The disclosure of debates is firstly ensured by the physical presence of the public, which can access, with a sitting ticket issued by a deputy, the galleries overlooking the chamber (approximately 500 seats). On pain of exclusion, persons attending debates must not show either their approval or disapproval (memory of the revolutionary times). 

The 1958 Constitution lays down that ‘Each assembly may sit in camera at the request of the Prime Minister or of one tenth of its members.’ (Article 33, paragraph 2) but, since 1958, the assemblies have never sat in camera

The Constitution sets forth that ‘A verbatim report of the debates shall be published in the Journal officiel.’  There are in fact two reports.

First, the so called summary record, drawn up by the debate secretaries, gives a faithful and complete but condensed image of the debates. It is distributed a few hours after the sitting and is posted on the Assembly’s website (http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr ).

Second, the verbatim report, drawn up by the debate drafters, is handed as a proof copy to the speakers approximately one and a half hours after their intervention. It is published on the National Assembly website thirty-six hours after the sitting, then by the Official Gazette (parliamentary debates edition) three to five days afterwards. It forms the official record, which alone forms the authentic text.

Outside the scope of the Constitution, modern dissemination techniques, particularly television and then the Internet, have considerably broadened the scope of the disclosure of debates (see above p. ).

§ 2 – BEFORE THE PUBLIC SITTING

-1. Intervention of committees 

The process which leads to debate in public sitting is the same for any instrument, whether a government bill or a Member’s bill: the instrument must be tabled before being sent to a committee for consideration.  

In a political or administrative assembly, a committee is a select formation tasked with preparing the work of the plenary meeting. Under the V^th Republic, the family of committees comprises, as before 1958, special or standing legislative committees and committees of inquiry. There is also a new representative, the joint committee of seven deputies and seven senators, tasked with endeavouring to reconcile the viewpoints of the two assemblies on government bills or Members’ bills under consideration by them.

The 1958 Constitution strictly defined the rules governing legislative committees.

The referral of a Government bill or a Member’s bill to a standing legislative committee for consideration is laid down by the Constitution as the exception, the rule being referral, at the request of the Government or of the Assembly having the bill before it, to committees specially set up for this purpose (Article 43, paragraph 1, of the Constitution).

The number of standing legislative committees is limited to six in each assembly. The low number of standing committees, between which the 577 deputies are split, explains the large size of their staff. Two of them (Cultural, Family and Social Affairs Committee; Economic Affairs, Environment and Territory) have some 140 members (two-eighths of the total number of deputies), the four others (Foreign Affairs; National Defence and Armed Forces; Finance, General Economy and Planning; and Constitutional Acts, Legislation and General Administration) have 70 members (in other words one eighth). Deputies are appointed to committees by proportional representation of groups; therefore each committee reflects the Assembly’s political composition. 

‘The discussion of government bills shall pertain, in the assembly which first has the bill before it, to the text introduced by the Government.’ (Article 42, paragraph 1, of the Constitution). This is a break with the prior state of affairs when amendments passed by the committee were included, on amending them, to the text submitted to the Assembly in plenary sitting. The amendments adopted by the committee, are recorded in the ‘comparative table’ of its report, and must again be tabled and debated in public sitting.

The three innovations described above have experienced a variety of fates:

Special committees have not replaced standing committees. Only one hundredth of the texts have been referred to them (including some very important bills: the economic and social ordinances in 1967; nationalisations in 1981-1982; and the bill relating to spatial planning in 1994…). The consideration of an instrument by a standing committee has been a systematic solution for a long time, the creation of special committees therefore being somewhat exceptional. In 1980, the automatic setting up of a special committee in the event of requests for referrals for opinion to two standing committees was moreover abolished.

The limiting of the number of standing committees to six has been maintained, although subject to criticisms. To a certain extent, the constitutional ban has been compensated by the creation of bodies such as the Offices and Delegations, although these inquiry and information bodies do not have legislative powers strictly speaking…

It has also been proposed to reform the constitutional provision which imposes the discussion in public sitting of a Government text. The criticisms have not had any effect on this point either. For Members’ bills, which are rarer, it is the text—what is known as its ‘conclusions’ elaborated by the competent committee—which is submitted to the Assembly in public sitting. The Government for its part enjoys the right of amendment.

-2. Role of amendments

An amendment is a written proposal aimed at amending a text submitted to the deliberation of an assembly. It forms one of the three options open to the legislator: accepting without amending, rejecting, amending.

However, some texts submitted to the assemblies cannot be amended: when they vote on Government bills authorising the ratification or approval of an international agreement, deputies accept, reject or adjourn but cannot amend (Rule 128 of the Rules of Procedure). Parliament passes a large number of such bills: they frequently form more than half of the hundred or so laws passed each year by Parliament.

Variety of amendments:

While they are all aimed at amending the instrument to which they apply, amendments can achieve this in different ways: repealing amendment; substitution amendment: substitute the following text for this article, or this paragraph, or this sentence or part of a sentence…; addition amendment: either by  insertion or by addition; when an amendment consists in adding a new article to the text under discussion it forms an ‘additional article’;  transfer amendment: it is proposed to change the place of a title, an article, sentence or part of a sentence;  contraction amendment (shorter re-writing, to lighten the wording) or extension amendment (longer re-writing).

Growth in the number of amendments:

The National Assembly has seen an increase from an annual maximum of 2,500 amendments until 1970 to 4,000 in the 1970s, and 5,000 on average in the 1980s. In the most recent period, the Assembly has dealt each year with more than 10,000 amendments. These figures are very high, even if the adopted amendments vary widely in scope.

This growth can be explained firstly by the ease of use of amendments, despite their being inadmissible in some cases. It has also been considered that amendments, previously ‘the corollary of the right to initiate legislation’, have become its substitute. In the making of laws, parliament’s right to initiate legislation is now mainly exercised by the tabling of amendments.

A FEW POINTS OF REFERENCE

Parliament has produced a hundred or so Acts on average each year since the beginning of the V^th Republic. Among these Acts, a considerable number deal with authorising the approval or ratification of international agreements and comprise a single article. In contrast there are Acts comprising more than a hundred articles, such as the annual Finance Act.

The proportion of Acts resulting from a government bill with respect to those resulting from a Member’s bill has varied. In recent year, the trend has been for a clear increase in the number of the latter which represent approximately half the instruments definitively adopted, except for those authorising the ratification of treaties or agreements.

The National Assembly sat for 113 days during the 2003-2004 session (1 October 2003-30 June 2004), and 112 days during the 2002-2003 session). These figures correspond to 280 sittings and 1,058 hours for 2003-2004, 274 sittings and 1,065 hours for 2002-2003.

During the 2003-2004 session, 13,437 amendments were brought before the National Assembly and 3,668 were adopted.

 § 3 – CONDUCT OF PUBLIC SITTINGS

The debate of an instrument set down on the National Assembly’s agenda comprises three phases: first, general presentation; second, except in the very rare case of interruption of the debate after the passing of a motion of censure, a phase of consideration of the clauses and amendments; and third, a vote on the whole instrument, sometimes postponed to a date allowing this vote to be more formal.

-1. General presentation

This comprises as a rule:

The hearing of the minister(s) tasked with supporting debate of the Government bill, and sometimes the hearing of the Prime Minister. Members of the Government shall in any case ‘address either assembly whenever they so request.’ (Article 31 of the Constitution).

Intervention of the rapporteur of the committee responsible followed possibly by the shorter intervention of the rapporteur of the committee(s) asked for its (their) opinion. 

When the debate concerns a Member’s bill, the ‘Government’—in other words the minister representing it in the debate—intervenes after the rapporteur to present its viewpoint or even its reservations or opposal to an instrument which does not emanate from it.

If there is no procedural motion, the general debate then takes place, being ‘organised’ by the Chairmen’s’ Conference, which lays down a global length of time for debate and determines, on an essentially proportional basis, the time allocated to groups and non-attached deputies. Each group then subdivides between its members the time allocated to it and determines the order in which they shall intervene. The length of time adopted by the Conference varies in terms of the importance of the instrument under debate: one hour for instruments of lesser importance; three, four or even more hours for the most important instruments.  

-2. Procedural motions

Before the general debate, procedural motions may be put to vote: one objection that a question is inadmissible and not more than one preliminary question. If they are carried the instrument is rejected. The closure of the general debate can be delayed by the discussion of a third procedural motion, the motion to refer the instrument back to the committee responsible, the effect of which, if carried, shall be to suspend debate until the committee presents a fresh report. 

The discussion of these three procedural motions is organised by the Rules of Procedure. For long, the speaking time of a speaker moving a procedural motion was not limited, which promoted the use of delaying strategies. Such strategies are now limited to multiplying the number of amendments, and having recourse to suspensions of sittings and to public ballots. This strategy is commonly described as ‘obstruction.’

In 1999, the National Assembly amended its Rules of Procedure with a view to limiting the speaking time of speakers moving a procedural motion (one and a half hours in first reading, thirty minutes in second reading and fifteen minutes for subsequent readings), the Chairmen’s’ Conference having the possibility of waiving this time limitation.

-3. Debate of clauses

Any instrument, whether a government bill or a Member’s bill, comprises an ‘explanatory memorandum’ which presents the ‘purview’, drafted in articles, and which forms the rule-making part.

Each deputy can intervene prior to the consideration of a clause. The Rules of Procedure (Article 95, paragraph 2) places a five minute limit on speeches. The President may invite the speaker to conclude or close the debate when two speakers of opposite opinion have spoken. 

When deputies wishing to intervene regarding a clause have spoken, and after the possible intervention of the Government and, if it so desires, of the committee responsible, amendments—if there are any—are debated. This is an essential phase of legislative debate. The so-called yellow document or ‘sitting unfolder’—dérouleur de séance published on the website is the main medium of debate, with the comparative table published at the end of the committee report. Amendments discussed in public sitting are made available to deputies in the form of collections in which they are classified according to the order by which they are called.

Amendments are called by the President who works through from the general to the specific, from the repeal to a mere modification, paragraph by paragraph. The amendment differing most from the instrument is started with. To avoid amendments from being eradicated before being debated, Article 100, paragraph 6, of the Rules of Procedure authorises the President to submit mutually exclusive amendments to joint debate. Amendments are then put to vote in the regulatory order, but each will have been given its chance.

This procedure, which has been merely summarised here, is based on an ideal approach to parliamentary debate where the confrontation of arguments is organised to enlighten those deliberating and prepare their decisions. Its complexity is increased by various factors such as the tabling of sub-amendments, and the seeking of leave to defer a clause for the purpose of rearranging the order of debate of clauses: to avoid premature decisions, the Assembly can defer its vote on a provision until the clause where it is mainly developed has been addressed. Leave to defer amendments may also be decided.

-4. Voting

The Assembly votes on each amendment or sub-amendment, then on each article. Little by little its decisions build the instrument which emerges from its deliberations, on which it carries out a final vote, the vote on an instrument in its entirety.

Voting takes place in several ways:

- By a show of hands, which is the normal way of voting ‘on all matters other than personal appointments’, (Rule 64, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure),

- In case of doubt ‘by sitting and standing’,

 - By public ballot (by means of the electronic voting board equipping each deputy’s lectern), with publication of the breakdown of voters in the Official Gazette. Should an issue be made of the Government’s responsibility (Article 49 of the Constitution), the vote takes place at the rostrum. 

 Article 27 of the Constitution sets forth that ‘The right to vote of Members of Parliament shall be personal.’ and ‘no member shall be given more than one proxy.’ These obligations are detailed by the institutional ordinance of 7 November 1958. The personal voting obligation was infringed for a long time. In its decision no 86-225 of 23 January 1987, the Constitutional Council endorsed the practice that had been followed since 1958 and allowed those absent to vote using the electronic voting system. In 1993, the National Assembly Bureau decided that, henceforth, only those present would vote, bearing in mind the possibility of voting by proxy under which no member can be given more than one proxy.

 Quorum

In plenary sitting, the quorum, in other words the presence of the absolute majority of deputies, is not required to deliberate or determine the agenda (Rule 61, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure). However, on personal request by the Chairman of a group, the President can be asked to establish—when a vote is being held—whether a quorum is present in the precincts of the National Assembly.  When the quorum is not met, which is always the case otherwise the request would not have been made, the sitting is suspended after the President has announced that the ballot is to be deferred. The ballot cannot take place less than one hour later; it can also be deferred to the following sitting. The vote is then ‘valid whatever the number of deputies present.’ (Rule 61, paragraph 3).

 Second deliberation

Before voting on an instrument in its entirety, the Assembly may be led, particularly on request by the Government or the committee responsible, to reconsider votes taken during the consideration of clauses. This procedure, which concerns a limited number of clauses, is not rare. The Rules of Procedure lay down that ‘If the Assembly rejects amendments moved in the second deliberation, this shall be deemed to confirm the decision taken by the Assembly in the first deliberation.’ (Rule 101, paragraph 4).

 Vote on an instrument in its entirety

This is preceded by explanations of vote, for which a speaker from each group may intervene for five minutes. The committee and the Government may also wish to intervene.

 Where the vote on an instrument in its entirety is by public ballot, the Chairmen’s’ Conference can decide—generally at the request of a group Chairman—that it shall take place not at the end of the debate on the instrument but at a date it determines so that the greatest number of deputies can participate therein (Rule 65-1 of the Rules of Procedure). This is known as a postponed or a formal vote.   

FROM BILL TO ACT

To better understand how laws are enacted, let’s follow the course taken by the text which became Act no. 2000-295 of 5 April 2000 on the limiting of multiple electoral mandates and of elective duties and on their conditions of exercise.

This text—which was considered by Parliament at the same time as an institutional Act on the same subject—resulted from a Government bill which, after consideration by the Conseil d'État, was deliberated by the Council of Ministers on 8 April 1998, and tabled on the same day at the National Assembly Bureau.

This bill comprising 15 articles was referred for substantive consideration to the Constitutional Acts, Legislation and General Administration Committee which, after having heard various personalities, concluded its work on 19 May by adopting a report proposing the adoption of 21 amendments. The text was considered by the National Assembly in public sitting—at the same time as the institutional text—on 26, 27 and 28 May, during 4 sittings during which 149 amendments or sub-amendments were brought before the Assembly: it adopted 47 of them, including 21 from the Committee. At the end of this first reading at the Assembly, only 2 articles of the bill were voted without amendment; 1 article was repealed and 16 were added.

The bill amended by the Assembly was transmitted to the Senate by the Prime Minister and was considered there by the Constitutional Acts, Legislation, Voting, Rules of Procedure and General Administration Committee, on 21 October 1998, following which the Committee adopted amendments affecting 26 of the 31 articles of the text passed by the Assembly. Submitted in plenary sitting to the Senate on 27, 28 and 29 October 1998 in first reading, the text was the subject of  37 amendments of which 33 were adopted, all Committee amendments. Four articles were passed without amendment, in other words the Assembly text; 10 were amended; 17 were repealed (only 1 was the subject of an identical repeal).

The shuttle continued by a second reading in each assembly, as the Government had not declared the matter urgent. This reading took place on 4 March 1999 at the National Assembly: of the 95 amendments brought before it, it adopted 51, of which 45 had been moved by its committee, and it accepted the repeal of 4 articles, and introduced 6 new ones. On 19 October 1999 it was the turn of the Senate, before which were brought 35 amendments to the text passed by the Assembly in second reading. All the amendments were adopted, of which 32 had been moved by its Committee.

Following the shuttle, 8 articles were passed in identical terms by the two assemblies, 1 was repealed and 26 remained under discussion.

On 27 October, by a letter sent to the President of each assembly, the Prime Minister decided to convene a joint committee, composed of an equal number of members from each assembly, on the provisions still under discussion, in accordance with Article 45, paragraph 2, of the Constitution.

Composed of 7 deputies and 7 senators and as many alternates, this joint committee met at the Palais-Bourbon on 9 December 1999. It noted its failure, in other words the fact that it was impossible for it to achieve a joint text on the provisions still under discussion.

In accordance with Article 45, paragraph 4, of the Constitution, the Government asked the two assemblies to carry out a further reading of the bill. The Assembly did so on 8 February 2000, on the basis of the text amended by the Senate in second reading. 79 amendments were brought before it, of which it adopted 33, 30 being amendments by its legislation committee.  On 2 March 2000, the Senate considered the text adopted this way by the Assembly, which it rejected when voting on the text in its entirety.

In accordance with Article 45, paragraph 4, the Prime Minister asked the National Assembly, in a letter sent on 3 March 2000 to its President, to make a final decision on the text as adopted by it in the new reading. This final reading took place on 8 March 2000.

The text adopted this way by the National Assembly was submitted to the consideration of the Constitutional Council before which it was brought by more than sixty deputies and more than sixty senators. Its decision (no. 2000-426 DC) was given on 30 March 2000 and declares that two articles as well as parts of seven articles are contrary to the Constitution.

The Act, amended this way, was promulgated by the President of the Republic on 5 April 2000 and published in the Official Gazette of 6 April. It comprises 34 articles, in other words 19 more than the initial Government text, only two articles having been passed without any amendment with respect to the initial text.

  § 4 – SUCCESSIVE CONSIDERATION OF BILLS

 -1. Shuttle

 Before it is finally adopted by Parliament, a bill must be passed in identical terms by the two assemblies. For this purpose, as set forth by article 45, paragraph 1, of the Constitution, any government bill or Member’s bill is considered successively in the two assemblies with a view to the adoption of an identical text. Each consideration by an assembly is called a reading. 

 The normal procedure therefore consists in the text shuttling between the two assemblies, each being called on to consider and, possibly, amend the text adopted by the other. The shuttle comes to an end when one assembly adopts without any amendment the text previously adopted by the other assembly. This is known as a vote conforme (identical vote).

 The shuttle remains the most current procedure for the adoption of laws, approximately two-thirds of them being passed without recourse to the conciliatory procedure instituted by the joint committee composed of an equal number of members from each assembly. 

 -2. Joint committee

 In order to limit the number of readings, the 1958 Constitution introduced, in paragraphs 2 and 3 of Article 45, a conciliatory procedure between the two assemblies which takes the form of an intervention by a joint committee composed of an equal number of members from each assembly. This committee, composed of seven members and seven alternates from each assembly, is tasked with seeking an agreement on the texts considered by them and proposing, where possible, a joint text on the provisions still under discussion. When the Senate and the National Assembly have not been able to pass an identical text after two readings, or after only one if the Government has declared the matter to be urgent (Article 45, paragraph 2, of the Constitution), the Prime Minister may ‘convene a joint committee, composed of an equal number of members from each assembly, to propose a text on the provisions still under discussion.’ (Article 45, paragraph 2). These joint committees sit alternately at the Palais-Bourbon and at the Palais du Luxembourg.

 For each clause still under discussion, the joint committee seeks a common solution which may moreover be the purview adopted by one of the assemblies. When no common solution has been found to one of the provisions still under discussion, disagreement is noted and therefore the failure of the joint committee.

 In the event of an agreement on the text of the Government bill or Member’s bill still under discussion, the Government may decide to submit it to the two assemblies. If they approve it one after the other with, where applicable, amendments—which are admissible only with the agreement of the Government—the text is finally adopted. If the joint committee fails, or if the joint text has not been adopted, the joint committee episode is closed. The shuttle resumes with a reading in each assembly. After this further reading, the Government may ask the National Assembly to make a final decision. The Constitution defines very precisely the procedures for this last vote.

 Some texts cannot be dealt with by the joint committee procedure.

 ‘Institutional Acts relating to the Senate must be passed in identical terms by the two assemblies.’ (Article 46, paragraph 4, of the Constitution).

 Constitutional Acts, after having been adopted in identical terms by the two assemblies, are submitted to referendum. However, a bill to amend the Constitution shall not be submitted to referendum where the President of the Republic decides to submit it to Parliament convened in Congress; such a bill shall be approved only if adopted by a three-fifths majority of the votes cast.

 -3. Final enactment of law

 The passing of a text by the two assemblies or the intervention of the National Assembly in the final reading does not mark the end of the legislative procedure: for a law to be enacted, a few mandatory or optional steps still remain to be crossed. 

ENACTMENT OF LAW

As a rule, the parliamentary phase of the legislative procedure is closed by the adoption of a government bill or a Member’s bill in identical terms by the two assemblies or, in the event of disagreement between them, by the National Assembly alone, in the final reading. This normally leads to the promulgation of the Act, which is then published. Promulgation may however be delayed or prevented in two cases: owing to the checking of the conformity of an Act with the Constitution or when a further deliberation takes place.

1. Review of constitutionality

The Constitutional Council—an institution composed of nine members of whom a third are replaced every three years—is in particular tasked with reviewing the constitutionality of Acts passed by Parliament (Articles 61 et 62 of the Constitution). Three of its members are appointed by the President of the Republic, three by the President of the Senate and three by the President of the National Assembly.

This review takes place ex officio for so-called institutional Acts, expressly referred to as such by the Constitution and which are aimed at applying constitutional provisions. For ordinary statutes, on the other hand, this review is made only on request by some authorities: President of the Republic, Prime Minister, President of the Senate, President of the National Assembly and, since the amendment of the Constitution in 1974, sixty deputies or sixty senators. Reference to the Council must be made within the time limit for promulgation; it suspends said time limit. When Acts are referred to the Council it has one month to make a ruling or eight days if the Government so requests. Its decisions shall be binding on all and no appeal shall lie therefrom.

When the Council declares an Act to be in conformity with the Constitution, it can be promulgated. In contrast, a decision declaring the entirety of an Act not to be in conformity with the Constitution shall prevent its promulgation. The legislative procedure which has led to the adoption of such an Act is nullified and there is no other solution but to resume it from the beginning, unless the reason for non-conformity forms a decisive obstacle supposing, for instance, a prior amendment of the Constitution itself. The Council may also decide that an Act is partly in conformity with the Constitution. In this case, the Act can be promulgated except for its articles or parts of articles declared unconstitutional.

2. Reconsideration

Within the promulgation time limit, the President of the Republic can ask for a reconsideration of an Act, particularly to remedy a declaration of unconstitutionality (Article 10, paragraph 2, of the Constitution).

This procedure, which has been used only twice since 1958, is initiated by a decree of the President of the Republic countersigned by the Prime Minister. The promulgation time limit is suspended. A complementary phase of the legislative procedure then opens, Parliament being asked to resume, totally or partially, the consideration of the bill it has just adopted: this complementary phase follows, apart from a few exceptions, the above-described ordinary legislative procedure (tabling of the bill, shuttle and, where applicable, conciliatory procedure, and lastly, final adoption).

3. Promulgation

When the Act is fit to be promulgated, the Secretariat-General of the Government is tasked with presenting the bill for signature by the President of the Republic who is empowered to promulgate Acts, making them legally binding. The President of the Republic shall sign the promulgation decree within fifteen days (Article 10, paragraph1, of the Constitution).

4. Publication

After its promulgation, the Act is published in the Official Gazette (Laws and Decrees edition [édition Lois et Décrets]). Its implementation is subject to its publication.

The Act bears the date of its promulgation, preceded by two series of figures; those of the year of promulgation and the sequence number in the series of acts and regulatory decrees published in the year in question. (Example: Act no. 2000-1354 of 30 December 2000 facilitating compensation for convicted persons recognised as innocent and containing various coordinating provisions as regards criminal procedure, published in the Official Gazette of 31 December 2000).

  § 5 – SIMPLIFIED EXAMINATION PROCEDURE

 Instituted in 1991, then amended in 1998, this procedure, organised by Rules 103 to 107 of the Rules of Procedure, is aimed at lightening the Assembly’s work load in plenary sitting, by shortening certain phases of the debate and by promoting preparatory debate in committee.

 Consideration of a bill by this procedure is initiated by the rapporteur of the committee responsible, speaking for ten minutes, followed, where applicable, by the rapporteur of any committee asked for an opinion, speaking for five minutes. In the ensuing general debate no more than one speaker per group may intervene, each for five minutes. Bills for which this procedure is chosen cannot be the subject of procedural motions. 

Where amendments have been moved, the President calls only those clauses to which amendments have been moved; he puts to the vote any amendments, the clauses to which they relate and the entire bill. Leave to speak is limited: it is not accepted to enter names of deputies seeking leave to speak regarding clauses called and, regarding amendments, there is no possibility of answering the Government and the committee. 

 Where the bill is not the subject of any amendment, the President puts the entirety of the bill to vote after the general debate.

 Implementation of this procedure implies a certain consensus: it is adopted only if no opposition has arisen, at the Chairmen’s Conference, to a request made in this respect by the President of the Assembly, by the Government, by the Chairman of the committee responsible or by the Chairman of a group.

II – Governmental means of action

in the legislative procedure

  A very wide range of means, defined by the Constitution or the Rules of Procedure, allow the Government to intervene at all the stages of this procedure. Some of these means have already been presented.

 The Government engages and ‘feeds’ the debates by tabling bills pursuant to its right to initiate statutes  (Article 39, paragraph 1, of the Constitution) and by using its right of amendment (Article 44, paragraph 1). For texts resulting from joint committees, only amendments accepted by the Government are debated (Article 45, paragraph 3, of the Constitution). More generally—but this provision is rarely implemented—the Government can object to the consideration of any amendment which has not previously been referred to committee (Article 44, paragraph 2, of the Constitution).

 It can determine the schedule for the adoption of its bills thanks to the precedence it enjoys in determining the agenda (Article 48, paragraph 1, of the Constitution).

 It can accelerate debates (declaration of urgency - Article 45, paragraph 2, of the Constitution) or, on the contrary, let them follow their course (non-convening of a joint committee). 

 It can conclude debates, either by convening a joint committee and sending a request to the National Assembly, in the event of failure of the former, to ‘make a final decision.’ (Article 45, paragraph 4, of the Constitution), or by making an issue of its responsibility regarding a bill (Article 49, paragraph 3). In this latter case, ‘debate shall immediately be suspended for twenty-four hours.’ (Rule 155-1 of the Rules of Procedure) pending the possible tabling of a motion of censure (see hereafter).

 It can suspend debates or have them stopped for good (pure and simple withdrawal of bills before their final adoption—Rule 84, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure—or withdrawal from the agenda).

 The Government may also with the authorisation of Parliament, ‘take measures by ordinance that are normally a matter for statute.’ (Article 38, paragraph 1, of the Constitution). In this hypothesis, intervention in the legislative procedure leads to the Government substituting itself for Parliament. This procedure is regularly used for bills of highly varying importance.

 The following procedures have special importance.

  § 1. INADMISSIBILITIES

 These are of a legislative (Article 41 of the Constitution) or a financial nature (Article 40 of the Constitution).

Pursuant to Article 41, if a Member’s bill or an amendment ‘is not a matter for statute or is contrary to a delegation granted by virtue of Article 38 the Government may object that it is inadmissible. In the event of disagreement between the Government and the President of the assembly concerned, the Constitutional Council shall rule within eight days.’

 This is a little used procedure as, once an Act is adopted, the Government can in any case get the Constitutional Council to observe that certain provisions are of a regulatory nature, and therefore, if it desires, it can proceed to amend them by decree.  

 Inadmissibility pursuant to Article 40

 ‘Bills and amendments introduced by Members of Parliament shall not be admissible where their adoption would have as a consequence either a diminution of public resources or the creation or increase of an item of public expenditure.’ A difference exists in the procedure applying to the appreciation of whether a Member’s bill or an amendment is financially admissible. Whenever, at the time of the tabling of an amendment, there is a doubt as to its admissibility, it is submitted to the Chairman of the Finance Committee who exercises strict control. The inadmissibility of a Member’s bill is not, on the other hand, pronounced by the designated Bureau members unless it is quite clear. However, if during the legislative procedure, it is objected that a Member’s bill (or a report) is inadmissible pursuant to Article 40, strict scrutiny is exercised, this time by the Finance Committee Bureau.

 Compensation is not allowed, either between expenditure and income (a Member’s bill increasing costs is inadmissible even if its author proposes simultaneously an increase in resources, for instance by creating a new tax or by raising a social contribution), or between expenditures (a deputy cannot propose to increase a cost while decreasing another). The diminution of a resource can, for its part, be compensated by the creation of another resource, on three conditions: the new resource must be real, it must benefit the same community, and the compensation must be immediate.

 A Member’s bill or an amendment which has been observed to be inadmissible is not distributed.

  § 2. BLOCK VOTE

 Article 44, paragraph 3, of the Constitution allows the Government to ask the assembly having a bill before it to decide ‘by a single vote on all or part of the text under discussion, on the sole basis of the amendments proposed or accepted’ by it. 

 The Government defines the contours of the bill for which it is asking for a single vote, commonly called a block vote. In that, Article 44, paragraph 3, can be likened to Article 49, paragraph 3, which also entails a set-up of provisions imposed by the Government, and of amendments possibly accepted by it. The aim is to force deputies to commit to a binary choice, without any medium term: rejection or acceptance of a bill in the version suiting the Government. However a block vote may concern only amendments previously debated in the manner laid down by the Rules of Procedure.

  § 3. MAKING THE PASSING OF A BILL AN ISSUE OF THE GOVERNMENT’S RESPONSIBILITY

 Article 49, paragraph 3, of the Constitution allows the Prime Minister, after deliberation by the Council of Ministers, to make the passing of a bill an issue of the Government’s responsibility before the National Assembly. This bill shall be considered adopted unless a motion of censure, introduced within the following twenty-four hours, is carried by the majority of the members of the Assembly. In making an issue of the Government’s responsibility, only a part of the bill may be concerned and it can take place any time during the debate, including immediately after it opens. Once an issue has been made of the Government’s responsibility, consideration of the bill in question is immediately suspended.

 Once an issue has been made of the Government’s responsibility, a twenty-four hour time limit commences during which deputies can deliver a motion of censure to the President of the Assembly. In accordance with Article 49, paragraph 2, of the Constitution, such a motion shall not be admissible unless signed by at least one tenth of the members of the National Assembly (in other words presently 58 deputies as the 577 Assembly seats are filled). 

 Two hypotheses can then be envisaged:

 - If no motion of censure has been tabled at the expiry of the afore-mentioned time limit, the Assembly shall take note that the bill has been passed with the content defined by the Government.

 - If a motion of censure is tabled, it is debated in the manner set forth by the Constitution and by the Rules of Procedure (see Third part).

 Adoption of a motion of censure would force the Prime Minister to hand in the resignation of the Government and, subsidiarily, to reject the bill, but the case has never arisen since 1958 within the framework of Article 49, paragraph 3, of the Constitution.  Rejection of a motion of censure produces the same effects as the absence of the tabling of a motion of censure: the bill ‘shall be considered adopted’ by the National Assembly.

III – Acts of a specific character

  Apart from institutional Acts and enabling Acts, already mentioned, the Constitution reserves specific treatment for some other Acts: two which Parliament considers each year—the Finance Act (Article 47 of the Constitution) and the Social Security Finance Act (Article 47-1); others which have been said to form a considerable share of the bills passed by Parliament—Acts authorising the ratification of treaties or international agreements (Article 53, paragraph 1); and lastly, constitutional Acts, by which Parliament exercises its constituent power (Article 89).

  § 1. THE FINANCE ACT

 The Finance Act, also commonly called the budget, authorises the collection of taxes and other State resources and determines the expenditure generated by its activities. As the fiscal year begins on 1 January, the Finance Act must be promulgated at the latest by 31 December of the preceding year. Its adoption procedure is therefore subject to strict provisions characterised by a higher governmental role and mandatory time limits.

 An institutional ordinance of 1 August 2001 shall replace as of 2005 that of 2 January 1959. It regulates the content, elaboration procedure, and the presentation, debate and implementation details for Finance Acts. Its provisions also apply to amending Finance Acts aimed at amending the annual Finance Act and which are also known as a ‘collectif budgétaire’ (supplementary estimates). The main characteristics of the procedure applying to Finance Acts are as follows: 

 As regards Finance Acts the government has a monopoly defined by Article 37 of the institutional ordinance of 2 January 1959. ‘Under the authority of the Prime Minister, the Minister for Finance prepares finance bills which are adopted by the Council of Ministers.’ The right of parliament to initiate statutes is excluded at this stage—there are no finance Members’ bills, but the right of amendment can be exercised within certain limits. 

 The finance bill is presented first to the National Assembly, pursuant to the principle of financial priority set forth in Article 39 of the Constitution.

 Appropriations sets aside by the Finance Act are grouped per chapter, each being a whole programme contributing to a defined public policy. 

 According to Article 47, paragraph 2, of the Constitution, should the National Assembly fail to reach a decision on first reading within forty days following the introduction of a bill, the Government shall refer to the Senate the bill initially presented, amended where applicable by the amendments passed by the Assembly and accepted by the Senate. In this case, the Senate shall reach a decision within fifteen days. However, if the National Assembly has reached a decision in the prescribed time limit of forty days, the Senate shall have twenty days to reach a decision.

 Leaving amendments aside, which are always numerous, a hundred or so votes are needed to adopt the general budget appropriations, and twenty or so for those of the ancillary budgets and of the special Treasury accounts.

 The budget procedure does not include any ‘shuttle’. After a single reading in each assembly, or if the Senate has not reached a decision in the prescribed time limit, the bill is considered under the urgency procedure, in other words by a joint committee convened by the Government (Article 40 of the ordinance of 1 August 2001).

 Should Parliament fail to reach a decision within the time limit of seventy days after the tabling of a bill—wording which excludes the case of rejection—it may be brought into force by ordinance. 

 If it is impossible to promulgate the finance bill before the beginning of the financial year, the Government may ask Parliament to pass the first part of the Finance Act (revenue) or else pass a special Act authorising it to continue to collect the existing taxes.

 The Finance Act is in most cases subject to scrutiny by the Constitutional Council, which shall reach a decision in a very short timeframe since the Finance Act must be published in the Official Gazette at the latest by 31 December in order to avoid any interruption in the collection of taxes authorised annually in its first article.

 Following the adoption of the institutional Act no 2001-692 of 1 August 2001 relative to Finance Acts, the whole budget procedure will be deeply amended as of the Finance Act for 2006 to be considered in 2005.

  § 2. SOCIAL SECURITY FINANCE ACTS

 This category of acts was created by the institutional Act of 22 February 1996. The Constitution did not provide for any annual procedure to determine the general conditions of the financial balance of the social security, whereas the sums involved are higher than those of Finance Acts. Three articles have been amended:

 - Article 34, which defines the ambit of statutes. Parliament was already empowered to ‘determine the fundamental principles (…)  of the social security,’ and it has become so ‘to determine the general conditions for its financial balance’ and to determine, taking revenue forecasts into account, ‘its expenditure targets.’;

 - Article 39, where paragraph 2 states that finance bills and now also social security finance bills shall be considered first by the National Assembly. This was traditionally the case for just finance bills; 

 - Article 47, now featuring 47-1, which imposes on the National Assembly, for the first reading, shorter consideration time limits than for finance bills: twenty days following the introduction of a bill instead of forty. The time limit imposed on the Senate remains the same: fifteen days. The total time limit is fifty days (instead of seventy); if it is not respected ‘the provisions of the bill may be implemented by ordinance.’

 The institutional Act of 22 July 1996 confirmed the annuality of the passing of Finance Acts and specified that amendments failing to comply with its aim are inadmissible.

 The debate of Finance Acts and of Social Security Finance Acts are two important moments in the National Assembly’s activity. Debate not only leads to the passing of provisions with often very wide ranging consequences (financial, economic, fiscal, social), but is also part of the scrutiny role, often inseparable from the legislative role, while differing from it by the implementation of specific procedures.

  § 3. RATIFICATION ACTS

 Pursuant to Article 52 of the Constitution, the President of the Republic shall negotiate and ratify treaties. However, Article 53 of the Constitution sets forth that ‘Peace treaties, commercial treaties, treaties or agreements relating to international organisation, those that commit the finances of the State, those that modify provisions which are matters for statute, those relating to the status of persons, and those that involve the cession, exchange or addition of territory, may be ratified or approved only by virtue of an Act of Parliament.’ In practice, these provisions mean that, save recourse to a referendum, a large share of treaties and agreements concluded by France are submitted to Parliament before these Acts enter into force. Agreements concluded by the European Union are submitted to Parliament when they concern a field of competence shared between the Union and the Member States.

 At the National Assembly, all treaties and agreements are systematically committed to the Foreign Affairs Committee which therefore considers some forty agreements each year. Their consideration in committee is very close to that of a ‘normal’ bill apart from the fact that they cannot be amended. Quite often, these bills are adopted unanimously by the committee but, in some cases, the committee postpones its decision, or even rejects the bill or obtains its adjournment.

 Adjournment of the bill is a procedure specific to the consideration of treaties and international agreements (Rule 128 of the Rules of Procedure). This procedure allows the debate of an international agreement to be postponed without formally rejecting it. It is adapted to situations where deputies deem that their approval must depend on conditions external to the aim of the agreement.

 In most cases, ratification authorisations are addressed by the simplified examination procedure. According to Rule 107 of the Rules of Procedure, as amended in March 1998, these bills can be put directly to vote without any speaker intervening, unless the Chairmen’s Conference decides otherwise. These provisions do not at all limit the powers of the Assembly since, on the one hand, consideration of the bill has taken place in committee and, on the other hand, group Chairmen in particular can object to the simplified examination procedure.

  § 4. CONSTITUTIONAL ACTS

 According to the Rules of Procedure (Rule 126, paragraph 1), ‘Government and Members’ bills to amend the Constitution shall be considered and put to vote by the ordinary legislative procedure, subject to the second paragraph of Article 89 of the Constitution. However, the simplified examination procedure shall not be used.’

Article 89, paragraph 2, states that ‘A government or a member’s bill shall be passed by the two assemblies in identical terms.’, which implies that the joint committee procedure does not apply in this case. To be laid before Congress or submitted to referendum, depending on the choice made by the  President of the Republic when it is a matter of an amendment bill, the text must therefore be previously passed in identical terms by the two assemblies.

THIRD PART:

SCRUTINY AND INFORMATION ROLE

  For several terms now, the National Assembly’s activity has been turning increasingly towards sectors previously relatively neglected: scrutiny, information and inquiry. This evolution can partly be explained by the feeling that the future of a modern Parliament lies here. Even if statutes exist only after being passed by the assemblies, the field of legislation is inevitably dominated by Government bills and its hold over the agenda and control over each of the steps of the procedure.

 The range of questions has therefore grown even wider, committees of inquiry have sprung up again, and standing committees have organised information assignments bordering on investigation and scrutiny; the notion of evaluation has come into being. Bodies of a new type, such as offices and delegations, have appeared. The Delegation for the European Union, whose Chairman is now a member of the Chairmen’s Conference, has obtained rules governing it very close to those of a committee. In most cases, the advent of these new tools took place either firstly conventionally, or by the passing of ordinary Acts, or else by mere reforms of the Rules of Procedure.

   I – Procedures for raising an issue of the Government’s responsibility

According to Article 20, paragraph 1, of the Constitution ‘The Government shall determine and conduct the policy of the Nation.’ Paragraph 3 of the same article specifies ‘It shall be responsible to Parliament in accordance with the terms and procedures set out in Articles 49 and 50.’ Although Article 20 of the Constitution lays down that the Government is responsible to Parliament, Article 50 of the Constitution to which it refers limits the sanction to the sole votes taken by the National Assembly ‘Where the National Assembly carries a motion of censure, or where it fails to endorse the programme or a statement of general policy of the Government, the Prime Minister must tender the resignation of the Government to the President of the Republic.’

 The Constitution therefore allows the National Assembly alone to raise an issue of the Government’s responsibility, by voting, and thereby to challenge its existence.  But raising an issue of the Government’s responsibility before the National Assembly is no longer, under the V^th Republic, a factor of governmental instability, owing to what is known as the fait majoritaire (majority rule), in other words the existence of a majority supporting the Government by its votes. This does not mean that the procedures for raising an issue of the Government’s responsibility are not applied. They are applied when, after the formation of the Government, or periodically during the latter’s existence, the Prime Minister makes a statement of its general policy or a statement on its programme  (Article 49, paragraph 1); when the opposition takes the initiative of introducing a motion of censure to oblige the Prime Minister to give explanations on all or part of the Government’s policy (Article 49, paragraph 2); or when, to obtain the passing of a bill,  the Prime Minister must make an issue of the Government’s responsibility, according to a procedure already mentioned (Article 49, paragraph 3).

  § 1. PROCEDURE OF ARTICLE 49, PARAGRAPH 1

 According to this provision, ‘The Prime Minister, after deliberation by the Council of Ministers, makes the Government’s programme or possibly a statement of its general policy an issue of its responsibility.’  It appeared to result from this provision that the Prime Minister was obliged to make the Government’s programme an issue of its responsibility, whereas the approval of a statement of general policy was a matter of opportunity, but this interpretation has given way to a practice according to which the  engagement of responsibility is optional and intervenes, for this reason, in the very great majority of cases, regarding a statement of general policy.

 According to Rule 152 of the National Assembly Rules of Procedure, when the Prime Minister makes an issue of the Government’s responsibility pursuant to Article 49, paragraph 1, ‘the Chairmen’s Conference shall arrange the debate in manner provided by Rule 132.’: determination of the total speaking time allocated to groups in proportion to their size. ‘After the closure of the debate, the floor may be given for an explanation of vote lasting fifteen minutes to a speaker designated by each group and five minutes to other speakers… The President shall put to vote approval of the Government’s programme or statement. An absolute majority of votes cast shall be required.’

 Voting shall be by public ballot at the rostrum.

  § 2. PROCEDURE OF ARTICLE 49, PARAGRAPH 2

 According to this provision, ‘The National Assembly may raise an issue of the Government’s responsibility by passing a motion of censure. Such a motion shall not be admissible unless it is signed by at least one tenth of the members of the National Assembly (…). Except as provided in the above paragraph (in other words in response to the engagement of its responsibility regarding a bill), a deputy shall not sign more than three motions of censure during a single ordinary session and more than one during a single extraordinary session.’

 Rule 153 of the National Assembly Rules of Procedure specifies that, ‘A motion of censure shall be tabled by delivering to the President of the Assembly a document entitled ‘Motion of censure’ together with a list of signatures of at least one tenth of the members of the Assembly. The tenth of members shall be calculated by reference to the number of seats actually filled; if the calculation results in a fraction, the number shall be rounded up.’  For instance, when the 577 seats are filled, this figure stands at 57.7, rounded up to 58. ‘No deputy shall sign more than one motion of censure at a time.’ ‘Reasons may be given for motions of censure.’ ‘Once a motion of censure has been tabled, no signature shall be withdrawn or added. The President shall notify the Government of the motion, shall have it posted on the noticeboard and shall inform the Assembly at its next following sitting. The definitive list of signatures shall be published in the verbatim report.’

 As Article 49, paragraph 2, of the Constitution sets forth that ‘Voting may not take place within forty-eight hours after the motion has been introduced.’, Rule 154, paragraph 1, of the National Assembly Rules of Procedure specifies that the ‘Chairmen’s Conference shall determine the date on which motions of censure are to be debated, the date to be no later than the third sitting day after expiry of the constitutional time limit.’  The debate is organised in the same conditions as the debate on a statement of general Government policy pursuant to Article 49, paragraph 1, of the Constitution.

The specific character of Article 49, paragraph 2, of the Constitution, resides in the way a motion of censure is adopted: ‘Only the votes in favour of the motion of censure shall be counted; the motion of censure shall not be adopted unless it is voted for by the majority of the members of the Assembly ". Rule 154, paragraph 6, of the National Assembly Rules of Procedure specifies consequently that ‘Only deputies in favour of the motion of censure shall take part in the ballot, which shall take place as provided in section II of Rule 66.’, in other words at the rostrum, for a length of 45 minutes. All deputies not participating in the vote are presumed to approve the Government, including those who, in a ballot held in ‘ordinary’ conditions, would have simply abstained.

  § 3. PROCEDURE OF ARTICLE 49, PARAGRAPH 3

 As already seen, this provision links the engagement of responsibility to the legislative procedure: when the Prime Minister makes the passing of a bill an issue of the Government’s responsibility, this bill is ‘considered adopted’ unless a motion of censure is introduced and carried as provided in paragraph 2 (see above p. ).

  II – Information and investigation procedures

 In its legislative role, and particularly when considering the finance bill and the social security finance bill, the Assembly, at the same time as it passes bills, informs itself and exercises scrutiny over governmental action. Apart from this continuous process inherent in parliamentary activity, there are specific procedures which apply either at the Assembly itself, or at committees, or as regards deputies and their questions for written answer.

  § 1 - AT THE ASSEMBLY

 -1. Government statements

 Apart from the statements set forth by Article 49, paragraph 1, the Government can make statements before the Assembly with or without debate—either on its initiative, or if asked to do so—in order to explain aspects of its policy.

 The discussion of statements with debate is organised by the Chairmen’s Conference which determines the total time allocated to groups. The Government takes the floor at the start of the sitting to make its statement and at the end to answer the speakers. 

 When the Government statement is without debate, the President may give leave to one speaker only to answer the Government.

 No vote is taken on these Government statements.

 -2. Questions for oral answer

 The right to question the Government is a traditional prerogative acknowledged by Article 48, paragraph 2, of the Constitution: ‘At one sitting a week at least precedence shall be given to questions from Members of Parliament and to answers by the Government.’ The Rules of Procedure lay down that these questions sittings are organised by the Chairmen’s Conference. 

 There are several kinds of questions for oral answer, of a somewhat different nature.

 Questions to the Government

 Instituted in 1974, outside the Rules of Procedure, these questions were constitutionalised in their principle, by the amendment of August 1995. On 30 May 1974, in his first message to Parliament, Mr Giscard d’Estaing suggested to the National Assembly to ‘set aside on each Wednesday, at the beginning of the afternoon, one hour for topical questions which would be raised with equal speaking times according to a procedure to be defined by the majority and the opposition. I would then ask the Prime Minister and all the ministers to be present at this Wednesday sitting in order to personally answer questions.’

Since then, this procedure, revised many times, has become established. The beginning of sittings on Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons is devoted, for one hour or one hour five minutes, alternately, to questions raised by the deputies of each group, according to an order of passage which successively grants each group the advantage of raising its first question—or its question if it is entitled to only one—at the beginning of the sitting.

The following organisation principles apply:

- Time is shared between groups depending on their size, per five minutes or five minute multiples;

- One hour before the beginning of the sitting, each group transmits a list comprising only the name of the authors of questions and the ministers they wish to question, in the desired order of calling in the sitting. The topic does not have to be transmitted, which grants these questions a spontaneous character. The Government is immediately informed; 

- Each question and its answer must normally take no more than five minutes—half of the time for the author of the question, and the other half for the answer by the minister, which does not give rise to a reply. No exception to the time limit rule is made except for the answers by the Prime Minister. While he does not intervene at each sitting, the Prime Minister reserves his attention to answering the questions he considers most important, and his interventions contribute to strengthening the political and media interest of these sittings. 

Televised by the channel France 3, sittings of questions to the Government form one of the highlights of the parliamentary week. 

Questions for oral answer without debate

The day and the time for sittings of questions without debate have varied. One morning per week is, as a rule, devoted to them (except during the budget review period), alternately with Members’ bills sittings. These mornings consist in a dialogue between a deputy who has previously transmitted a text briefly developing his subject and the minister who answers him. The latter is not always the minister responsible. A decision of the Constitutional Council of 24 January 1964 recalled that, owing to the indivisibility of the Government, any of its members appointed by the Prime Minister is empowered to answer questions by members of Parliament.

The dialogue takes place as follows: a few minutes for the question to be presented, the minister’s answer, a possible response, and a possible answer by the minister. The total time for the sitting is shared between groups depending on their size, for a total number of 25 questions per sitting. 

Questions for oral answer with debate

This procedure, which is not frequently implemented at the Assembly, amounts to organising a debate at the initiative of deputies, based on questions raised by a member of each group on a common topic chosen by the Chairmen’s Conference. These questions give rise to an answer by the Government, following which speakers whose names have been put down to speak in the debate intervene for a time determined by the Chairmen’s Conference, in proportion to the size of groups. The Government answers at the closure of the debate.

§ 2 – AT COMMITTEES

-1. Standing committees

Standing committees are the place of choice for scrutiny over the Government. They exercise such scrutiny continuously in their field of competence, particularly when reviewing instruments brought before them.

They exercise even stricter scrutiny outside the legislative framework. They indeed make wide use of hearings of members of Government and, with the authorisation of their ministry, of officials. They may also—which could not be done in public sitting—invite personalities from civil society in France or abroad. These hearings may derogate from the principle of confidentiality of committee work: committees can indeed organise, according to the procedures of their choice, the disclosure of all or part of the hearings they hold. Representatives of the written and audiovisual press may therefore be invited to attend these meetings, which moreover are most often televised on the internal channel. 

Review of the annual Finance Act is the ideal opportunity for committees to exercise their scrutiny role. They are indeed all involved: the Finance Committee as the committee responsible and the five others for their opinions on the appropriations for ministerial departments entering into their respective field of competence. In this framework, special rapporteurs—in other words rapporteurs appointed by the Finance Committee—play a specific role as they are permanently empowered to exercise scrutiny, on the basis of vouchers and on the spot, over the employment of appropriations set out in the budget. The result of their investigations, like that of the rapporteurs of the other committees, appears in the reports published on behalf of the committee.

The Finance Committee may ask the Audit Court to assist it in exercising scrutiny over the management of departments and bodies which it scrutinises, and generally speaking, pursuant to the paragraph in the Constitution ‘The Audit Court shall assist Parliament (…) in monitoring the implementation of Finance Acts’  (Article 47, paragraph 6).

Apart from these ordinary powers, bodies can be created to exercise scrutiny or an inquiry in a specific field: the Assembly may create committees of inquiry; each committee may make use of information assignments, and such assignments may be common to a number of committees.

RIGHT OF PETITION

Petitions are written requests or suggestions addressed by one or several persons to the President of one or the other of the parliamentary assemblies. The right of petition, which has existed almost permanently since the French Revolution, is presently defined by Article 4 of the ordinance of 17 November 1958 on the functioning of the parliamentary assemblies and by their Rules of Procedure. However, the existence of remedies that are sometimes more adapted both outside and within the National Assembly leave relatively little place for this procedure.

Petitions received at the presidency of the National Assembly, and which can be recorded as such, are transmitted to the Constitutional Acts, Legislation and General Administration Committee. Petitions deemed admissible are entered on a general list and considered, as a rule, once or twice a session, by this committee which, according to the Rules of Procedure, can take three types of decisions giving rise to publication in the Official Gazette. It can simply take no further action on the petition; refer it to another standing committee or to a minister or to the Mediator of the Republic; or submit it to the Assembly. [Petitions received in 2001-2003]

-2. Committees of inquiry

According to Article 6 (§1, subparagraph 2) of the ordinance of 17 November 1958 on the functioning of the parliamentary assemblies, committees of inquiry are ‘formed to gather items of information either on given facts or on the management of public services or nationalised industries, with a view to submitting their conclusions to the Assembly which created them.’ Such a committee may be appointed if a motion for a resolution which ‘shall precisely set out the facts warranting the inquiry or [which] shall specify  the public services or nationalised industries whose management is to be investigated by the committee’ is carried. (Rule 140, paragraph 1, of the Rules of Procedure).

No committee of inquiry shall have more than thirty members, designated in such a way as to ensure proportional representation of groups. At their constitutive meeting they appoint their chairman and their rapporteur. They also decide on the public or secret nature of their work. Like all parliamentary documents, their report is available to the public, unless the Assembly, sitting in camera, decides not to authorise its publication (Rule 143 of the Rules of Procedure).

They enjoy far-reaching prerogatives. The powers of their rapporteurs are similar to those of the special rapporteurs and the Audit Court may provide them with its assistance. Also, any person whose hearing they deem useful is obliged to accede to their summons.

They are obliged to comply with certain constraints: the length of their operation is limited to six months; they cannot investigate facts giving rise to court proceedings; their members are required to uphold secrecy for their work which does not have a public nature. 

The creation of a committee of inquiry depends on the agreement of the majority. But it is accepted that each group can obtain the review once a year of a motion for a resolution tabled by its members for the creation of a committee of inquiry. 

A FEW RECENT COMMITTEES OF INQUIRY
Twelfth term (Since 2002)

Committee of inquiry on the health and social consequences of the heat wave (October 2003)

Committee of inquiry on the application of the recommended measures as regards the safety of the maritime transport of dangerous or polluting products and assessment of their efficacy (July 2003)

Committee of inquiry on the management of public corporations in order to improve the decision-making system (July 2003)

Committee of inquiry on the economic and financial causes of the disappearance of Air Lib (June 2003)

Committee of inquiry on the conditions of the presence of the wolf in France and the exercise of pastoralism in mountain zones (May 2003)

Reports of committees of inquiry on line.

-3. Committee information assignments

Rule 145 of the National Assembly Rules of Procedure sets forth that standing committees ‘may entrust one or more of their members with a temporary information assignment concerning, notably, the enforcement of an item of legislation. Such assignments may be common to a number of committees.’  

This highly flexible framework allows committees, where applicable on the basis of an initiative common to several of them, to pursue their investigations in the widest variety of fields, and such assignments sometimes play the role of a substitute for committees of inquiry. These assignments give rise to the drafting of an information report whose publication is authorised by the committee(s) which took the initiative to create the assignment. In recent years, standing committees have therefore carried out extensive investigative work by creating information assignments (events in Rwanda, fight against money laundering, amendment of bioethics laws…) which have given rise to as many reports.

In order to strengthen parliamentary scrutiny over the use of public funds and the efficacy of public expenditure, an innovative structure was set up by the Finance Committee in 1999, inspired by foreign examples, especially the British National Audit Office. The Mission d’évaluation et de contrôle (MEC—Assessment and Scrutiny Assignment Task Force), created within the Finance Committee, is principally tasked with assessing the results of public policies and has the specific characteristic of being co-chaired by a deputy from the majority and a deputy from the opposition. This task force publishes each year a report on several questions drawn up with a view to reviewing the Finance Act, in order to strengthen the scrutiny exercised by the Finance Committee on this occasion over the Government.

-4. Scrutiny over the implementation of acts

Standing committees also deal with scrutiny over the implementation of acts, which scrutiny concerns not only the publication and the content of regulatory instruments required for the implementation of statutes, but also what is called the ‘assessment’ of acts, in other words appreciating the beneficial or adverse, expected or unexpected effects of given legislation. This scrutiny takes place most often at the time of the review of bills aimed at reforming the enacting clauses in question.

Specific provisions (already mentioned: see Financial scrutiny) have been laid down as regards the scrutiny of the Finance Committee over the employment of appropriations budgeted for the various ministerial departments and over the accounts of public corporations. Since 1990, this committee has systematically studied the implementation of the fiscal provisions contained in the Finance Act and publishes each year a report on the subject.

§ 3 – QUESTIONS FOR WRITTEN ANSWER

A question for written answer is a request for information sent by a parliamentarian to a minister regarding an aspect concerning his ministry. Quite often they are tabled with a critical intention but no personal allegations are allowed.

The minister has one month, renewable once, to answer. The text of the question and of the answer are published in the Official Gazette (Edition Débats A.N. Questions).

 Computerisation of the questions for written answer procedure allows them to be consulted on the Questa database, updated every term. The Official Gazette also publishes an annual table of questions for written answer.

 Approximately 15,000 questions for written answer are raised each year by deputies. This procedure is especially important in the fiscal field, since it is accepted that a taxpayer can base himself on the interpretation of fiscal texts given by a minister in response to a question for written answer, which therefore allows administrative doctrine to be expressed in the same way as a ministerial direction or a circular. The database of questions for written answer and ministerial answers is accessible on line, on the National Assembly website, at the following address: http://questions.assemblee-nationale.fr

 Since 1994, each sitting week, groups have had the possibility of distinguishing among the questions which have not received a response, a quota of questions—called ‘signalled questions for written answer’—for which the Government commits to giving an answer within ten days.   

FINANCIAL SCRUTINY

As the National Assembly does not have any power to initiate budget legislation, it has always sought to develop financial scrutiny. Even if some expectations remain unsatisfied, recent change in practices has led to undeniable progress in this field. The financial scrutiny it exercises has seen its field of investigation broaden over the years. Scrutiny instruments have grown in number to form today a wide and varied range. 

1. Financial scrutiny is based, firstly, on exercising the power of budget scrutiny and analysing budget implementation data. From this viewpoint, the many accounting documents sent to the National Assembly Finance Committee permit detailed budget monitoring: monthly statement of the general budget appropriations and expenditure, monthly comparative statement of the expenditure and appropriations of each ministry, half-yearly statement of expenditure incurred, quarterly statement of expenditure incurred, monthly statement of State income collection, summary statement of Treasury operations, etc.

This data is completed by the investigations which the budget general rapporteur may carry out, possibly on the basis of vouchers and on the spot, regarding the general implementation data relative to the Finance Act. It is also completed by the information which the Finance Committee special rapporteurs are entitled to obtain as part of the investigative and monitoring powers granted to them, with a view to permanently monitoring and scrutinising the use of appropriations included in the budget of the ministry on which they are tasked with reporting during the review of the year’s finance bill. In this respect they can in particular make use of the answers to the budget questionnaires sent each year to the ministries concerned. 

Budget scrutiny is also exercised by making use of the many means of information available, more generally, to Parliament. For instance, over the years, the list of reports, balance sheets, or other documents which the legislator obliges the Government to attach—in keeping with a schedule that can vary—to its finance bills, has considerably grown. The annexes to the initial Finance Act, called ‘jaunes – yellows’ are, in this respect, highly instructive. At the same time, the standing committees, especially the Finance Committee, have developed the practice of information reports, provided for in the National Assembly Rules of Procedure, which—in addition to the hearings, whether public or not, which they can be led to hold—has enabled the progressive transition from the notion of scrutiny to the broader notion of assessment.

The review of amending Finance Acts, commonly called ‘supplementary estimates’ and which are tabled during the year by the Government, also provides an unparalleled opportunity to scrutinise implementation of the State budget. The traditional year-end supplementary estimates form an ideal moment in this respect. The Finance Committee general rapporteur devotes a significant part of the report, which he then presents, to credit movements having affected, during the year, for each ministerial department, the amount of the initial appropriations.

Lastly, one cannot forget the Settlement Act which, tabled at the latest at the end of the year following the implementation of the budget, is aimed at noting the financial results of each calendar year and approving the differences between these and the forecasts of the initial Finance Act, possibly amended by the amending Finance Acts. In addition to the implementation report presented by the Audit Court, a detailed Audit Court questionnaire has existed since 1975, the answers to which allow the Finance Committee general rapporteur to inform the National Assembly of the final implementation state of the budget of a given year.

2. Financial scrutiny cannot be limited to conventional budget scrutiny. During the past thirty years, Parliament has had to face an upheaval in the field of government finance owing to the emergence of the European budget, the financial consequences of the decentralisation policy and the high growth in social expenditure.

The rise of European finance and the increasingly large share of the State’s contribution to the European budget have led the legislator to increase his scrutiny in this field. A specific article of the initial Finance Act and, at the National Assembly, a separate debate, have therefore been devoted since 1993 to the amount of the levy corresponding to France’s participation in the European budget. Similarly, the decentralisation reform and the concomitant transfers of competences and of fiscal revenue have made the review of the Finance Act an unparalleled opportunity for Parliament to exercise a right to follow the evolution of the finances of local authorities.

Lastly, the size of the ‘Nation’s social budget’, higher than the amount of the State budget, has led to the introduction in the constitutional text of a new category of acts, Social Security Finance Acts, already examined in the second part, whose structure and review procedure have been largely modelled on those of Finance Acts. 

 III – Offices and Delegations

  These bodies have developed within Parliament since the past twenty years or so, by a kind of spontaneous adaptation to unsatisfied needs. As a rule they are information bodies and not committees with legislative powers, although their investigative powers are tending to draw closer to those of the committees.

 Some are shared by both assemblies, such as the Parliamentary Office for Scientific and Technological Assessment (Act of 8 July 1983), the Parliamentary Office for Legislation Assessment (Act of 14 June 1996) and the Office for the Assessment of Public Health Policies (Social Security Finance Act for 2003).

 Other bodies exist symmetrically at the National Assembly and at the Senate: this is the case with the Delegation for the European Union which participates in reviewing drafts of instruments of the European Communities within the framework of Article 88-4 of the Constitution; this is also the case with the more recently created delegations.  

 Delegations or Offices are created, not by an institutional Act or by the Rules of Procedure of the assemblies, but by an ordinary Act, which completes in this respect the ordinance of 17 November 1958 on the functioning of the parliamentary assemblies.

 In some cases, this new type of bodies lead in fact if not in law to bending somewhat the strictness of the Constitution which limits to six the number of standing committees.

 § 1 – THE DELEGATION FOR THE EUROPEAN UNION

 Act no. 79-564 of 6 July 1979 created in each assembly a delegation for the European Communities. Two subsequent Acts (nos. 90-385 of 10 May 1990 and 94-476 of 10 June 1994) and two constitutional amendments (of 25 June 1992 and 25 January 1999) progressively transformed a mere information body, most often providing a posteriori information on Community affairs, into a sort of seventh standing committee. It is the Government’s institutional interlocutor regarding draft instruments under negotiation within the European Union.

 -1. Organisation

 At the National Assembly, as at the Senate, the law sets at thirty-six the number of Delegation members. These are appointed by each of the assemblies so as to ensure ‘proportional representation of the political groups and balanced representation of the standing committees’. The National Assembly delegation is elected at the beginning of the term and for its length.

 In both assemblies, the Bureau is composed of a Chairman, four Vice-Chairmen and two secretaries.

 The two Delegations can hold joint meetings.

 -2. Role and operation

 The role and operation of the Delegations were deeply modified by the constitutional Act of 25 June 1992 prior to ratification of the Treaty of Maastricht and by that of 25 January 1999 prior to ratification of the Treaty of Amsterdam. These amendments have allowed a certain parliamentary scrutiny of Community legal rules, pursuant to the new Article 88-4 of the Constitution which sets forth:

‘The Government shall lay before the National Assembly and the Senate any drafts of or proposals for instruments of the European Communities or the European Union containing provisions which are matters for statute as soon as they have been transmitted to the Council of the European Union. It may also lay before them other drafts of or proposals for instruments or any document issuing from a European Union institution.

In the manner laid down by the Rules of Procedure of each assembly, resolutions may be passed, even if Parliament is not in session, on the drafts, proposals or documents referred to in the preceding paragraph.’

 -3. European resolutions

 Resolutions aimed at giving the Government the opinion of the assemblies before Community instruments are adopted by the Council of the Communities are deliberations which are not legally binding. Their adoption procedure is as follows:

 - Proposals for Community instruments as well as other European Union instruments which are to be submitted to Parliament are tabled by the Government with the Bureau of each of the assemblies.

 - They are considered by the Delegation which adopts for some of them conclusions taking the form of a motion for a resolution tabled by a rapporteur on behalf of the Delegation. Any deputy also has the possibility of himself tabling a motion for a resolution.

 - Proposals for resolutions are committed to a standing committee for consideration.

 - If the Government or the Chairman of a group so asks, or it is a matter of a motion for a resolution moved on behalf of the Delegation, the committee must table its report on the motion for a resolution within one month of the motion being referred to it.  

 - Within eight days following the distribution of the committee report on the motion for a resolution which itself concludes by a motion for a resolution, the latter can be set down on the agenda of the Assembly on request by the chairman of a group, the chairman of a committee, or by the Government. The resolution adopted by the Assembly is transmitted to the Government.

 - If no request for inclusion on the agenda is presented, the text adopted by the committee responsible is considered as final and transmitted to the Government.

 - In all cases, resolutions adopted by the Assembly are published in the Official Gazette (édition Lois et décrets).

 4-. Parliamentary scrutiny reserve

 The Delegation’s initial task has therefore been coupled with a new role: giving Parliament’s opinion on Community legislation before it is adopted in Brussels.

 The role of systematically examining proposals for Community instruments submitted by the Government to the National Assembly is enshrined in the so-called ‘parliamentary scrutiny reserve procedure’. The Government has given the commitment to ensure that the European Union Council of Ministers  does not deliberate on drafts of or proposals for Community instruments before—when their consideration is desired—they have been so considered at the assemblies in one manner or another.

 Resolutions adopted pursuant to Article 88-4 aim to enlighten governmental action by expressing the position of the assemblies on drafts of or proposals for Community instruments in the elaboration and adoption of which ministers participate. 

  § 2 – PARLIAMENTARY OFFICE FOR SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT

 This body was created by Act no. 83-609 of 8 July 1983. Its role is ‘to inform Parliament of the consequences of choices of a scientific and technological nature so that it can in particular make informed decisions.’ In this respect, ‘the Office gathers information, implements study programmes and makes assessments.’

 The Office meets a need for information in the scientific field, which has been expressed for a long time by parliamentarians. It belongs to the ‘Delegations’ family.  As a body shared by the National Assembly and the Senate, it is staffed by eight incumbent deputies and eight incumbent senators, each having their alternate. This number was raised to eighteen deputies and eighteen senators in 2002 (Act no. 2000-121 of 16 February 2000). The chair is held alternately by a deputy and a senator.

 Only parliamentarians can refer matters to the Office in various manners (Bureau, group chairman, sixty deputies or forty senators).

 The Office calls on a Scientific Board made up of fifteen personalities (twenty-four in 2002). On proposal by this Board, experts can provide it with their aid.

 The rapporteurs appointed by the Office have identical investigative powers to those of budget rapporteurs.

 In less than twenty years of existence, the Parliamentary Office for Scientific and Technological Assessment has published fifty or so reports, making it an interlocutor recognised by the scientific community. It has ensured relative autonomy for Parliament in a field where it was hitherto totally dependent on information issuing from the Government. 

 The main topics addressed, often dealt with in greater depth in successive reports, have been energy, the environment, new technologies, life sciences…

  § 3 – MOST RECENTLY CREATED BODIES

 An office shared by the two assemblies has recently been created in each assembly as well as two Delegations with a specialised aim.

 - The Parliamentary Office for the Assessment of Health Policies was created by the Social Security Finance Act for 2003 no. 2002-1487 of 20 December 2002 (Article 2) to inform Parliament of the consequences of public health choices and enlighten its decisions. For this purpose, it gathers information, implements study programmes and carries out assessment in order to contribute to the follow-up to Social Security Finance Acts. It is made up of the Chairmen of the National Assembly and Senate Social Affairs Committees, as well as of the rapporteurs of these committees tasked with  health insurance within the framework of Social Security Finance Acts, and of ten deputies and ten senators [see composition of the Office]

 It is assisted by a board of experts made up of six personalities chosen on account of their competence in the public health field and it can also ask, for their opinion, health professionals, trade union and professional organisations and associations intervening in the health field. 

 Matters are referred to it by the Bureau of one or the other of the assemblies, either on its initiative, or on request by a group chairman, or on request by sixty deputies or forty senators or else by a special or standing committee.

 - The Delegation for Women’s Rights and Equal Chances between men and women, tasked with informing the Assembly about government policy in respect of its consequences on women’s rights and equal chances between men and women (Act no. 99-585 of 12 July 1999). This Delegation can present recommendations on legislative instruments set down on the agenda and appoint a representative to intervene in public sitting on its behalf. 

 - The Delegation for Spatial Planning and Sustainable Territorial Development, tasked with assessing spatial planning and territorial development policies and informing the Assembly about the elaboration and implementation of master plans of communal services as well as about the implementation of plan contracts (Act no. 99-533 of 25 June 1999).

 PRACTICAL INFORMATION

Communicating with the National Assembly

126, rue de l’Université, 75355 Paris 07 SP
Switchboard: 01.40.63.60.00
Fax: 01.45.55.75.23
webmestre@assemblee-nationale.fr

 Presidency:
Presidency switchboard: 01.40.63.50.00
Email:
president@assemblee-nationale.fr

 Information on National Assembly activities

Information: 01.40.63.69.69
or infos@assemblee-nationale.fr
Agenda of the next sitting: 01.40.63.77.77

On the Internet: http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr
All parliamentary documents on line, in real time.
Government and Members’ bills, parliamentary reports,
summary record and verbatim report of public sitting debates,
reports on committee work, 
instruments adopted, ballots, questions for written answer and ministerial answers,

biography of deputies, composition of committees, Delegations and offices, composition of political groups, etc.

National Assembly mailing list (19,000 subscribers) :
 

Subscriptions

 Visiting the Assembly

Attending the public sitting

Live broadcast of the public sitting

La Chaîne Parlementaire – Assemblée nationale (LCP-Assemblée Nationale)

 LCP – Assemblée Nationale, the parliamentary channel, broadcasts live and delayed National Assembly sittings, as well as magazines and debates related to current political and parliamentary events. The programmes can be consulted on the website (www.lcpan.fr).

 Via DTTV (Digital Terrestrial Television)
TNT : channel 13

Via satellite:
Canal Satellite: channel 35
TPS: channel 61

 Via cable:
Noos: channel 24 for subscribers to the standard digital offering in Paris, Boulogne, Levallois, Neuilly, Saint-Germain, Saint-Mandé and Liévin.
France Télécom câble: channel 55
NC Numéricâble: channel 73
UPC :
UPC France : Channel 110 Channel 64
Channel 202 ( In the Lyon area depending on locations)
Est Vidéo communication: channel 110
NTL:
Channel 12 for the inhabitants of Toulon and La Valette
Channel 36 for the inhabitants of Mantes, Sèvres, Suresnes and Saint-Cloud
ADSL:
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France Telecom - Ma ligne TV
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Via Internet
www.lcpan.fr

 La Boutique de l'Assemblée

 Located in the Palais-Bourbon (7, rue Aristide Briand, 75007 Paris), the Boutique is an information and sales area open to the public from Monday to Friday, from 10 00 a.m. to 7 00 p.m. and on saturday, from 10.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m. (Tel: 01.40.63.00.33).

  WHERE CAN NATIONAL ASSEMBLY DOCUMENTS BE FOUND?

You are interested by a National Assembly debate, the speech by a deputy in a sitting, a question to the Government or a question for oral answer without debate:

 - The Journal officiel (Official Gazette) ‘Débats de l’Assemblée nationale’, contains the verbatim report of all the sittings. It appears between 4 and 6 days after the date of the sitting.

 - Verbatim reports are available on the National Assembly website two days after the date of the sitting.

 - Summary records are available on the National Assembly website three hours after the end of the sitting. Before that, you can consult an incomplete version updated as the sitting takes place. 

 - Questions to the Government and questions for oral answer without debate that have been posed since the beginning of the tenth term (1993) are on line on the Assembly website ( http://questions.assemblee-nationale.fr ) and can be searched with the search engine.

 You are interested by a question for written answer:

- The Journal Officiel ‘Débats de l’Assemblée Nationale: questions écrites et réponses des ministres’ appears each Monday.

 - Questions for written answer posed since the beginning of the tenth term and ministers’ answers are on line on the Assembly website and can be searched with the search engine.

 You are looking for the text of a statute:

You can:

 - Find the text adopted provisionally and then the ‘little law’ on the website. 

 - Find the promulgated Act in the corresponding Journal officiel ‘Lois et Décrets’  and on the Assembly website, within the framework of the corresponding legislative file.

 - Purchase the Recueil des lois published by the Assembly.

 You are looking for more detailed information on work by the committees or by the Delegation for the European Union:

You will find it:

 - In the parliamentary reports on instruments being debated or in the information reports (DIAN. –documents d’information de l’Assemblée nationale).

 - In the Bulletin des commissions (committees bulletin) which appears every week during the session.

 - In the Bulletin de la Delegation pour l’Union européenne (bulletin by the Delegation for the European Union).

 - On the Assembly website  ( www.assemblee-nationale/commissions and www.assemblee-nationale.fr/europe/ ).

 You are looking for a parliamentary document:

 - You can obtain National Assembly documents at the Journal officiel and at the National Assembly Boutique (see above).

 - The website contains all the Assembly’s parliamentary documents published since June 1998 (General index : ¨Projets, propositions de loi, rapports, dossiers législatifs ou d'actualité )

 - Documents by the Senate are on sale at the Espace Librairie du Senate (20, rue de Vaugirard, 75006 Paris), as well as at the Journal officiel and can be consulted on the Senate’s website: www.senat.fr

 You are looking for the instruments implementing an Act:

 - You will find their references in the Journal officiel, or at the Paris Interministerial Centre for Administrative Information (Centre Interministériel de Renseignements Administratifs de Paris - CIRA.) on 0821 08 09 10 (0,1 € min.) and service-public.fr

 - You can obtain their text in the Journal officiel ‘Lois et Décrets’:

° You will find the day’s edition on the Journal officiel website: www.journal-officiel.gouv.fr

° You will find an older edition on the Legifrance website: www.legifrance.gouv.fr

 You are looking for all the work carried out to prepare an Act: 

- You can obtain it:

· At the National Assembly Boutique (see above),

· On the Assembly website (Projets, propositions de loi, rapports, dossiers législatifs ou d'actualité), each bill tabled at the National Assembly being the subject of a legislative file updated as parliamentary work advances. 

 FURTHER INFORMATION

 Apart from the brochures forming the ‘Connaissance de l’Assemblée’ Collection:

 - Information on texts governing the organisation and activity of the Assembly:

·  The Rules of Procedure [French] [English] and the Instruction générale du Bureau (general instruction by the Bureau) (Presidency Secretariat-General)

· The Recueil des pouvoirs publics (public authorities compendium) (drawn up by the National Assembly and Senate Sitting Departments), also accessible on line http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/connaissance/pouvoirs-publics/pouvoirs_publics.asp

 - Information on the Assembly’s activity :

· The Bulletin de l’Assemblée nationale (BAN – National Assembly Bulletin)

· The statistics published at the end of each session (BAN Statistiques)

· The Rapport annuel d’activité de l’Assemblée nationale (National Assembly annual activity report).

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