Institutions

The European Parliament will gain much from the ratification of Lisbon, and we’ll see the effects immediately. Firstly, the EP still has to approve Ashton’s appointment as High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. Rest assured that the 736 MEPs will not go easy on her at her upcoming parliamentary hearing. After grilling, and subsequently approving or rejecting Ashton, the EP will do the same to the new Commission appointees, as per usual. But Lisbon extends the EPs role beyond striking fear in the hearts of all wannabe Commissioners. Once approved, the new FP chief must consult the EP regularly. The EP will also be consulted on the specific formation of the new External Action Service. Trade deals negotiated by the Commission on behalf of member states in the WTO will now need EP approval to be formalized. The list goes on…

Photo: Flickr, Xaf

Over the first October weekend, Ireland announced a 67.1% victory of the ‘Yes’ side in the country’s second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. Voter turnout increased by 5% from the first referendum, which was held in June 2008.

Image: www.flickr.com/ infomatique

10 days left for the European Elections. 400 million European citizens will be eligible to elect 736 MEPs. The European Parliament is the only institution that the citizens can elect directly. The 7th elections will take place in June. Moreover, on 19 May, in a try for creativity and engagement of how young people experience the European idea, the Polish youth project “YOUrope needs YOU’ was awarded the first prize in the European Charlemagne Youth Prize (ECYP) competition.

Image: Aegee : YOUrope Needs You

On Thursday May 14th, the Araine 5 rocket blasted into space, carrying with it the Herschel and Planck telescopes. They will remain in orbit for the next 2-3 months, making valuable observations. The telescopes have a combined cost of €1.9 billion, the most expensive package that the European Space Agency’s science division has ever launched from a single rocket. Herschel is the largest telescope that has even been put in space, while Planck is a survey telescope with the sharpest sight, most sensitive instruments, and widest frequency range. The successful launching of these cutting-edge telescopes is the product of 20 years of research, and over 100 different contractors from 15 countries.

Image: www.flickr.com/ ttfnrob

VoteWatch.eu is an independent website that aims to make EU decision-making more transparent. Employing complex statistical methods developed by scholars from LSE and Université Libre de Bruxelles, it tracks attendance and voting records of MEPs in the European Parliament. Citizens can view this analysis by nationality, national political party, or European party grouping. Votewatch.eu is a particularly useful tool for citizens considering who to support in the upcoming EP elections.

Image: www.flickr.com/ *bene*

This was the reaction of controversial French MEP Jean Marie Le Pen to news that MEPs from several parties are moving to block him from chairing the European Parliament immediately following the June elections. It is customary that following elections, the oldest MEP chairs the Parliament until a new president is elected. Among his more controversial statements are remarks that Nazi gas chambers are a mere ‘detail of history.’ Le Pen was fined for making said claim in 1987, but repeated the remark again, prompting Socialist leader Martin Schulz to express concern over the prospect of a ‘Holocaust denier’ presiding over the inaugural session of European Parliament. The Green Party has suggested changing the tradition to allow the youngest MEP to open the session, as ‘a sign of the future.’ ALDE leader Graham Watson disagreed with his EP colleagues (admittedly before Le Pen repeated his gas chamber comment), seeing no justification to handle Le Pen differently, ‘even if we hate his politics.’

Image: www.flickr.com/neno

The website of the European Parliament is itself not new, but interesting new updates have just been added, namely images drawing attention to the upcoming EP elections, and will be seen on billboards around the EU as of April 1st. Distribution of the advertisement campaign will be uneven, with more billboards placed in member states which had the lowest voter turnout in the 2004 EP elections, such as Poland and Slovakia. Nevertheless, billboards will be printed in all 23 of the official EU languages, and will be displayed in every EU member state. The billboard campaign will cost €3 million, and a further €1 million will go towards a print and online campaign using the same images, which were created by Berlin-based advertising agency Scholz & Friends.

2009 election billboards on flickr

The European meeting-point of the year 2009 will most definitely be the elections of the European Parliament. Be rprepared for June 2009. Although there is still some way to go, the election of the next president of the European Commission is at the heart of the current debate – will the Portuguese Manuel Barroso be reappointed? While the European People’s Party (EPP) supports Barroso, the Party of European Socialist (PES) has no common candidate as of yet. An interesting factor in this debate is the fact that the European Parliament elections have no direct influence on the election of the president of the European Commission. He will be appointed by secret vote by the European Council. However the Parliament has then to approve the entire Commission. Furthermore, it is more than likely that the Parliamentary elections will, once again, be second order national elections, where parties look for approval of their national policies. The legitimacy of the elections will be determined by the voter turnout. Will the reinforced communication policy of the Commission show any results? The Euros are covering the European elections with different articles and audio-visual documentaries about the role of the European Parliament.

Photo: www.sxc.hu

When the 27 head of states signed the Lisbon Treaty on December 13th 2007, there was hope that the simplified Treaty would, this time, come into force in January 2009. All contentious points and symbols had been left out, and the new Treaty concentrated only on the urgently needed institutional reforms. However, the tables quickly turned: On 12th June the Irish – Ireland was the only country which held a referendum – voted against the Treaty. Yet, 25 member states have ratified the Treaty so far, mostly through their parliaments. Only the Czech Republic has not yet ratified it. While parliaments mainly voted pro-European, referenda in different member states would certainly have led to a different result. Knowledge and undertstanding of the Treaty is prevadingly low. The Irish government seems therewhile constrained to reorganise a referendum. But in an economic downturn and a growing negative atmosphere in Ireland a positive outcome seems close to unachievable.

Photo: www.flickr.com/ Smallisbeautiful

Those were the words of Nicolas Sarkozy as he addressed the European Parliament this week to launch the six months of the French presidency of the European Union. He outlined his priorities: climate change, immigration, defence and a review of the common agricultural policy. The underlying idea is that the EU should do more to protect its citizens in the context of globalization. Mr Sarkozy acknowledged in his speech that the EU was undergoing a crisis but stressed that the presidency and all its partners have a responsibility to find a solution. The French President accused the leaders who are now reluctant to proceed with the ratification of the Lisbon treaty of cowardice. In his opinion it is a question of moral duty and of coherence as the EU’s enlargement commands a reorganisation of the institutions. The European leaders are expected to explore alternative solutions at a summit in October.

President Barroso’s Commission has tabled a new “social package”. The initiative is said to be caused by Barroso’s ambition to take another five years in the Commission presidency after the 2009 European Parliament elections. With the Lisbon Treaty in place the Commission President will have to be chosen in the light of the results from the Parliament elections. The controversial Rüfert and Laval cases have left many Europeans with the feeling that the European Court of Justice gives supremacy to the free movement of goods over workers rights and could give a push to the centre-left in the elections. That could again upset Mr. Barosso’s ambitions. To some the Commission initiative may seem as simple populism but it indicates something very important about European democracy; that Commission leaders are forced to listen to the people, that the directly elected European Parliament is indeed powerful should anyone still have doubts and that the political direction of the European project is becoming a contested issue. Left and right politics is slowly taking up a more visible role in the daily politics of the EU. That is good news.

This is what EU-scepticsm is made of. A report, examining the way MEPs spend their monthly staff allowances, allegedly identifies large scale abuse among the MEPs. The report is currently being kept far away from the media in the basement of the parliament building in Strasbourg. The official explanation is that the report is an internal audit report that under parliament’s rules is not supposed to be made public. The report is therefore only available to members of the budgetary committee who, furthermore, are forbidden to take notes from the report and who can only read the report under supervision. European politicians, spending the European citizen’s tax money in an abusive way and the public is not allowed to know about it. If some European citizen had not heard the stories about the “Euro-crats” of Bruxelles they will now. Talking about digging one’s own grave.

It was with unmistaken and understandable pride that Slovenia, one of the smaller member states of the EU, took over the presidency of the Union on 1 January. Priorities are set to be the ratification of the Lisbon treaty, ensuring the progression in EU energy and climate change policy and stabilising the Western Balkan region. The last matter is particularly delicate. Slovenia has already made its first move by announcing that it would like to see the signing of a Stabilisation and Association Agreement with Serbia, by the end January. This again could forge stronger ties between the EU and Serbia. The Slovenian presidency seems to be hoping that the agreement could provide for a countering force when Serbia is expected to release all its diplomatic fury upon the EU when Kosovo supposedly declares its independence in February. Time will show soon enough if Slovenia will succeed . In this respect, we will also learn if being a Balkan state is an advantage or a disadvantage for stabilising the Western Balkan region.

Car-pooling yes, but have you ever heard about plain-pooling? Well, now you have. The quote by a Dutch government Spokesman, refers to the plan outlined by the three prime ministers of the Benelux countries - Belgium’s Guy Verhofstadt, the Netherlands’ Jan Peter Balkenende and Luxembourg’s Jean Claude Juncker – to fly together to Lisbon in December to sign the Reform Treaty, so that the Portuguese can name the new treaty the Lisbon Treaty. Much noise has been made in the media during the last weeks over the “eco footprint” of the European leaders who, immediately after signing the treaty, head to Belgium for the actual summit. And indeed, it is a ridiculous waste of time, money and CO2. However, good examples are good but often useless. Even if the EU leaders stayed in Brussels, the Europeans would still buy products imported from Australia, still take the car to the bakery and still fly over Heathrow airport when flying from Holland to Greece because it is slightly cheaper. It is a question of lifestyle: the lifestyle of international politics is comparable to the Portuguese’s need for self-promotion. Solid policies that dramatically change the conditions on the basis of which all of us make our daily lifestyle choices will combat climate change. Not the reliance on citizens’ consciousness.

On Wednesday 14 November a strange political marriage broke up. To the great satisfaction of the majority of the MEP’s in the European Parliament, it was announced that the extreme right-wing political group of the EP, ‘Identity, Sovereignty and Tradition’ broke up, when five Romanian MEPs abandoned the group, leaving it below the threshold of the internal EP-rules on party group formation that demand for at least 20 MEPs from six countries to be eligible for recognition. The straw that broke the camels back in a party-group, where internal quarrelling has been the order of the day, was a series of comments by Alessandra Mussolini who failed to distinguish between Roma and Romanians when responding to homicide charges on a Roma in Italy. At the Euros we respect the democratic right of representation of any MEP that the Europeans have chosen to represent them. At the same time we reserve the right to rejoice when the extremists of Europe suffer setbacks. And today we rejoice with the rest of the EP.