Opt-outs in The European Union - Future Opt-outs

Future Opt-outs

In 2009, Czech President Václav Klaus refused to complete ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon unless the Czech Republic was given an opt-out from the Charter of Fundamental Rights (as Poland and the United Kingdom had been with Protocol 30(source)) fearing the Charter would allow the families of Germans who were expelled from territory in modern day Czech Republic after the Second World War to challenge the expulsion before the EU's courts, though legal experts suggested that the laws under which the German were expelled, the Beneš decrees, did not fall under the jurisdiction of EU law. In October 2009, EU leaders agreed to amend the protocol at the time of the next accession treaty to include the Czech Republic.

A draft protocol to this effect was proposed by the European Council and is currently under consideration by the European Parliament. However, the Czech Senate approved a resolution in October 2011 which opposed their accession to the protocol. In October 2012, the European Parliament Constitutional Affairs Committee voted not to recommend the Czech Republic's accession to the Protocol. On 11 December 2012, a third draft of the European Parliament's committee report was published, and is scheduled to be voted on by Parliament during its session on 12 March 2013.