The European Documentation Centre (EDC)

What are COM Documents?

COM Documents, or COM Docs as they are commonly known, are one of the largest and most significant categories of EU documentation. They are working documents of the European Commission, and as such are important sources of information on one of the key institutions of the EU. Around 600-700 COM Documents are produced each year. They can be divided into three types of document:

• Proposals for legislation
  The majority of COM Documents are the texts of formal proposals for legislation from the European Commission. In addition to the text of a proposal, 'explanatory memorandum' explaining the background and purpose of the proposal is also published.

• Communications
  These are pre-legislative consultative documents outlining the Commission's early thinking on a subject. Often called 'green' or 'white' papers, they are designed to seek the views and responses from interested parties as a prelude to possible legislative action in the future.

• Reports on the implementation of policy
  Such reports analyse and evaluate the implementation of existing EU laws or policies.  

Availability

• EUR-Lex
  This database contains the full text of COM Documents since 1999.

• Westlaw
  This database contains full text COM Documents.

• The EDC has printed copies of COM Documents from 1982-1987, and microfiche copies from 1987-2002. They are all kept in the Library store. Please use the store request form if you wish to consult any COM Documents from this period. There was also a monthly index called Documents, published 1987-2000. 

Citing COM Documents

COM Documents are numbered sequentially beginning at no. 1 at the start of each calendar year. A citation for a COM Document should include the following elements:

• COM
• Year
• Number
• Final (meaning the Commission had adopted the document and made it public)
• Date of adoption by the Commission

eg. Communication from the Commission to the Council, the European Parliament, the Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions - Industrial policy in enlarged Europe

would be cited as:

COM (2002) 714 final (11.12.2000)

In addition those COM Documents that are proposals for legislation have some further information which indicate under which legislative procedure the proposal will follow:

• COD (codecision)
• SYN (cooperation)
• AVC (d'avis conforme)
• CNS (consultation)
• ACC (Article 113 (CCP))
• PRT (social protocol)

eg. Opinion of the European Economic and Social Committee on the "Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on official feed and food controls

would be cited as:

COM (2003) 52 final (16.7.2003). 2003/0030 (COD)