While citizens of most countries would expect their newly-created laws to originate from the ruling politicians and political parties of the time, the citizens of the EU may have trouble finding out where the ideas for their new laws actually originate from. Of course sheer public pressure can, on occasion, cause the European Union to enact new regulations, but most of the time a new idea generally begins life with the European Commission, which presumably primarily gets those ideas from non-elected officials and private individuals. The Commission then passes on the proposed legislature to both the European Union Parliament and The Council of the European Union (Council of Ministers) for approval, in most cases.

Main EU Legislature Procedure (Codecision procedure):
Most of the legislature for new laws, acts, directives and regulations is originally produced within the non-elected European Commission, by Commissioners and Civil Servants. When the Commission is ready to attempt to introduce any new laws, it then passes on the proposed legislature to the EU Parliament, where it is read out for the MEP's to digest, and also to the Council of Ministers at the same time. If both vote to approve the bill, it is quickly enacted into law, but if the Council of Ministers approves legislature, and the EU Parliament fails to either reject or propose amendments to a bill (by an absolute majority, meaning that half of all elected MEP's must vote a certain way, not just half of the assembled MEP's on that day) within three months of its adoption by the Council of Ministers, then a new law is enacted automatically. However, during the first Parliament reading for any new legislature, MEP's can propose amendments, and if they are also approved by the Council of Ministers, then the newly-created laws will come into force. If the Council of Ministers does not approve amendments made by the EU Parliament, they suggest other amendments, and then pass the bill back to Parliament for them to debate and vote again on the updated legislature.

Other EU Legislature Procedures:
In some cases, the legislative procedure is very different. For example, under the Assent procedure, the Council of Ministers is allowed to enact legislation which was proposed by the European Commission, after obtaining the prior consent of the EU Parliament. In this case, Parliament has the legal power to accept or reject any proposal but has no way of proposing amendments. Assent procedure is used for economic and social cohesion laws, amendments to the Statute of the European Central Bank, and for issues concerning European Union membership. Under the Consultation procedure, the Council of Ministers can adopt Commission-proposed legislation, whilst only consulting with the EU Parliament. In these cases the EU Parliament has absolutely no power to stop a law coming into effect. Consultation procedure is used for legislation relating to some areas of taxation, the common market, competition laws, visas, immigration, asylum policy, discrimination, and for fiscal measures relating to the environment. The European Commission and Council of Ministers can also act alone in the sensitive area of freedom of movement of capital, and furthermore, the Commission can sometimes bring in new laws independently, without Parliament or the Council's approval, and has done so twice, in the areas of (1) competition within the telecommunications sector and (2) transparency between Member States and companies.

Based in the Berlaymont building in Brussels, the European Commission acts as the main executive branch of the European Union. Along with running the European Union on a day-to-day basis, it proposes legislation and makes sure that new legislation is rolled out to the 27 member states. There are 27 Commissioners, one from each member state, who all have different portfolio's, and who act collectively as a typical government cabinet. They are supposed to represent the interests of the EU as a whole, not just their own national interests, and all appointments are made by the European Council (27 EU heads of state), with the EU Parliament then voting to approve the entire 27 member cabinet as a single body. The un-elected Commission has a backroom staff of 25,000 civil servants which are credited with producing the majority of the EU's legislation and direction, prompting many EU citizens to be sceptical of these mysterious people, who hold so much power with no public scrutiny.

The Council of the European Union is the main decision-making institution of the European Union (EU), being even more important than the European Parliament itself. It is often called the 'Council of Ministers' and is made up from one minister from each of the 27 member states' governments, but the identity of the 27 ministers varies depending on the topics being discussed. For example, if the Council is meeting regarding education issues, then the meeting will include all 27 education ministers from the EU states. The Council is chaired by a different member state every six months, and when that country holds the rotating 'Presidency', their entire ruling government will assume the Presidency role with their ministers setting the agenda for any Council meetings during that time. For example, if a fisheries meeting is scheduled and Sweden holds the Presidency, then the Swedish fisheries Minister will chair the meeting, with the only exception being the Foreign Affairs Council, which is chaired by the High Representative (Catherine Ashton). The EU has started to combine every three of these six month presidency's, so that a common agenda can be planned by three national governments collectively over an 18 month period.

In short, the Council has tons of legislative powers when it comes to passing laws which the European Commission has recommended, it has some executive powers, and it has joint power - along with the EU Parliament - over the vast €120bn EU budget. Most EU laws must be passed by both the Council and the Parliament to come into force, and voting within the 27 person council is based on a population-based basis, with the heavily-populated nations allotted more votes than the less populous countries. For the Council to pass a law, a majority of EU member states must vote in favour of it (either 55% or 72% of member states, depending on the type of issue) and atleast 65% of the EU's population must be represented by those member states which voted it in.

The European Council (as opposed to The Council of the European Union, aka the Council of Ministers) is the body which is made up from the heads of state of the European Union's 27 member nations. Whilst it holds no executive power, it's composition of the continents major leaders makes it an extremely powerful entity. It meets atleast twice every six months to define the EU's policy direction, to sort out any enlargement and integration issues and to discuss any major international issues. Often the European Council takes a united stand on foreign policy issues, and it has been described as the EU's 'collective head of state' and 'supreme political authority'.

The 27 heads of state who make up the Council directly appoint their own President (currently Herman Van Rompuy), the President of the European Commission (currently José Manuel Barroso) and the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security (currently Catherine Ashton). The European Council also chooses the entire 27 member European Commission, before the EU Parliament votes on whether to accept their choice of cabinet. This means that the heads of state, from the most powerful European countries, can generally look forward to a host of friendly faces in the biggest EU jobs, which many people feel is an un-democratic situation, because those people could potentially be primarily aiming to please the heads of state, rather than the general public at large.

The Court of Justice of the European Union was formally set up in 2009 with the Lisbon Treaty coming into force, and it is comprised of three different entities - the Court of Justice (created in 1952), the General Court (created in 1988) and the Civil Service Tribunal (created in 2004). It is supposed to make sure that EU law is observed in all 27 member states, and acts as an enforcer of sorts in this regard. It's other role is to help interpretate the laws which the European Union creates for it's 500 million citizens, if national courts and tribunals request it to do so.