In order to make decisions andadminister the Community, new institution had to be set up. By 1967 there was a Council of Ministers, a Commission, a European Parliament and a Court of Justice. The Council ofMinisters was made up of ministers from each country's government. It has the final say on the policies and programmes of the Community. The Commission is made up of two people from each larger country and one from each smaller country. They take decisions on routine matters andpropose new laws.

The members of the European Parliament are directly elected by voters in each member state. The Parliament is able to comment on proposals, put up by the commissioners and influence the budget and it is slowly gaining more powers.

The Court of justice has the power to enforce Community law on member states. {This Court has sometimes overturned a decision made by the British law courts.} All citizens of Community countries have the right to appeal to the European Court of Justice.

From l973 to 1986 Denmark, the Irish Republic, the United Kingdom, Greece, Spain and Portugal joined the Community. So it increased from the original six to twelve member states. In 1987 these twelve member states passed the Single European Act. This meant that from the end of 1992 money, goods, services and people could move Freely within the Community without customs and other controls at the frontiers. Any citizen of a member state can start a business, hire workers and sell product as easily in another member country as in his own. Workers are able to use their skills to find jobs anywhere throughout the Community.

For many people the main purpose of the European Community is to create a continent whose countries need never go to war with each other again, because Europe is our common home.

In the 1st century AD Britain become Roman province as the result of colonises invades in AD 43. By about AD 100 the Romans had conquered many of the lands that now make up countries of modern Europe, including Spain, France and Britain. However, their power didn’t extend beyond the river Rhine, because there were German tribes whom the Romans called ‘barbarians’.

Then the Roman Empire gradually split into a western half and an eastern half (the Byzantine Empire). The West accepted the Pope in Rome as head of the Church and called itself Christendom. In Eastern Europe and Russia, people were gradually converted to Christianity by missionaries from Greek Orthodox Church in Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine empire. From then on the Ural Mountains were regarded as the European eastern border with Asia.

As the Christianity spreads at the end of the 4th century the Roman Empire gradually split.

As the Roman Empire declined and collapsed, many tribes crossed the Rhine and moved into Western Europe. By about AD 500 there were as many as twenty different tribes, including Franks, Saxons, Visigoths and Ostrogoths, controlling particular areas of Europe. These peoples gradually came to accept the power of the Church and throughout Christendom. Latin became the official language of church services, of governments, and of lawyers and scholars. Educated people travelling across the continent could easily understand each other.

The followers of the proper Muhammad, known as Muslim, launched a series of wars in southern Europe after his death in AD 632. They conquered much of the Byzantine Empire, without managing to take Constantinople. They also invaded Spain and France in the West. Charles Martel (‘Hammer’) defeated a Muslim army at a battle near poitiers in 732 and they were driven out of France. But Muslim Moors from North Africa settled in Spain, and for hundreds of years southern Spain was Islamic, not Christian. The Muslim ruled Granada right up to 1492, the year Columbus sailed to the Caribbean.

In the 9th century Vikings conquered Ireland, England, France and Italy.

Vikings from the North made trips for trade and adventure along the great Dnieper and Volga River to Kiev, Novgorod and other cities. Kiev also traded with Greeks in the South and it was from the Greeks that the Russians took their Christianity religion. In 988 Grand Prince Vladimir of Kiev was converted to Christianity. Russians adopted an alphabet based on the Greek rather than the Roman alphabet.

Gradually, during the Middle Age, people in Western Europe who spoken different languages began to separate into nations. The first strong, united country was Francia (France) ruled over by Charlemagne (Charles the Great), grandson of Charles Martel. England became a united country even before the Norman invasion of 1066.

Later Spain, Portugal, Sweden and other countries gradually established themselves. Many German-speaking countries were ruled by the Emperor of Austria, who during many centuries used the title Holy Roman Emperor.

In the 13th century (12 - 14) the Golden Hora of Mongol - Tatars conquered Kiev. Tatars came from the Goby-Desert. Mongolia occupied the countries for two hounded and fifty years cutting it off from important era in Europe. The Russian people constantly struggled against Tatars and didn’t allow them to come to Europe. Thus Russians gave an opportunity to develop. {The princess of Moscow gradually beat Mongol - Tatars off and in the 16th century Ivan the Terrible finally defeated the Tatars at Kazan.}

Between the 14th and 17th centuries great advances took place in learning and the arts. Italian artists, sculptors and architects studied the writings and ruined buildings of the ancient Romans and were inspired by the classical civilisation. Their ideas spread all over Europe. Printing made it possible for books and pamphlets to be produced so that more people had the chance of learning to read.

Many people wanted to read the Bible in their own languages and, for this and other reasons, they split from the Roman Catholic Church. This ‘Reformation’ was created by Protestant Churches, which became powerful in northern Europe, particularly in England, Scotland, Sweden and northern Germany. Terrible wars between Catholics and Protestants followed in the 16th and 17th centuries. The Thirty Years War from 1618 till 1648 caused enormous loss of life and damage right across central Europe.

At that time in Russia after Ivan the Terrible`s death Michael Romanov became tsar. The Romanov family ruled Russia from 1613 until they were overthrown in 1917. Michael Romanov`s grandson Peter I was the greatest of all Russian tsars. He opened a window into West by building a grand new capital Peterborough, where the Neva River meets the Baltic.

After the religious wars France emerged again as the strongest European country, but Britain, her oldest rival began to build an empire. In Seven Year War Britain defeated France, India and Canada.

The new inventions of the Industrial Revolution were also helping Britain economically. In 1789 the French Revolution took place and France become a republic.