Decision-making in the Council of the European Union is generally described as highly consensual and voting records reveal very low levels of disagreement among governments. However, in this paper we demonstrate that consensus at the voting stage masks fundamental contestation during negotiations by making use of a novel approach of studying video footage of the Council’s public deliberations (DICEU - Debates in the Council of the European Union). Analysing deliberations on legislative packages in the Economic and Financial Affairs Council between 2011 and 2015, we show that governments are responsive to public opinion when setting out their policy positions, but only when the policy issues are salient domestically. This conforms to our expectations that government responsiveness in the EU is conditioned by domestic politicisation. Our study also contributes to the debate on what drives bargaining and contestation in the Council.
