Time for European Parliament to become democratic institution

THE new European Parliament kicked off its five-year term during the week, a term during which it will either grow up and become a properly democratic institution, or continue to languish in the twilight world the member states have created for it.

The ruling of the German Constitutional Court is sitting like an elephant in the corner of the great hemicycle where the MEPs meet in plenary.

The initial jubilation of the court ruling that the Lisbon treaty was compatible with German law has worn off and the impact of its argument is taking hold.

Basically it said that the Lisbon treaty was OK because it does not make the EU into a state, so cannot take from the sovereignty of the member states.

Its argument found that the Parliament could not replace national parliaments in the role of giving democratic legitimacy to the will of the people.

It argued that the European Parliament cannot be considered completely democratic for two reasons.

Firstly, because citizens are not represented equally in the Parliament. For instance, Germany has one MEP for each 800,000 people, while Ireland has two.

Secondly, because the Parliament was not constituted with political parties divided into government and opposition, so voters had no control over policy.

The judgment’s comment on the European Parliament was akin to telling someone they did very well in an exam considering they were a half-wit.

This reality of the Parliament’s lack of traditional democratic legitimacy has been recognised for some time by various MEPs – including those committed to a more federal Europe.

Head of the European Federalists, Liberal group MEP Andrew Duff, is pledged to push for reform of the Parliament. He wants to see a certain number of MEPs elected on a cross-border system in the next elections in 2014.

This would begin to address one issue raised by the German court.

The court has proposed its own solution, however, in insisting that the German parliament must approve EU proposals before they become law.

The Government has already said it will bring draft legislation before the Oireachtas in future and, indeed, the Lisbon treaty provides for this.

However, there is a danger that, given the country’s size, the German parliament will be the tail that wags the EU dog. It can dictate a direction for laws or, if it vetoes legislation, then it cannot proceed at EU level.

The German court ruling must result in a greater sense of reality both in the Parliament and the member states. Its ruling means that the pilot project that the EU has been up to now has to find a new way of being democratic.

The European Parliament, in particular, must address the issues raised by the court. The judgment makes it clear that claiming to be democratic is not enough – it must be democratic.

If it cannot achieve this, it risks being just an expensive ornament whose decisions do not necessarily matter as it is being overseen by national parliaments.

Its going to take a lot of ingenuity, diplomacy and hard-tack politics to fashion the EU so that it remains a confederation of nation states but is able to take decisions that benefit the union overall and move forward.

If the Lisbon treaty comes into force, the Parliament will have equal say with the member states (Council) in almost all legislation to be decided at EU level. So it’s even more important that it sorts out this issue of democratic legitimacy.

The member states will not relish that thought as they hope the Lisbon treaty will put an end to debate about the institutions and their powers.

However, they could find themselves caught between the potentially paralysing power of national parliaments and the need to unite to tackle global problems.