European Commissioner for Democracy, Justice, the Rule of Law and Consumer Protection
The European 'Commissioner for Democracy, Justice, the Rule of Law and Consumer Protection' is a member of the European Commission. The current holder is Michael McGrath.
Portfolio
The post was created in 2010 by splitting the previous Justice, Freedom and Security portfolio into a justice post and a security post: the Commissioner for Home Affairs. This split was made as a concession to the liberals in the European Parliament to gain their support for the second Barroso Commission.A major innovation of the Juncker Commission is the nomination of a First Vice-President, Frans Timmermans, for Better Regulation, Inter-Institutional Relations, Rule of Law and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. His role includes to "guide and coordinate all other Justice and Home Affairs-related Commissioners, in particular those of the new DG Justice and the DG Home Affairs ".
The portfolios of Justice and Equality were previously combined as Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality under commissioner is Věra Jourová; however, the two portfolios were split in 2019.
The portfolio of the Commissioner has evolved under the Juncker Commission and renamed into Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality. Major changes are:
- "The Commissioner for Justice no longer holds the title that was used in the previous Commission. Other citizenship-related matters regarding ‘communication to citizens’ have been moved from DG Communication and attributed to the new Commissioner for Education, Culture, Youth and Citizenship."
- "Issues related to non-discrimination in employment have been removed from DG JUST and placed back under DG Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion. However, DG JUST still holds responsibility for the wider non-discrimination portfolio."
- DG JUST gained competences on issues related to Corporate Governance and Social Responsibility, previously in DG Internal Market and Services, and on issues related to Consumer Affairs. Regarding Consumer Affairs, the whole directorate has been transferred from DG Health and Consumers - now DG Health and Food Safety, except for Health Technology and Cosmetics issues, for which DG Enterprise and Industry gained responsibility.
- The responsibility of Anti-Drug Policy has been transferred to DG Home Affairs.
List of commissioners