theoretically achieved back in the 1960s, meant the abolition of all barriers. In practice, the latter had remained a pious aspiration so long as a whole host of technical, fiscal and other barriers existed. Early in 1985 the Commission produced a white paper on establishing a single market. This, together with the report by the Dooge Committee, established at Fontainebleau to examine institutional issues, formed the major agenda when the European Council met in Milan in late June 1985 and took the crucial decisions which were to lead to the negotiation and signature of SEA. The Milan European Council was an early demonstration of the new Franco-German axis. Analysis of these events should properly focus on three critical features. First, the European Council confirmed its assumption of direct responsibility for all major decisions. In 1984 this involved enlargement and the budget. In 1985 it embraced ‘completion’ of the Community itself in the shape of the single market. Second, the actual decision to hold an inter-governmental conference (IGC), which would give a treaty base to foreign policy co-operation and revise some of the institutional arrangements, was taken by a majority despite opposition from Britain, Denmark and Greece. Italian Prime Minister Craxi as President of the European Council played a key role in this. Third, despite objections to developing European structures and institutions, Britain attached sufficient importance to the single market to accept a majority decision on the IGC. The lead up to the IGC had been long and tortuous, but the actual negotiation of the SEA was relatively simple. The IGC met in September, and by January an agreed text had emerged. The treaty itself is analysed in the next chapter. Its main features were agreement to implement the single market by the end of 1992, the establishment of a legal basis for Political Co-operation and a number of institutional reforms. Whilst not formally repudiating the Luxembourg compromise with its apparent extension of the national veto, member states seemed to have reached some understanding that in future the spirit of the original treaties would apply. The point is underlined by the fact that virtually all the provisions relating to the single market would be implemented by majority vote. In the immediate aftermath of the ratification of the SEA, some observers drew attention to the gap between aspirations expressed by Parliament in its Draft Treaty and the actual achievement. Although true, such comments are wide of the mark. In the negotiating process Parliament was little more than a bystander with the right to be heard. The member states were anxious to achieve a relaunching of the move towards unification after a period of apparent