The Thursday Briefing is a blog by Tom Redford about green things, especially if they’re political, and even more so if they are to do with Europe. What I write isn’t necessarily representative of any Green party.
Humour me for a moment, and go to the iTunes Store, Amazon MP3, or Spotify. I’m sure you will agree that the experience of buying music from these stores in the comfort of your own home is far more pleasant than the noisy and uncouth atmosphere of the average branch of HMV. Now, using the search box, try to find the song ‘Loca’ by Shakira. If you’re in the UK, then this toe-tapping number will probably not show up, or if it does, it will be on an obscure compilation album released by Sony Music Entertainment Austria.
Thanks to very little BBC reporting on it, it wasn’t until I noticed the European Council lanyards on the other people in the pub last night that I realised that there had been a summit during the day (somehow, despite working in the centre of Europe, and dealing with EU related things all day, I manage to miss the big stuff), but with the reports today of a confrontation between Sarkozy and Barroso, I’m glad that for once we see some passion in a European summit. It’s just unfortunate that it was over the appalling treatment of European citizens.
I’m a bit surprised that Sarkozy is still pushing on, claiming support from other heads of state and government, despite the fact that he really does seem to be standing alone on this one. I suppose it shows a modicum of decency in the leaders in the EU that there have been public condemnations of the French Government’s actions, and it certainly is nice to see a Commissioner willing to publicly criticise a member state, but I can’t help but feel that it is all a bit too little, and a bit too late. I don’t want Europe to be tiptoeing around, with everyone playing diplomacy. The EU should be part of the rough and tumble of politics, just like any national capital or regional government. Maybe the next time a member state does something reprehensible—though obviously it’d be nice if whatever it was simply didn’t happen—the Commission and Parliament speak out sooner.
If there is one thing that is sure to enrage the more Eurosceptical ‘contributors’ to the debate on whether or not the EU is a good thing, then it is the prospect of Brussels levying a tax on something, whether it be financial transactions, or aviation; just look at the way that Osbourne has had to drop the reassuring word, “sovereignty” into his remarks about the outcome of the Council of Ministers meeting the other day, where the proposed Financial Transaction Tax was discussed. But giving the EU the ability to levy taxes would surely bring a major benefit to individual member states, and one which might in other circumstances be welcomed by the likes of UKIP: it would let the EU raise part of its own budget, reducing the burden on member states’ budgets. It needn’t even increase the burden on the taxed, as the newly instituted EU taxes could be raised in areas that need to be taxed more stringently (aviation providing a prime example of this), but where this is not yet the case. Nevertheless, I’m pretty certain that the likes of the Taxpayers’ Alliance in the UK, and their friends around the continent will quickly paint any proposals on that note, should they ever emerge, as the self-aggrandising Eurocrats trying to get their mitts on money they have no right to.
I could never quite bring myself to proclaim, “anyone but Barroso”, last year when the post of Commission President was being considered—what with the implications that I’d plump for Wilders or Griffin instead—, but still, I really can’t say that I think he’s any good.
When I think of Barroso, I think of the grey concrete and soulless boulevards of the European quarter of Brussels. He is a civil servant and a bureaucrat; I can’t summon any idea of what he stands for, and, perhaps more importantly, where he wants to take the EU. Maybe this could be seen as a good thing, for the EU to have a settled time to get used to its new system with Lisbon &c., but while the EU is doing the equivalent of breaking in a new pair of shoes, where does it leave public perception and opinion of the Union?
Various blogs and newspaper articles have suggested that the post-war idealism of peace in Europe, brought about by the unity between nations, is meaningless to most people of my generation. Frankly they’re right. I still think it is one very positive contribution of the European project, but it isn’t something that can motivate people to accept what is still an oddity in most people’s conceptions of what a state is, and where laws come from.
Ultimately I wasn’t surprised by Barroso’s first State of the [European] Union. It was as much of a feast of buzzwords as many have predicted, and it didn’t really seem to say anything astonishingly new or push forward a continuing vision of where the European project is going. Perhaps it will prove a worthwhile contribution to the political process of the EU, with a growing acceptance that the citizens, and thus their representatives in Parliament, are prime, with the executive reporting to them, but I have little faith that this isn’t just going to end up like the sort of mechanical and contrived show that so much of EU politics and governance manages to perform. The fact that the compulsory attendance of MEPs was discussed before, with members being infantilized by a requirement to press voting buttons to confirm their presence is perhaps testament enough to the unnatural character of such an occasion.
It might not be the best thing to start a post with, but I’ve come to a conclusion: the citizens’ initiative, currently being fleshed out by various civil servants and politicians in Brussels, is not really all that much about citizens. My conclusion has been prompted by the changes that the Council of Ministers has proposed to the draft regulation that will set out how the whole thing will work.
“… and enhances further the democratic functioning of the Union by providing inter alia that every citizen shall have the right to participate in the democratic life of the Union and that not less than one million citizens who are nationals of a significant number of Member States may take the initiative of inviting the European Commission, within the framework of its powers, to submit any appropriate proposal on matters where citizens consider that a legal act of the Union is required for the purpose of implementing the Treaties.”
Extract from the proposal for a Regulation on the citizens’ initiative.
A bit of background first: the Lisbon Treaty included a provision for a citizens initiative, essentially being a petition by individual citizens to get whatever the issue at stake might be, considered by the Commission. Lisbon however, left most of the detail for later. Now is later, and the details are here.
With the current Council proposals, a minimum number of citizens (in proportion to the number of MEPs from a state), in at least one third of member states, will need to sign the initiative for it to be accepted. I don’t know about you, but I certainly would struggle as an ordinary European Citizen to pull off something like that. Even with a movement of some form behind the issue being dealt with, it’d take a lot of international coordination (I’d say more than Twitter could achieve) to get the initiative off the ground, let alone successfully submit it to the Commission. There’s also a slightly sinister provision that, “the Commission should reject the registration of proposals which would be manifestly against the values of the Union.” From a legal perspective, that’s not too controversial a statement. It means that initiatives which contradict the positive and sunny opening articles of the treaties—where all the good things the EU wants to do and thinks are important are laid down—would be dismissed without the Commission having to publish the initiative on its website, or give it any serious thought at all. From a non legalese point of view though, the language is unfortunate. Politically, it could be thrown back at the EU, for it reserving the right to dismiss things based on values that it, not the people, decides. And to citizens thinking of organising an initiative, it is as clear as mud in its meaning.
The citizens initiative, as it is being proposed now, needs someone with a fairly well developed knowledge of how the EU works. Most people don’t have that sort of knowledge about their own political systems, but they aren’t barred at the door for that ignorance. In Scotland, ordinary people (am I using that term too much now?) can start or participate in a petitions system which triggers discussion on the topics in a committee of the Scottish Parliament. Knowledge of the intricacies of this system, and a reading of the Scotland Act to determine the details of reserved and devolved powers. or the ‘values’ of Scotland, isn’t needed. An interest in a political issue (and isn’t everything political?) and an understanding of how to get people to sign a petition means that any person in Scotland can “participate in the democratic life of the” country, to borrow a few words from the Council’s suggestions.
The Citizens’ Initiative will be pretty good for some though. Lobbying groups, NGOs, and campaigning networks will love this. It offers a way to get the EU to, at the very least, think about something. This is good to some extent, but it means that it is wrong to go about thinking that having this wonderful Citizens’ Initiative helps to lessen the democratic deficit of the EU. I still support the idea of the initiative, but it is not something that many ordinary citizens will ever have a chance of using to further a cause dear to their hearts.
I seem to be in a digital rights mood just now, what with my last post, and a Eurovision prompted foray into the EBU and EC’s positions on cross border media (I know, only I could go from the Eurovision Song Contest to the Audio Visual Media Services Directive in only two steps). I’m far from an expert on European broadcasting rules, and regulation of AVMS (to use the wonderful Eurojargon), my specialist area being development policy, but as an avid consumer of media, gulping down content from the UK, the Netherlands, and Belgium, to name but a few, it seems crazy that the directive is limited by not creating a common market for copyright. To get boring for a second, I shall reach for my copy of the Treaty on European Union, which states in paragraph 3 of Article 3,
“The Union shall establish an internal market … It shall promote economic, social and territorial cohesion, and solidarity among Member States. It shall respect its rich cultural and linguistic diversity, and shall ensure that Europe’s cultural heritage is safeguarded and enhanced.”
To me, these provisions suggest that a copyright licensing system that reinforces national borders and locks some truly fantastic content (naturally not just TV, but also music &c.) into the member states would be contrary to the principles on which the EU is built. I have a feeling it’ll take a tad more than an EBU workshop with Tom Dice and his guitar to make cross-border copyright work.
Gordon Brown might have everyone (by which I mean, electoral-system-obsessed-politics-geeks of the sort who will happily engage in a passionate discussion down the pub of the merits of different forms of PR—and I would include myself in there) talking about electoral reform in the UK right now, but in terms of actual impact on the machine of politics, I’d be willing to bet that Article 11, paragraph 4 of the Treaty on European Union will be bigger, more significant, and, if we can tear ourselves away from d’Hondt versus Sainte-Laguë for long enough, subject to more geek analysis.
I like Article 11, paragraph 4, but I’m annoyed with it as well. Why am I annoyed? I’m annoyed because I signed a petition calling for the EU to raise its carbon emissions reduction targets from 20% to 30%; while that’s all well and good (why not head on over to the petition yourself?), it could be so much better if I was signing the form of petition found in Article 11: a citizens’ initiative.
A bit of digging revealed that the European Commission has consulted on implementing the initiative, and will be drawing up a regulation this year, before actually unleashing this little bit of direct democracy in 2011. I know it takes time to make laws, and it isn’t a job to rush, but Lisbon has been around for ages, surely the fleshing out of the text of the article* could have happened sooner?
*4. Not less than one million citizens who are nationals of a significant number of Member States may take the initiative of inviting the European Commission, within the framework of its powers, to submit any appropriate proposal on matters where citizens consider that a legal act of the Union is required for the purpose of implementing the Treaties.
Constantly talking about the institutional aspects of the EU is getting boring, so it made me happy to see a nice, sort of green and European story in European Voice today. By 2021, there will be a requirement for new buildings to have “nearly zero emissions”.
Leaving aside the fact that this only covers new-builds, not existing structures; will be so woefully late in implementation that its impact will be somewhat limited; and doesn’t seem to offer a definition of “nearly”, its nice to hear of a bit of greenery getting close to being passed.
Oh all right, I’ll admit I’m just grasping at the smallest fragment of news to satisfy my self-imposed commitment to blog every day for the next fortnight.
