Article 29: Voting in the Community Council and Ministerial Councils

  1. Save as otherwise provided in this Treaty and subject to the provisions of this Article and Article 27, the Ministerial Councils shall take decisions by a qualified majority vote  and such decisions shall be binding.
  1. For the purposes of paragraph 1 of this Article a qualified majority vote means an affirmative vote of the Member States comprising no less than three-quarters of the membership of the Community.
  1.   Where issues have been determined to be of critical importance to the national well- being of a Member State, in accordance with paragraph 4 of this Article, such decisions shall be reached by an affirmative vote of all Member States.
  1. Decisions that an issue is of critical importance to the national well-being of a Member State shall be reached by a two-thirds majority of the Member States.
  1. For the purposes of paragraph 3 of this Article abstentions shall not be construed as impairing the validity of decisions required to be reached by unanimity provided that Member States constituting not less than three-quarters of the membership of the Community vote in favour of such decisions.