Article 153 [Union Action]

In the original provision (ex-Article 118 TEEC) the Commission had very limited powers. In other words, in the founding Treaties the Community action was not supported by any explicit competence in the social fields. For this reason, the secondary legislation on social matters adopted within the original European Communities was based on the doctrine of ‘implied powers’ deriving from ex-Article 235 TEEC (now Article 352 TFEU, the so called ‘flexibility clause’), in conjunction with the aim of harmonising the MS’s laws concerning the internal market (ex-Article 100 TEEC = Article 115 TFEU). Such legal basis implied putting into practice the unanimity rule.