A European Commission official said yesterday it would be preferable to involve national parliaments in scrutinising EU legislation in the preliminary stages rather than later in the process.
Commission deputy secretary general Eckhart Guth was speaking at the National Forum on Europe in Dublin. He replaced Polish commissioner Danuta Hübner, who has gone to Rome to attend the Pope's funeral.
The forum debated whether the EU constitution, which will be voted on here in a referendum, would give national parliaments a bigger say in EU laws.
Under the constitution, national parliaments are to be given prior notice of legislation coming from Brussels and a role in blocking certain measures.
A national parliament may submit an opinion about a proposal it believes does not respect the principle of subsidiarity - that there should be no law-making at EU level which can best be done at state level.
Mr Guth said national parliaments would have the opportunity to scrutinise legal changes. The new member states seemed eager to have prior examination, which would mean scrutinising EU legislation in their national parliaments.
"Involvement of the national parliaments in this preliminary way is a very useful way to improve the quality of EU decisions and legislation," he said.
"It makes sense to give national parliaments control over the debate on the question of subsidiarity, which has to be monitored and is a crucial issue."
However, Czech MEP Dr Jan Zahradil, who voted against the constitution when the European Parliament endorsed it earlier this year, said the legislation did not go far enough.
"What is introduced here is a 'yellow-card' principle where a national parliament would have the right to warn the institutions of the commission if they feel it breaks the principle of subsidiarity and penetrates into its sovereign field of jurisdiction," he said.
He had wanted a "red card" system which meant national parliaments would have the right to veto or block such legislation. However, this was not adopted.