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On International Women’s Day, the European Parliament's Bureau approved proposals to name two of its buildings in Brussels after prominent European women.

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SEDE organises a public hearing on 'Defence planning and procurement in the EU - a joint approach' on Tuesday, 16 March 2021 from 14.45 to 16.15hrs in room ANTALL 4Q1 and remotely, with external experts.
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Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

SEDE organises a public hearing on 'Defence planning and procurement in the EU - a joint approach' on Tuesday, 16 March 2021 from 14.45 to 16.15hrs in room ANTALL 4Q1 and remotely, with external experts.
Location : ANTALL 4Q1 and remotely
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"In the context of the exponential growth of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), the President of the European Parliament has announced a number of measures to contain the spread of epidemic and to safeguard Parliament's core activities.

The current precautionary measures adopted by the European Parliament to contain the spread of COVID-19 do not affect work on legislative priorities. Core activities are reduced, but maintained to ensure that the institution's legislative, budgetary, scrutiny functions are maintained.

The meetings will be with remote participation for Members (being able to view and listen to proceedings, ask for the floor and intervene in the meeting). Other participants are invited to follow the meeting through webstreaming.

Following these decisions, the next ordinary AFET Committee meetings will take place on 17-18 March (via videoconference).

EP Calendar 2021
AFET-SEDE-DROI meetings
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Today is International Women’s Day, and I want to take the opportunity to remember the wise words of Hannah Arendt, a woman who is regarded as one of the most influential political philosophers of the twentieth century.

Born to a German-Jewish family in 1906, she had to flee from the Nazis when Hitler came to power in 1933. She became an expert in dictatorships, and the disturbing tell-tale signs that lead to totalitarianism.

But it’s what she said in an interview, one year before her death in 1975, that I particularly want to draw attention to, because the parallels with what’s happening in Britain today are chilling.

That’s not because I believe the UK is a totalitarian state. No.

It’s because we are on a path that could, if we are not alert, lead us to the wrong place.

Said Hannah in an interview with the French writer Roger Errera in 1974.

“What makes it possible for a totalitarian or any other dictatorship to rule is that people are not informed; how can you have an opinion if you are not informed?”

She went on:

“If everybody always lies to you, the consequence is not that you believe the lies, but rather that nobody believes anything any longer. 

“This is because lies, by their very nature, have to be changed, and a lying government has constantly to rewrite its own history.

“On the receiving end you get not only one lie – a lie which you could go on for the rest of your days – but you get a great number of lies, depending on how the political wind blows. 

“And a people that no longer can believe anything cannot make up its mind.

“It is deprived not only of its capacity to act but also of its capacity to think and to judge. 

“And with such a people you can then do what you please.”

NORMALISED LYING Today, we live under a government, and a Prime Minister, who have normalised lying to ‘the people’.

The country is so misinformed, with so many competing and incompatible versions of events, that nobody is sure what to believe anymore.

And so, passively, so many of us just accept what’s happening, apathetically shrugging our shoulders as the government radically changes the country, with hardly a murmur of miscontent, let alone any signs of rebellion.

Last week a court order confirmed that the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, misled Parliament when he reassured MPs in the House of Commons in February that all Covid-related contracts were “on the record”.

That wasn’t true.

Let me be less polite. It was a lie.

The Judge’s Order stated that:

“the Defendant acted unlawfully by failing to publish the contracts”.

The Prime Minister acted unlawfully and misled Parliament.

Why isn’t that front page news? Why is it hardly in the news at all? Why no uproar, not even murmurings, from the masses?

Heck. Why hasn’t the Prime Minister resigned?

It’s because lying to us, misinforming us, cheating on us, have become normal and accepted.

AN UNLAWFUL PRIME MINISTER Remember the autumn of 2019? Boris Johnson decided to close-down Parliament for five weeks, saying that was his right.

But the Supreme Court ruled that his actions were unlawful. The Judges said it was wrong of the Prime Minister to stop MPs carrying out their duties.

The Prime Minister faced calls to resign, but they were muted, and mild. 

In ‘normal times’, wouldn’t an honourable Prime Minister have immediately stepped down, after the country’s highest court judged that he had acted unlawfully?

Not in current times.

A ‘source’ at 10 Downing Street simply told the press that the Supreme Court had “made a serious mistake…” 

Not that the Prime Minister made a mistake. The court had made a mistake.

Less than three months later, in the General Election, Mr Johnson won a landslide victory, having told the country another whopper of a lie – that he had a “fantastic” Brexit deal that was “oven-ready”.

The country voted back into office a man who we all know is a compulsive liar (and I am safe in publishing that without fear of being sued for defamation) and who the country’s highest court confirmed had acted unlawfully.

And once again, a court this month confirmed that the Prime Minister acted unlawfully.

‘So what?’ the country replies in its silence.

IT’S OK TO LIE There’s an old saying. We teach people how to treat us.

And so, it has come to pass. The placid populace has taught the government that it’s ok to lie.

It’s ok to break the law. 

It’s ok to do what they want to the country, because we, the people, are so fed-up, befuddled, and depressed, that we are beyond caring, or fighting back.

And in this ‘perfect storm’ that has seen any misgivings by ‘the people muzzled by lockdowns, to the rescue of the government, that cheats and lies, is an inept and weak Opposition.

An Opposition that facilitates the government, rather than bellows every day with fire and anger, that the Prime Minister has no clothes – he is naked, a nobody, a conman, a cheat, who should not be anywhere near the levers of power.

And so, it goes on.

STATISTICS AND DAMNED LIES Last month The Guardian reported a survey of The Road Haulage Association (RHA) that in January export volumes from the UK to the EU had dropped by a staggering 68%, all because of new Brexit barriers.

But the government hit back, robustly asserting that the RHA survey was wrong.

The Cabinet Office, run by Michael Gove, confidently cited statistics that inbound and outbound volumes were “close to normal”.

The UK Statistics Authority, however, has officially reprimanded the government for using unpublished and unverifiable data, in their attempt to deny that Brexit had caused a massive fall in trade through UK ports.

Does that seem familiar? It does to me.

THE LIE ON THE BUS During the EU referendum campaign, Boris Johnson drove around the country in his battle bus that claimed that the UK sent £350m a week to the EU, that could instead be used to fund the NHS.

It wasn’t true.

The UK Statistics Authority wrote to Mr Johnson to complain that the claim made on his bus was ‘potentially misleading’ as it made no account of what Britain got back from the EU, including the deduction of a hefty rebate.

Sir Andrew Dilnot, then the Chair of the UK Statistics Authority, warned Mr Johnson and his campaign:

‘Given the high level of public interest in this debate it is important that official statistics are used accurately, with important limitations or caveats clearly explained.’

It made no difference. Mr Johnson continued to use the wrong figure on his bus; he continued to lie.

After the referendum, Dominic Cummings, Vote Leave’s Campaign Director, wrote:

‘Would we have won without £350m/NHS? All our research and the close result strongly suggests No.’

• So, a misinformed country voted for Brexit.
• A misinformed country voted for Boris Johnson.
• A misinformed country watches on, with barely a blink, as our nation is dismantled and rearranged, by those who have, indeed, fulfilled their sinister promise to ‘Take back control’.

REMEMBER THESE WORDS Today, remember the wise and prophetic words of Hannah Arendt. Let them shoot shivers up your spine. Let them sear your spleen and spur you into action. “What makes it possible for a totalitarian or any other dictatorship to rule is that people are not informed; how can you have an opinion if you are not informed?”

It is imperative that we become informed. That we seek and engage the truth.

That we understand that knowledge is our best defence, and attack, against the creeping totalitarianism that now threatens our country.

• Follow my journalism page on Facebook: Jon Danzig writes
• My campaign page on Facebook: Reasons2Rejoin
• And LinkedIn

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The post On International Women’s Day, remember the words of Hannah Arendt appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

The Monthly Highlights publication provides an overview, at a glance, of the on-going work of the policy departments, including a selection of the latest and forthcoming publications, and a list of future events.
Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

Length of video : 113'

Disclaimer : The interpretation of debates serves to facilitate communication and does not constitute an authentic record of proceedings. Only the original speech or the revised written translation is authentic.
Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

Length of video : 71'

Disclaimer : The interpretation of debates serves to facilitate communication and does not constitute an authentic record of proceedings. Only the original speech or the revised written translation is authentic.
Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

Introduction

Once the reformation of suffrage (see Reform #1) is accomplished – laying down the foundation of enlightened democracy –, the transformation of the united Europe’s (henceforward Republic of the United Europe or RUE) political system is the next priority. As any political system is complex and their institutions are interconnected, I am going to introduce the political system of the Republic of the United Europe in separate volumes, focusing on the European electoral system, the European Parliament, the European Government (and its ministries), and the European Presidential Council (including the President of the RUE).

In my previous article, I argued that the eligibility to vote and to stand for election must be radically redefined along certain principles. This volume is going to focus on the mechanism of how the votes of the enlightened public is going to translate into seats and power in the European institutions, introducing the reformation of the European electoral system – as the first step of the reformation of the European political system.

Principles

The European Parliament election procedures are based on European and national legislation. The common European rules explain the principle of proportional representation and certain incompatibilities with the MEP (Member of the European Parliament) mandate. The exact voting system used and the number of constituencies are governed by national laws, meaning that the electoral system of the European Union is far from unified, as it is in the nation-states’ authority to decide on the regulations – following only two loose European guidelines. The direct result of national control is major dissimilarities in voting age, compulsion in voting, threshold, and apportionment of seats – amongst others. However, the most concerning fact is the dearth of true European parties. Therefore, the European electoral system is in need of numerous fundamental amendments before it could serve as the RUE’s voting system.

The basic requirements to vote on European elections should be citizenship in any of the member states, age of sixteen, and certificate of eligibility (see Reform #1). Regarding the electoral system, most experts prefer the voting systems of mixed-member proportional and single transferable, which normally could be considered the best indeed. However, the Republic of the United Europe is going to be a very unique political entity, which has national and European institutions co-operating in symbiosis; therefore, could not adapt either of those voting systems. In my view, the best and most common electoral procedure is the application of party-list proportional representation in a transnational form (or transnational list), enabling only true European parties (henceforward pan-Europarties) to stand for election.

Regrettably, the current European parties are mere coalitions of national parties without European agendas and programmes, meaning that the national delegates of national parties stand for election, campaigning along national issues and interests. Therefore, only pan-Europarties should be permitted to stand for election, obligating them to nominate candidates (in accordance with Reform #1) in every single member state and to campaign only under the name (and symbols) of the pan-Europarty. The transnational representative system would require national parties to form broader European coalitions, thus creating pan-Europarties, which concentrate on existing universal European issues, seeking to find solutions to problems (e.g. wages, unemployment, illegal immigration, health care) by proposing programmes across Europe.

Another important principle is the abolishment of seat allocation based on population size in the European Parliament (or EP), making 800 seats available for distribution in the EP based on the pan-Europarties’ election results instead. Once these principles are translated into legal regulations, the voters are going to have the new opportunity of voting for a national branch of a pan-Europarty in either of their member state of origin or of residence (voting should take place on the same day in all member states).

Mechanism

In the transnational party-list proportional representative system, the actual number of votes in each member state is going to be irrelevant, as only the rate of election result and turnout are going to decide the final result. The pan-Europarties’ rate of support is determined by the total result in percentage divided by the number of member states, ignoring the actual number of votes. More specifically, at the elections of the Republic of the United Europe (consisting of 27 member states), the European Green Party gets 15% of the votes in nine, 10% in ten, and 5% in seven member states, whereas it does not get a single vote in one of the member states. In this case, the calculation is [(15×9)+(10×10)+(5×7)+(0x1)]/27=10, which means that the Greens gain 10% (80 seats) of the total seats available in the EP. As I find it necessary to introduce a mandatory 5% admission threshold, there would be occasional surplus votes, which must be divided proportionately between the qualified parties in accordance with the votes gained. As even the most powerful national parties would be unable to nominate candidates and launch campaigns in every single member state of the RUE – let alone reach an average of 5% election result –, they will have to unite, forming pan-Europarties on a supranational level.

The first phase of the electoral system determines the number of seats gained by the pan-Europarties in total, but it does not resolve the issue of internal seat allocation to the numerous national branches. In my view, internal seat allocation has to be decided by the rate of supporting voting age population (henceforward SVAP), which indicates the rate of those, who voted for the national branches of the pan-Europarties of all eligible to vote (and registered) in each member state. In order to get the rate of SVAP, the rate of turnout (rate of registered VAP that voted) must be multiplied by the rate of election results in each member state, and then divided by 100. Each pan-Europarty’s average of total rate of SVAP and average of total seats gained must be used to calculate a key figure, which can be applied to calculate the exact seat allocation of each national branch within each pan-Europarty.

In order to present the precise calculation, I am going to use the EPP’s election results from 2019 in the followings (see full table at the bottom). Applying my principles of transnational list, the EPP secured the 26.04% of total votes (national branches’ rate of election results in total, divided by the number of member states), which translates into 208 seats (800×0,2604) in the new European Parliament. The exact seat allocation of these 208 seats is going to be set by two directives: the rate of SVAP and the mandatory minimum MEP.

The higher the turnout, the more representative the election result is, when it is compared to the entire population. Therefore, a strong election result is not going to be enough in itself, unless it is backed by strong turnout figures. For instance, Germany’s CDU-CSU gained 28.90% of the votes, backed by a 61.38% turnout; whereas Luxembourg’s CSV gained only 21.10% of the votes in the 2019 EP election, but the turnout was at an outstanding 84.24%. The current electoral system ignores the figures of turnout completely, rewarding parties purely based on their election results, which deforms the image of real support behind the elected political party. Therefore, I find it vital to integrate turnout into the process of seat allocation, treating it equally important to election results in order to recognise the real support of a political party amongst the population (or the rate of SVAP).

The rate of SVAP is determined by the turnout multiplied by the election results, and divided by 100 – in each member state. In the case of Germany’s CDU-CSU, the calculation is (61.38×28.90)/100=17.74, which means that 17.74% of the population eligible to vote support the coalition. In the case of Luxembourg’s CSV, the calculation is (84.24×21.10)/100=17.77, which is a very similar figure to CDU-CSU’s, meaning that despite of the lower election results, significantly higher turnout in Luxembourg could turn around the overall results. The rate of SVAP is going to be the key figure, which determines the exact seat allocation amongst the national branches of the pan-Europarty. In order to simply, but accurately calculate the exact seat allocation, the figures of average of total rate of SVAP and of theoretical average seats per national branch need to be known – based on the pan-Europarty’s election results.

After the rate of SVAP is calculated in each member state, the total figure has to be divided by 27 (number of member states), which equals to 12.41. As previously mentioned, the EPP’s election results in 2019 would gain them 208 seats (or 208.32 to be precise) in the new EP of 800 seats. The figure of theoretical average seats per national branches can be simply extracted from the 208.32 (total seats gained), dividing it by 27, which equals to 7.71. The average rate of SVAP (12.41) divided by the theoretical average of total seats gained per member state (7.71) equals to the amount of rate of SVAP (1.61) worth one seat in the EP. The master key of 1.61 has to be applied in order to calculate the exact seats gained by each national branch within the pan-Europarty (in this case the EPP). The rate of SVAP divided by 1.61 equals to the exact seats gained by the national branches. In the case of Germany’s CDU-CSU, it is 17.74/1.61=11.02 (11 seats), whereas in the case of Luxembourg’s CSV, it is 17.77/1.61=11.04 (11 seats).

As explained, the second phase resolves the issue of internal seat allocation per national branch within the pan-Europarties, highlighting the importance of turnout coupled with election results; whilst eliminating the large power deficit between more and less populous member states. In the current system, which is based on population size and national interests, CDU-CSU has 29 seats, whereas CSV has only two seats in the EP. Regardless of the number people that turn up voting, parties can still claim chunks of seats based solely on election results, which is unacceptable in my opinion.

I find it important to add one more small legal condition to the mechanism of internal seat allocation: mandatory minimum MEP. The mandatory minimum MEP ensures that every national branch of the pan-Europarty can delegate at least one MEP, meaning that in case of an awful election result the national branch of the member state would not be excluded, thus unrepresented, in the EP (e.g. Estonia). In order to add an additional MEP without gained seat, one of the national branches of the pan-Europarty has to relinquish one seat, which could be decided by the pan-Europarty’s leadership (e.g. the national branch that gained the most seats could transfer one seat).

Conclusion

The reformed European electoral system is not only going to be truly European, introducing regulations related to pan-Europarties, transnational list, and nomination, but also more legitimate due to the inclusion of true representation based on the number of people that attend to vote, not only on the number of votes. In order to enhance legitimacy in the European Parliament, candidates are going to have to mobilise their voters, and make them interested in voting (e.g. comprehensive programmes). The neutralisation of national tone in the agendas, programmes, and campaigns is also essential, which I am going to mention more detailed in the following volume of the reformation of the political system: the European Parliament.

The electoral system of the Republic of the United Europe

The post Reform #2: Political system (vol. 1) – European electoral system appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

The Council prolonged the existing asset freezes directed against 8 individuals responsible for the misappropriation of Ukrainian state funds.

The EU issued a declaration on South Sudan underlining that the humanitarian situation remains critical in the country, and urging the South Sudanese Government to pursue and accelerate the implementation of the Peace Agreement.

Coreper today mandated the Portuguese presidency to negotiate with the European Parliament the public country-by-country reporting (CBCR) directive.

At the end of his trip in the region, President Charles Michel met in Kyiv with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Member states' ambassadors to the EU approved a set of regulations on the structural funds for 2021-2027, representing one third of the EU's seven-year budget.

At a press point, following his visit to a crossing point in eastern Ukraine with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, European Council President Charles Michel expressed unequivocal EU support for the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

The Council imposed restrictive measures on four Russian individuals responsible for serious human rights violations in the country

Together with President Zelesnkyy, President Charles Michel addressed the forum "Ukraine 30. Development of Justice" during his visit to eastern Ukraine. He stressed the importance for Ukraine to commit to the fight against corruption and a comprehensive judicial reform, in the framework of the Association Agreement.

Remarks by President Charles Michel after his meeting in Georgia with Prime Minister Garibashvili and leaders of the opposition political parties.