The Council of the European Union shares with the the responsibility for and taking policy decisions. It also bears the main responsibility for what the EU does in the field of the common foreign and security policy and for EU action on some justice and freedom issues.
The Council of the EU consists of from the national governments of all the EU countries.
Each country has a number of votes in the Council broadly reflecting the size of their population. Most decisions are taken by majority vote, although sensitive issues in areas like taxation, asylum and immigration, or foreign and security policy, require . Once the Council of the EU and the Parliament have passed a new law, the EU governments have to make sure it is in their countries.