Dear colleagues
You many be interested in the information concerning COM Documents in a
document sent from the Publications Office (EUR-OP) to the Council Working
Party on Legal Data Processing recently. It does not tell us much more than we
all know anyway, except I am glad to see that a CD ROM of COM documents
(multilingual monthly and and single language annual) is to be published,
something I have been calling for for a while. This will be a useful back-up to
the reliance on the web version.
What we still need is a reliable listing updated daily or weekly of precisely
which COM Docs are available and when they have been added to EUR-LEX so that we
can check systematically what has been newly issued.
Document text:
NOTE
from : Publications Office
to : Council Working Party on Legal Data Processing
Subject : European Union Law portal
New method for publishing COM documents
At the end of 2002, the Commission decided to discontinue publishing COM
documents in the Official Journal, except in the form of lists of titles. The
full text of the documents is published electronically on EUR-Lex. This
decision applies to COM documents dating from 2003 onwards.
Until now, COM documents (proposals and explanatory memoranda) were published
directly on EUR-Lex after their adoption (within 24 hours of receipt by the
Publications Office). The texts of the proposals were then published in the
OJCE; since October 2002, the explanatory memoranda have also been published in
the OJ. The availability of a text published in the OJ meant that clean,
synoptic files could be consulted. The version published in the OJ became the
reference version, particularly on publication in the OJ of the adopted acts,
and was archived.
Once adopted and as the various language versions become available, COM
documents are e-mailed by the Commission Secretariat-General to the Publications
Office for publication on EUR-Lex. In the case of some versions, this can take
several weeks .
For this new approach to publishing the availability of COM documents must be
ensured, particularly as regards the following:
- until now, versions submitted for immediate publication on EUR-Lex were not
archived; PDF versions of these texts now are, to ensure that these documents
are always available;
- tighter control procedures for sending and receiving of documents are
currently being introduced, in association with the Commission
Secretariat-General.
With the disappearance of the full text of COM documents from the OJCE, the
CD-ROMs of the OJ L and C series have lost a major part of their substance. It
has been decided, therefore, to publish monthly, annexed to the two OJ L and C
series CD-ROMs, a multilingual CD-ROM containing the COM documents adopted in
the course of the month, in the language versions available at the start of
production. Annual editions for each language version will contain all the
COM documents adopted by the Commission during the year.
Url: http://register.consilium.eu.int/pdf/en/03/st08/st08052en03.pdf
Best wishes
Ian
Ian Thomson
Editor, European Access/European Access Plus
[http://www.europeanaccess.co.uk]
Executive Editor, KnowEurope
[http://www.knoweurope.net]
Manager, European Documentation Centre, Cardiff University
Information Consultant, Wales Euro Info Centre
President, European Information Association
Contact details:
European Documentation Centre
The Guest Building
PO Box 430
Cardiff University
Cardiff CF10 3XT
Tel: 029-2087-4262
Fax: 029-2087-4717
Email: [log in to unmask]
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