> they (EP) tried

The EP didn't do anything yet, right now as far as I can tell the only concrete document we have is the initial commission draft proposal

> starting to think that the Council is the root of most problems in the EU

Starting? (semi-/s)

I stand corrected: I haven't followed the EFMA proposal in detail, so I thought it was already in trilogues.

As for the Council: if they really are going to open up the treaties, everyone should be up to arms against the non-democratic practices and grey areas.

There isn't really anything non-democratic about the council to be honest. Not in a manner that would be fixable by treaty

The issue is mostly one of awareness, if people cared about the Council there'd be political interest for other politicians to keep ministers more accountable. As is no one even knows what the Council is and who is on it. No national politician is going to waste political capital on council oversight

The main issue with the Council of ministers is that it's a legislative body made up of executive branch actors, I don't like that on a philosophical level. Would be much better if they were replaced by national legislature delegates. Same voting system, same competencies and powers, just 1-2 hundred members instead of 27+1

Good that you brought this argument. It is a very thorny issue; we are talking about the equality of states versus the equality of citizens.

I for one support the supranational democracy element and not the intergovernmental one. For all things related to civil rights, including privacy and other things, the good things have always come from the supranational level, whereas the intergovernmental arrangement has always watered things down (or worse). The rot traces to the Lisbon Treaty.

It is a schizophrenic system: high-level politicians (ministers) are deciding things at the EU-level (such as building an "ECHOLON" like someone noted below) and then coming back to their national constituencies saying that "Brussels did it".

And their COREPER henchman ;-) Those invisible relics from the coal and steel union are invisible for the electorate and don't represent the member states but rather the government of the member-states, thus is a minority wiping out a majority. All the while they do policy laundry on a EU echelon without anyone batting a eye.

Yeah. The "very democratic" bodies like CIVCOM and INTCEN surely never yield any power over these "exceptional use case" clauses.