Article 7 Opinion of the Committee

Where a matter is put to the Committee for its opinion, it shall be discussed under the conditions and according to the procedure set out respectively in Article 11(3) of the 10th EDF Implementing Regulation and in Article 8(2) and (3) of the Internal Agreement.

When the oral procedure is used, and a substantive change is made or new factual elements are added to the draft measures during the meeting, the Chair, on his or her own initiative or at the request of a Member State, may postpone the vote on a particular agenda item until the end of the meeting or a later meeting.

If, in the situation described in paragraph 2, the Chair does not decide to postpone the vote as requested by one (or more) delegation(s), this (these) delegation(s) may enter a reservation which may be withdrawn within a maximum of three working days starting from the day following the meeting. The Committee's opinion shall be recorded as definitive upon expiry of this period. The Commission shall inform Member States of the definitive position adopted by the Member State(s) whose delegation(s) entered a reservation in the Committee.

If a delegation so requests, voting on an issue can be postponed if the documents relating to a specific agenda point have not been sent to members within the timeframe laid down in Article 5(1) and (2). In that case, the Chair may decide to extend the period of consultation, but no longer than the end of the next meeting. If necessary, the written procedure provided for in Article 11 of these rules of procedure may be applied.

However, at the proposal of the Chair or at the request of a Committee member, the Committee may decide by a simple majority of members to keep this point on the agenda because of the urgency of the matter.

In the context of an examination of annual action programmes, any delegation may request the withdrawal of a project or programme from the annual action programme. If this request is supported by a blocking minority of delegations, as laid down in Article 9(3), in connection with Article 8(2) of the Internal Agreement, the annual action programme shall be adopted by the Commission without the project or programme concerned in accordance with the management procedures set out in Article 11(3) of the 10th EDF Implementing Regulation. Unless the Commission, in line with the views of the delegations in the Committee, wishes not to pursue the withdrawn project or programme, the project or programme shall be re-submitted to the Committee outside the annual action programme in the form of a financing proposal which shall then be adopted by the Commission in accordance with the management procedures set out in Article 11(3) of the 10th EDF Implementing Regulation.