The Alliance of European Conservatives and Reformists have announced that they will not be putting forward a candidate for the Commission presidency in the 2014 elections. As an anti-federalist party, the main reason being given is that participating in the presidency contest will play into the hands of the more federalist parties. But are they giving up an electoral opportunity by giving the "federalist" candidates a free run? And does their main argument fit in with the AECR's general political position?
Obviously the AECR must consider it a good tactical and electoral move. Presumably the AECR is setting itself up to oppose any move by the European Parliament to prevent the European Council from ignoring the contest when it nominates the next Commission president, but their support of a nominee will probably be more dependent on how closely he or she reflects their free market and anti-federalist positions. The biggest advantage is probably the freedom of movement it gives the AECR's member parties, such as the UK Conservatives, in the elections. European elections have typically been viewed through a national lens, and AECR parties will be free to highlight the any embarrassing policies that their opponents may be connected with through their European political families.
The common decision to not run a candidate gives the national parties a good Eurosceptic response to any questions over why they're not supporting a candidate, which could help protect them on their Eurosceptic flank. Finally, the AECR is unlikely to go from fifth to first place in the European Parliament so they are not going to miss out on a chance to actually win the office of Commission President for themselves. Therefore it probably seems to be a small sacrifice for a potential tactical advantage.
Despite these advantages, I think that the AECR have missed an opportunity. While it was left to Daniel Hannan to give the Europarty's reasoning for the decision (that the EU doesn't have a common demos and therefore the contest cannot be democratically legitimate), unlike Hannan the AECR is not for withdrawal from the EU but for a looser, more free trade orientated Union. This means that it's not necessarily ideologically inconsistent to take part in the contest: votes for a common candidate espousing a more decentralised EU wouldn't by definition contradict the demos argument (agreement on an anti-federalist message should logically indicate an unwillingness to identify as a pan-European demos). It's not as if the European Conservatives don't want the European Parliament to have a stronger say over the Commission - they called for reform of the confirmation process of nominated commissioners back in 2010!
Politically, it is a missed opportunity to promote an anti-federalist but pro-free trade message. If the European Conservatives want to revise the free movement of people, then a common candidate will be able to put that opposing viewpoint to the other candidates in the televised debate, and the national parties could draw on their alliance - and perhaps the opinion polls - to argue that their proposals for changing the EU are possible and have support. The European Conservatives don't have a member party in each Member State, but the campaign could raise those issues where they haven't been raised before and it would help set the AECR up as an alternative political home for the more Eurosceptic member parties of the centre-right European People's Party, or put pressure on the EPP to move closer to them politically. When it comes to the televised debates, the AECR is probably betting that they won't attract much attention, but there is a risk that they might, and that the conservative viewpoint doesn't get that air time.
The European Conservatives believe in the single market and the EU as a market (though they are increasingly questioning the free movement of people) but want to return some powers to the national level, so the question is if they can advance that view within the EU. A common candidate could be a valuable tool in campaigning for that version of the EU, while surrendering that political space to more federalist parties actually makes it harder for the AECR to differentiate itself from the out-and-out anti-EU Eurosceptics. Without a credible voice for a more decentralised Union, the European Conservative position will lose support to parties like UKIP. After all, if the EU appears to be captured by the other Europarties, then the supporters of the AECR may increasingly wonder if their approach is worthwhile or if they should just abandon the hope of changing the EU. Not running a candidate is a political move that is more likely to benefit the Hannanite position than the Cameronite one.
I may not be a supporter of the European Conservatives, but their decision not to run a common candidate could be a loss to the quality of the public debate as well as a missed opportunity for the AECR itself.
Showing posts with label ECR. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ECR. Show all posts
Thursday, 27 February 2014
Friday, 28 June 2013
EU Budget Deal: Progress, from a Psychological point of View?
The EU institutions (Commission, Council and Parliament) reached a deal on the Multi-annual Financial Framework (MFF) that plans EU budget spending for 2014-2020. The MFF is not absolutely final since it has to pass a Parliamentary vote in September, but the deal does mark the end of the parliamentary revolt against the deal cut by national leaders. Politically, it's been a very charged budget, with arguments for cuts in a time of austerity, the European Parliament flexing its muscles over the budget, and the resignation of the parliamentary rapporteur on the MFF after the Irish Presidency mistakenly announced a deal last week.
So what's in the deal?
The cuts agreed by the Council remain: for the first time, the EU Budget will face a real terms cut of €85 billion, reducing the budget over the next 7 years to €960 billion. The focus on cuts meant that the parts of the budget prized by national governments were protected at the expense of more discretionary spending. The deal softens this by:
The deal has shown that the EP has made some progress in shifting the MFF back towards some spending that is not the preserve of a national carve-up. There are national vetoes behind agricultural spending, cohesion spending and rebates, but no single Member State has a defining interest in EU projects that tackle unemployment, research or competitiveness. Can you imagine a British Prime Minister saying that they've cut some of the rebate in order to protect spending on unemployment programmes? The EP has demonstrated some value in trying to balance the budget more in the direction of spending for programmes that all of Europe benefits from, but that don't deliver specific national receipts of money.
That said, the concessions aren't a major victory for the Parliament - particularly on the aid for the most deprived and on MFF review, where the concessions appear so vague and woolly as to be practically meaningless. However, it is notable that a right-leaning European Parliament has not held out for reducing or eliminating the cuts to the EU budget. Despite the unprecedented level of power over the budget, the Parliament hasn't been as pushy as it might have been. From my point of view on the left, the deal is a defeat: it doesn't really deliver that much in terms of research and employment projects, and it buys into the idea of austerity despite the EU Budget not being in deficit. Cutting from common programmes to symbolically satisfy austerity is daft, and it undercuts further the ability of common European spending to offset, at least to some extent, the economic damage caused by national austerity.
Still, the fact that a right-wing EP largely endorsed the budget direction set by the European People's Party-dominated Council is not surprising, though it's another sign that the Parliament does act along ideological and party lines, which is important for the upcoming elections next year. Party and policy do matter in the EP.
Party Positions
The EP still has to vote in the MFF in September if the Framework is to be passed, so the positions of the European political groups matter. What are they?
Supporters:
The European People's Party (EPP; centre-right) probably support the deal, though they do not have a specific press release at the time of writing. Since they are the largest group in the Parliament and dominate the Council and national governments, they will probably support the deal. EPP parliamentary leader Joseph Daul supports current Eurozone/EU economic policy, but also insists on flexibility and a review clause in the MFF. I think EPP support can be assumed.
The European Conservatives and Reformists group (ECR; centre-right, but further right than the EPP), have welcomed the deal, and have complained that the European Parliament tried to obstruct it. Since they have got the cut in the budget they wanted, and the cut is a big win for David Cameron, they're not likely to vote against.
Qualified Supporters:
The Alliance of Liberals and Democrats (ALDE; centrist, and economically centre-right) have welcomed the deal, but want to secure some of the details before giving support, such as on the legal basis of the MFF (to secure the Parliament's power), on money for the Digital Agenda and on the review clause.
The Socialists and Democrats group (S&D; centre-left) have welcomed the deal as an improvement for youth unemployment schemes and Erasmus, but will discuss their position next week.
Though only qualified support has been given, I imagine that now that the EP has finished its negotiations as a whole and that there have been some concessions, these groups will largely support the MFF.
Opposition:
The European Greens (Green) have condemned the deal as only consisting of cosmetic changes when the overall budget is still being cut.
United Left (GUE-NGL; left-wing) also condemned the cuts to the budget, and hit out against EP President Schulz for only seeking agreement with the two biggest political groups in the Parliament (EPP and S&D), keeping the rest of the groups in the dark.
While these aren't firm voting stances by the political groups, it looks like there will probably be a majority for the MFF, failing any last minute revivals of Parliament-wide opposition.
So what's in the deal?
The cuts agreed by the Council remain: for the first time, the EU Budget will face a real terms cut of €85 billion, reducing the budget over the next 7 years to €960 billion. The focus on cuts meant that the parts of the budget prized by national governments were protected at the expense of more discretionary spending. The deal softens this by:
- Permitting the front loading of up to €2,543 million in 2014-15 for youth employment, research and Erasmus and apprenticeships and pro-SME policies, to be split as:
- €2,143 million for youth unemployment;
- €200 million for Horizon 2020, the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation;
- €150 million for Erasmus; and
- €50 million for COSME, a programme for the competitiveness of SMEs;
- Allowing for voluntary contributions by Member States by up to €1 billion to the €2.5 billion pot for aid for the most deprived;
- Unspent money will in an annual budget will be retained by the EU for spending on other projects, rather than being returned to the Member States;
- There is a concession to the idea of the MFF being subject to review and revision, but it seems very vague.Is this, in the words of EP President Martin Schulz, progress "from a psychological point of view"?
The deal has shown that the EP has made some progress in shifting the MFF back towards some spending that is not the preserve of a national carve-up. There are national vetoes behind agricultural spending, cohesion spending and rebates, but no single Member State has a defining interest in EU projects that tackle unemployment, research or competitiveness. Can you imagine a British Prime Minister saying that they've cut some of the rebate in order to protect spending on unemployment programmes? The EP has demonstrated some value in trying to balance the budget more in the direction of spending for programmes that all of Europe benefits from, but that don't deliver specific national receipts of money.
That said, the concessions aren't a major victory for the Parliament - particularly on the aid for the most deprived and on MFF review, where the concessions appear so vague and woolly as to be practically meaningless. However, it is notable that a right-leaning European Parliament has not held out for reducing or eliminating the cuts to the EU budget. Despite the unprecedented level of power over the budget, the Parliament hasn't been as pushy as it might have been. From my point of view on the left, the deal is a defeat: it doesn't really deliver that much in terms of research and employment projects, and it buys into the idea of austerity despite the EU Budget not being in deficit. Cutting from common programmes to symbolically satisfy austerity is daft, and it undercuts further the ability of common European spending to offset, at least to some extent, the economic damage caused by national austerity.
Still, the fact that a right-wing EP largely endorsed the budget direction set by the European People's Party-dominated Council is not surprising, though it's another sign that the Parliament does act along ideological and party lines, which is important for the upcoming elections next year. Party and policy do matter in the EP.
Party Positions
The EP still has to vote in the MFF in September if the Framework is to be passed, so the positions of the European political groups matter. What are they?
Supporters:
The European People's Party (EPP; centre-right) probably support the deal, though they do not have a specific press release at the time of writing. Since they are the largest group in the Parliament and dominate the Council and national governments, they will probably support the deal. EPP parliamentary leader Joseph Daul supports current Eurozone/EU economic policy, but also insists on flexibility and a review clause in the MFF. I think EPP support can be assumed.
The European Conservatives and Reformists group (ECR; centre-right, but further right than the EPP), have welcomed the deal, and have complained that the European Parliament tried to obstruct it. Since they have got the cut in the budget they wanted, and the cut is a big win for David Cameron, they're not likely to vote against.
Qualified Supporters:
The Alliance of Liberals and Democrats (ALDE; centrist, and economically centre-right) have welcomed the deal, but want to secure some of the details before giving support, such as on the legal basis of the MFF (to secure the Parliament's power), on money for the Digital Agenda and on the review clause.
The Socialists and Democrats group (S&D; centre-left) have welcomed the deal as an improvement for youth unemployment schemes and Erasmus, but will discuss their position next week.
Though only qualified support has been given, I imagine that now that the EP has finished its negotiations as a whole and that there have been some concessions, these groups will largely support the MFF.
Opposition:
The European Greens (Green) have condemned the deal as only consisting of cosmetic changes when the overall budget is still being cut.
United Left (GUE-NGL; left-wing) also condemned the cuts to the budget, and hit out against EP President Schulz for only seeking agreement with the two biggest political groups in the Parliament (EPP and S&D), keeping the rest of the groups in the dark.
While these aren't firm voting stances by the political groups, it looks like there will probably be a majority for the MFF, failing any last minute revivals of Parliament-wide opposition.
Tuesday, 16 October 2012
Employment and Social Affairs Committee on Economic and Monetary Union
The European Parliament's Employment and Social Affairs Committee adopted an opinion last week on its position on economic and monetary union, pushing, naturally enough, for employment and social matters to be given more weight when it comes to European economic policy. You can read it here: PDF. The non-binding opinion was adopted on a vote of 27 for, 16 against and 1 abstention.
The Committee's basic attitude is reflected in this paragraph (p.6):
The opinion calls for minimum social benchmarks and for the Commission to look into the feasibility of introducing a minimum unemployment allowance for the Eurozone. The Committee also calls for an "integrated employment and social policy framework", and that increased worker mobility should be complimented with access to social protection and the portability of pension rights.
The recommendations reflect some of the amendments in the parliamentary reports on the 2-Pack of legislation: a Social Pact, employment and social benchmarks to make up part of any troika programme, for there to be a representative of the International Labour Organisation added to the Troika, and making the European Semester more accountable to the European Parliament. Cooperation on tax is also cited as necessary to prevent the free movement of capital from undermining tax systems - probably the most controversial idea if it gained any ground in public debate: tax competition versus certain common bands to prevent an undermining of tax systems within the internal market.
The European Conservatives and Reformists hit out against the opinion:
While I don't agree with everything in the opinion (there's a crazy paragraph on linking access to capital to the potential for employment in the investment) , I would support support some minimum social standards. The problem we face at the moment is that the policies at the EU level are far too focused on sovereign debt and the banking system, to the determent of employment and social policies (and the internal market has by definition a social dimension) - and while introducing minimum social standards is necessary to make the internal market work for all and to help preserve the Member States' own powers in this area, there needs to be political debate and support for these programmes.
I hope the parties that voted for this opinion will put these ideas and policies into their manifestos come election time so we have a chance to vote on them.
The Committee's basic attitude is reflected in this paragraph (p.6):
"...any upgrade of the role of the Commissioner for economic and monetary affairs will need to be echoed by an upgrade of the role of the Commissioner for employment and social affairs so as to ensure a balanced approach of the social market economy, in the same spirit the EPSCO Council [Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council in the Council of Ministers] should be upgraded and organized in a euro zone formation."
The opinion calls for minimum social benchmarks and for the Commission to look into the feasibility of introducing a minimum unemployment allowance for the Eurozone. The Committee also calls for an "integrated employment and social policy framework", and that increased worker mobility should be complimented with access to social protection and the portability of pension rights.
The recommendations reflect some of the amendments in the parliamentary reports on the 2-Pack of legislation: a Social Pact, employment and social benchmarks to make up part of any troika programme, for there to be a representative of the International Labour Organisation added to the Troika, and making the European Semester more accountable to the European Parliament. Cooperation on tax is also cited as necessary to prevent the free movement of capital from undermining tax systems - probably the most controversial idea if it gained any ground in public debate: tax competition versus certain common bands to prevent an undermining of tax systems within the internal market.
The European Conservatives and Reformists hit out against the opinion:
"The document also called for a minimum unemployment allowance and integration of civic initiatives, trade unions and other social groups at all levels of political decision-making. Such a populist proposal would, however, cut back on powers of democratically elected representatives in favour of lobbying organizations."
While I don't agree with everything in the opinion (there's a crazy paragraph on linking access to capital to the potential for employment in the investment) , I would support support some minimum social standards. The problem we face at the moment is that the policies at the EU level are far too focused on sovereign debt and the banking system, to the determent of employment and social policies (and the internal market has by definition a social dimension) - and while introducing minimum social standards is necessary to make the internal market work for all and to help preserve the Member States' own powers in this area, there needs to be political debate and support for these programmes.
I hope the parties that voted for this opinion will put these ideas and policies into their manifestos come election time so we have a chance to vote on them.
Wednesday, 29 February 2012
The EU's PNR Directive in Parliament
As well as Sophie in ‘t Veld reporting on the proposed EU-US PNR Agreement on Monday, Timothy Kirkhope (ECR) presented his draft report on the EU’s own Passenger Name Record regime. The PNR Directive is technical, but it involves a huge amount of data collection on people not suspected of a crime, and the processing of data to create models used to identify unknown criminals. The law poses major questions on data protection, and there are also issues of how necessary and effective the system is, and how much of the costs airlines (and therefore consumers) will bear to pay for the system. I’ll divide this post into outlining and discussing the proposed directive and briefly looking at Kirkhope’s report to the Committee on civil liberties, justice and home affairs.
The PNR Directive.
The proposed PNR Directive (PDF) would introduce a system where a wide range of data gathered by airlines on passengers on flights into and out of the EU would be processed for the purposes of fighting terrorism and serious transnational crime. The data gathered includes the information on passports, flight arrival and departure times and destination, check in status, payment details, address and contact information, frequent flyer information, travel agent, travel itinerary, general remarks (including information on unaccompanied minors and their guardian’s contact details and relationship to the minor), seat number, baggage information, code share information, ticketing field information, and date of reservation/issue of ticket. This data would be collected from everyone on flights into and out of the EU regardless of whether or not they’re suspected of a crime and without distinction to how susceptible an air route is judged to be to use for terrorism of serious transnational crime (also the UK has suggested an amendment for the latter). This raises questions of proportionality.
PNR data is to be used in three different ways: re-actively, in real time, and pro-actively. The re-active use of PNR data is the use of data in the investigation or prosecution of a crime which has already taken place; use of PNR data in real time entails the use of data to arrest or place an individual under surveillance for a crime being committed or about to be committed; and the pro-active use of PNR data is using PNR data to build up criteria against to identify persons worthy of further surveillance or action. “Serious transnational crime” isn’t really harmonised by the Directive – it uses the list of crimes in the European Arrest Warrant, but Member States can decide to exclude some of these crimes from their transposing legislation if they think one is too “minor” – so the Directive can’t even decide what’s a “serious crime”!
The data is transferred by airlines to “Passenger Information Units” (PIUs) that will be set up to process and analyse the data, and alert national law enforcement agencies if necessary. PIUs can be national, or countries can set up joint PIUs if they want to share the costs. (The vast majority of EU Member States don’t have a PNR regime, so this PNR Directive will effectively introduce PNR systems into most Member States for the first time). The data will be retained for 30 days, after which it will be “depersonalised” (identifying data removed, but not deleted so it can still be restored and used) and retained in this masked state for a further 5 years. Data can be kept for longer if it’s used in criminal investigations or prosecutions. 5 years seems disproportionate if the data isn’t being used in an investigation or prosecution – and even the Council’s own legal service has suggested a maximum retention period of 2 years ("Draft Agreement on the Use of Passenger Name Records (PNR), Note for the Attention of Mr Stefano Manservisi Director General, DG Home, European Commission Legal Service, SJ.f(2011)603245, 18/5/2011").
Data subjects (people who own data that is being stored or processed) have rights of access, rectification and erasure, and the National Supervisory Authorities set up under EU data protection legislation (Framework Decision on Data Protection) monitor the PIUs’ use of data and assist data subjects with their requests to exercise their rights. However the purposes for gathering and processing the data is so wide that it’s debateable how much substance there is to these rights. For example, PIUs can use the data for general analysis work and to update and create criteria for “objective assessment criteria” to identify unknown criminals – a very wide purpose to use and process data, so PIUs could probably refuse under the Directive to erase a person’s data even if they aren’t suspected of a crime. Also, this use of objective assessment criteria means that the PNR regime is open to the profiling of individuals by law enforcement authorities, where they might be put under closer scrutiny simply because they happened to match a certain pattern of behaviour. There are no safeguards for independent external review of these objective factors (the National Supervisory Authorities don’t seem to have the power to do so), and nor has there been an assessment of the effectiveness of this method in identifying unknown criminals versus the false identification of innocent people.
There’s also little satisfactory evidence that PNR is necessary or effective for fighting terrorism and serious transnational crime. We already have the Schengen Information System, the Visa Information System and the Carrier’s Directive (Link) permitted the use of a less invasive Advance Passenger Information system in 2004, where airlines would transfer passport information of passengers and flight arrival/destination details (rather than the whole gamut of PNR information) – but there’s been no assessment of the effectiveness of API, or whether changes in it or the other systems could provide a cheaper and less invasive alternative. The main advantage offered by PNR is presumably the detection of unknown criminals. The Commission has used crime statistics to highlight the levels of serious crime and terrorism to establish the need for further security measures to be introduced and it has also used statistics on the of PNR data in drug seizures (see its impact assessment here: PDF) Interestingly, some of these impressive PNR statistics derive from some Member States which do not currently have a national PNR regime! (Like Belgium - PDF).
So PNR faces a lot of questions on several fronts: is it necessary, does it work, are there cheaper and less invasive alternatives? So how does the draft report in the Committee deal with this?
Timothy Kirkhope’s report.
The draft report (PDF) has contains a long list of proposed amendments to the directive (it should be noted that the report is open to amendments from the Committee before it votes on the report as a whole).
Some of these amendments would clarify the scope of the Directive – by stating that it applies to airlines incorporated in the EU and that store data in the EU, and expanding the Directive to include intra-EU flights as well as flights entering and leaving the EU. By including intra-EU flights, there would obviously be a much, much greater amount of data gathered on people. In Committee it was explained that the Commission wanted the Directive to avoid including intra-EU flights so it could test the system out first (the Directive includes provision for a review in 5 years on whether to include intra-EU flights), while Kirkhope countered that gradual introductions of schemes rarely work in his experience. The costs of transferring data to the PIUs would be borne by the airlines, while Member States would pay for the PIUs and their work. Kirkhope said that the estimated costs that would be passed on to consumers in ticket prices would be between 10 to 18 cents.
The report’s amendments insert provisions regulating the transfer of data between Member States to ensure that safeguard standards are maintained and that data is only shared in certain circumstances. There are also new provisions to more extensively regulate the transfer of data to third countries, though the assessment is still left to Member States so there isn’t a common decision on the adequacy of a third country’s data protection standards like there is for internal market matters.
The amendments would also clarify the state of data after the initial 30 day period – the Directive uses the phrases “masked” and “anonymised”. Unfortunately, the draft report decides to simply change the phrasing to a more unified “masked” terminology rather than changing the procedure so identifying data will be deleted after 30 days. Some amendments do aim to strengthen data protection by setting down punishment for data breaches such as demotion, denial of system access, formal reprimands, and removal form duty, as well as an obligation to inform data subjects that might be affected by a data breach. National Supervisory Authorities would be given powers to take disciplinary action against persons responsible for a privacy breach, increasing their powers of independent oversight.
Kirkthorpe believes that the use of a PNR regime is necessary and proportional. While the necessity of the Directive is probably best debated by the Committee and whole Parliament, there are still questions over how proportional the Directive would be even with the report’s amendments, particularly over the targeting (or lack of targeting) of air routes, the oversight of creating and use of objective assessment criteria, and the length of the retention period. It does provide some good improvements to people’s rights to access, rectify and erase their data and makes it easier and more effective to exercise these rights (though the problem of the content of these rights given the wide use of data remains).
I’m very sceptical of the necessity for a PNR system – a lot of the analysis backing up the proposal seems to be based on numbers on the increase of crime together with rhetoric on fighting crime and anecdotal examples of how PNR could be used, rather than an analysis of the benefits of PNR versus the existing EU databases. It seems that we are being asked to accept the creation of a massive information gathering system on trust, and I’m not convinced.
The PNR Directive.
The proposed PNR Directive (PDF) would introduce a system where a wide range of data gathered by airlines on passengers on flights into and out of the EU would be processed for the purposes of fighting terrorism and serious transnational crime. The data gathered includes the information on passports, flight arrival and departure times and destination, check in status, payment details, address and contact information, frequent flyer information, travel agent, travel itinerary, general remarks (including information on unaccompanied minors and their guardian’s contact details and relationship to the minor), seat number, baggage information, code share information, ticketing field information, and date of reservation/issue of ticket. This data would be collected from everyone on flights into and out of the EU regardless of whether or not they’re suspected of a crime and without distinction to how susceptible an air route is judged to be to use for terrorism of serious transnational crime (also the UK has suggested an amendment for the latter). This raises questions of proportionality.
PNR data is to be used in three different ways: re-actively, in real time, and pro-actively. The re-active use of PNR data is the use of data in the investigation or prosecution of a crime which has already taken place; use of PNR data in real time entails the use of data to arrest or place an individual under surveillance for a crime being committed or about to be committed; and the pro-active use of PNR data is using PNR data to build up criteria against to identify persons worthy of further surveillance or action. “Serious transnational crime” isn’t really harmonised by the Directive – it uses the list of crimes in the European Arrest Warrant, but Member States can decide to exclude some of these crimes from their transposing legislation if they think one is too “minor” – so the Directive can’t even decide what’s a “serious crime”!
The data is transferred by airlines to “Passenger Information Units” (PIUs) that will be set up to process and analyse the data, and alert national law enforcement agencies if necessary. PIUs can be national, or countries can set up joint PIUs if they want to share the costs. (The vast majority of EU Member States don’t have a PNR regime, so this PNR Directive will effectively introduce PNR systems into most Member States for the first time). The data will be retained for 30 days, after which it will be “depersonalised” (identifying data removed, but not deleted so it can still be restored and used) and retained in this masked state for a further 5 years. Data can be kept for longer if it’s used in criminal investigations or prosecutions. 5 years seems disproportionate if the data isn’t being used in an investigation or prosecution – and even the Council’s own legal service has suggested a maximum retention period of 2 years ("Draft Agreement on the Use of Passenger Name Records (PNR), Note for the Attention of Mr Stefano Manservisi Director General, DG Home, European Commission Legal Service, SJ.f(2011)603245, 18/5/2011").
Data subjects (people who own data that is being stored or processed) have rights of access, rectification and erasure, and the National Supervisory Authorities set up under EU data protection legislation (Framework Decision on Data Protection) monitor the PIUs’ use of data and assist data subjects with their requests to exercise their rights. However the purposes for gathering and processing the data is so wide that it’s debateable how much substance there is to these rights. For example, PIUs can use the data for general analysis work and to update and create criteria for “objective assessment criteria” to identify unknown criminals – a very wide purpose to use and process data, so PIUs could probably refuse under the Directive to erase a person’s data even if they aren’t suspected of a crime. Also, this use of objective assessment criteria means that the PNR regime is open to the profiling of individuals by law enforcement authorities, where they might be put under closer scrutiny simply because they happened to match a certain pattern of behaviour. There are no safeguards for independent external review of these objective factors (the National Supervisory Authorities don’t seem to have the power to do so), and nor has there been an assessment of the effectiveness of this method in identifying unknown criminals versus the false identification of innocent people.
There’s also little satisfactory evidence that PNR is necessary or effective for fighting terrorism and serious transnational crime. We already have the Schengen Information System, the Visa Information System and the Carrier’s Directive (Link) permitted the use of a less invasive Advance Passenger Information system in 2004, where airlines would transfer passport information of passengers and flight arrival/destination details (rather than the whole gamut of PNR information) – but there’s been no assessment of the effectiveness of API, or whether changes in it or the other systems could provide a cheaper and less invasive alternative. The main advantage offered by PNR is presumably the detection of unknown criminals. The Commission has used crime statistics to highlight the levels of serious crime and terrorism to establish the need for further security measures to be introduced and it has also used statistics on the of PNR data in drug seizures (see its impact assessment here: PDF) Interestingly, some of these impressive PNR statistics derive from some Member States which do not currently have a national PNR regime! (Like Belgium - PDF).
So PNR faces a lot of questions on several fronts: is it necessary, does it work, are there cheaper and less invasive alternatives? So how does the draft report in the Committee deal with this?
Timothy Kirkhope’s report.
The draft report (PDF) has contains a long list of proposed amendments to the directive (it should be noted that the report is open to amendments from the Committee before it votes on the report as a whole).
Some of these amendments would clarify the scope of the Directive – by stating that it applies to airlines incorporated in the EU and that store data in the EU, and expanding the Directive to include intra-EU flights as well as flights entering and leaving the EU. By including intra-EU flights, there would obviously be a much, much greater amount of data gathered on people. In Committee it was explained that the Commission wanted the Directive to avoid including intra-EU flights so it could test the system out first (the Directive includes provision for a review in 5 years on whether to include intra-EU flights), while Kirkhope countered that gradual introductions of schemes rarely work in his experience. The costs of transferring data to the PIUs would be borne by the airlines, while Member States would pay for the PIUs and their work. Kirkhope said that the estimated costs that would be passed on to consumers in ticket prices would be between 10 to 18 cents.
The report’s amendments insert provisions regulating the transfer of data between Member States to ensure that safeguard standards are maintained and that data is only shared in certain circumstances. There are also new provisions to more extensively regulate the transfer of data to third countries, though the assessment is still left to Member States so there isn’t a common decision on the adequacy of a third country’s data protection standards like there is for internal market matters.
The amendments would also clarify the state of data after the initial 30 day period – the Directive uses the phrases “masked” and “anonymised”. Unfortunately, the draft report decides to simply change the phrasing to a more unified “masked” terminology rather than changing the procedure so identifying data will be deleted after 30 days. Some amendments do aim to strengthen data protection by setting down punishment for data breaches such as demotion, denial of system access, formal reprimands, and removal form duty, as well as an obligation to inform data subjects that might be affected by a data breach. National Supervisory Authorities would be given powers to take disciplinary action against persons responsible for a privacy breach, increasing their powers of independent oversight.
Kirkthorpe believes that the use of a PNR regime is necessary and proportional. While the necessity of the Directive is probably best debated by the Committee and whole Parliament, there are still questions over how proportional the Directive would be even with the report’s amendments, particularly over the targeting (or lack of targeting) of air routes, the oversight of creating and use of objective assessment criteria, and the length of the retention period. It does provide some good improvements to people’s rights to access, rectify and erase their data and makes it easier and more effective to exercise these rights (though the problem of the content of these rights given the wide use of data remains).
I’m very sceptical of the necessity for a PNR system – a lot of the analysis backing up the proposal seems to be based on numbers on the increase of crime together with rhetoric on fighting crime and anecdotal examples of how PNR could be used, rather than an analysis of the benefits of PNR versus the existing EU databases. It seems that we are being asked to accept the creation of a massive information gathering system on trust, and I’m not convinced.
Tuesday, 13 December 2011
Nirj Deva and the European Parliament Presidency Campaign
The British European Conservative and Reformist candidate for the Presidency of the European Parliament, Nirj Deva, has gained support from far-right MEPs despite not seeking it:
Martin Schulz, the leader of the Socialists and Democrats group (the centre-left group), will probably win the contest as there is an agreement between the European People's Party group and the S&D that they will share the presidency during this parliament. The current president, Jerzy Buzek (EPP) will soon stand down, and Schulz will be officially backed by the EPP and the Liberal group. However, Schulz isn't the most popular MEP, and British Liberal MEP Diane Wallis is running as an independent against him.
With two challengers to the EPP-S&D carve up, it will be interesting to see who will do better. Wallis is officially acting without the support of her Liberal group, but she could attract those liberal and EPP MEPs - and perhaps even some S&D MEPs - who can't bring themselves to vote for Schulz. But how will it compare to Deva's support? Though the ECR group doesn't attract a lot of good will, and therefore is handicapped when it comes to building parliamentary coalitions, Deva is a well respected MEP who, according to EUObserver, has won "MEP of the year" in the area of development last month.
It's good to see the ECR contesting the election. The EP presidency is more political than the role of most parliamentary speakers/chairpersons as the EP President has to stick up for the Parliament in inter-institutional battles. So while I don't support the ECR, this is exactly the kind of election they should be contesting: institutional politics and questions of integration are a major reason for founding the ECR in the first place. Will Deva present himself as more than just a candidate hoping to force an election, and run on a more ideological campaign? It would be a lost opportunity if he doesn't, even if it makes it harder for him to build alliances.
"A nomination paper leaked to Hope Not Hate, a UK anti-fascist watchdog group, and seen by EUobserver shows the signatures of Griffin, Gollnisch and five other MEPs from the far-right of the chamber, one immediately after the other, suggesting the document was passed directly between these MEPs, all of which maintain close ties with each other.
The anti-federalist European Conservatives and Reformist grouping in the parliament, which backs Deva’s bid for the presidency, was quick to distance the candidate from his nationalist supporters.
“He has been nominated by the ECR and nobody else,” the group’s spokesman, James Holtum, told EUobserver."
Martin Schulz, the leader of the Socialists and Democrats group (the centre-left group), will probably win the contest as there is an agreement between the European People's Party group and the S&D that they will share the presidency during this parliament. The current president, Jerzy Buzek (EPP) will soon stand down, and Schulz will be officially backed by the EPP and the Liberal group. However, Schulz isn't the most popular MEP, and British Liberal MEP Diane Wallis is running as an independent against him.
With two challengers to the EPP-S&D carve up, it will be interesting to see who will do better. Wallis is officially acting without the support of her Liberal group, but she could attract those liberal and EPP MEPs - and perhaps even some S&D MEPs - who can't bring themselves to vote for Schulz. But how will it compare to Deva's support? Though the ECR group doesn't attract a lot of good will, and therefore is handicapped when it comes to building parliamentary coalitions, Deva is a well respected MEP who, according to EUObserver, has won "MEP of the year" in the area of development last month.
It's good to see the ECR contesting the election. The EP presidency is more political than the role of most parliamentary speakers/chairpersons as the EP President has to stick up for the Parliament in inter-institutional battles. So while I don't support the ECR, this is exactly the kind of election they should be contesting: institutional politics and questions of integration are a major reason for founding the ECR in the first place. Will Deva present himself as more than just a candidate hoping to force an election, and run on a more ideological campaign? It would be a lost opportunity if he doesn't, even if it makes it harder for him to build alliances.
Wednesday, 28 September 2011
The Commissarial Speech 2011
Barroso has just delivered his State of the (European) Union speech. Last year I pointed out that it was a work programme speech setting out the legislative programme for the year ahead - a bit like the speech from the throne in European constitutional monarchies. This year the speech actually reflected the State of the Union title a bit more, though it was still a Commissarial Speech.
The speech had two themes: the economic crisis and the EU's role in the world. On the economic crisis, Barroso proclaimed the Commission to be the economic government of Europe, and announced several measures on market regulation and on jobs and support for growth. Barroso reminded the Parliament of the Single Market Act announced last year, and urged that it be fast-tracked through the legislative process. He also pointed out that the services legislation had not yet been fully implemented by Member States, and claimed that implementation would spur growth in the economy.
The most notable announcements marked a shift leftwards - perhaps made possible by the leftwards shift of the EPP following the departure of the British Conservatives, and the economic and political pressures of the crisis. Growth is a goal. Barroso announced that the European Investment Bank needed to be reinforced so it could lend to the real economy (though no detail was given on how), and called on an "Erasmus for jobs" which would help with youth unemployment by making more internships and work experience available (however no plan has been put forward yet, apart from calling for industry, national governments and the EU to work together on such a scheme). Project bonds will be launched to finance green projects and transport projects, which will stimulate the economy, while Barroso noted that the Commission will bring forward Eurobond proposals. Some forms of Eurobond will require a treaty change, while others won't. The treaty-friendly Eurobond was coined the "Stability Bond".
The biggest announcement was his support for a Financial Transaction Tax (FTT). This was were Barroso showed the most rhetorical energy on the economy: it is a matter of fairness that the financial industry contributes when the ordinary taxpayer has pumped so much into the sector. Is it fair, Barroso asked, to make the farmer pay more in taxes when they have already contributed so much? However such a tax would require unanimity in the Council, and where it would face a lot of opposition. Given that tax sovereignty was such a big issue in Ireland during the Lisbon Referendums, it might even lead to a referednum, should it come to a Council vote.
This leftward shift is not all it might seem, however. Parts of this plan are hard for the Commission to deliver and may not actually happen (the FTT being the most obvious). But Barroso made passing reference to the need to reform the labour market and pension funds. As no actual plans, or even a direction, were given to these reforms, it will be interesting to see what proposals will surface.
Finally, Barroso made a few more general points on Europe and Europe's place in the world. The Commission would protect citizens' rights, including their free movement and Schengen rights. Nobody wants to see a G2 (of the US and China), but the EU needs to play its part in the world and take more responsibility. The COmmission's role in foreign policy - hard foreign policy, rather than development aid and trade - is quite limited, so Barroso could wax rhetorically here about Europe's potential role without making concrete proposals. He did, however make reference to the need for a European defence industry: though nothing was announced, maybe there will be some form of market reforms of further industry co-operation through the European Defence Agency.
Overall the speech was better than last year's - now we need to see how much progress will be made on these promises.
The Parliamentary Response:
Daul (EPP Leader) improved his performance this year. Though still a pro-Commission waffle (leading me to wonder whether Ashton was listening to improve her French or just tuning out), he said his group would support more public-private partnership in education, training and R&D, where more investment was needed, as well as a job erasmus.
Schulz (S&D Leader), who gave one of the better parliamentary speeches last year, floundered this year. Maybe it was because the key issue of the FTT was taken by Barroso, but there was no discussion or analysis of the proposals Barroso put forward, and no questions on the labour and pension reforms Barroso mentioned in passing. Instead of playing a good opposition, Schulz critiqued the use of "19th centuary Vienna Congress methods" of diplomacy which was being "bullied by the markets" - it may be true, but Schulz should be holding Barroso to account, and proposing alternatives, rather than devoting the whole speech to talking about the "other place". Politically, Schulz even failed to stake a claim on the FTT, despite the Party of European Socialists (that make up the vast majority of the S&D group in Parliament) campaigning on the issue.
Verhofstadt (ALDE), the Liberal group leader, has become the federalists' Farage, and focused entirely on a pro-intergration message. Like the S&D, the Liberal leader's central policy idea of the Eurobond was given a place in Barroso's speech, so maybe it left him without anything to say on the actual policies in the speech. The best line he delivered pointed out that it was all very well telling the Parliament about these plans, but "Now you have to say it in the other place" - the "other place" being the European Council.
Zahradil (ECR leader) is the only change in leader since the last speech (an indication of the political turbulance in the right wing group over the last year). While he agreed with Barroso's market measures, he attacked the proposed FTT, saying it would drive financial industries abroad. The rest of the speech attacked the federalism of the other groups, and the Euro, asking if some countries would leave the currency union and if other countries would reconsider their commitment to joining. Though he did not want the Euro to fail, he sharply criticised any of the proposals to change things in the Eurozone as increasing the EU's powers. This provides a handy political cover for playing up the anti-federalist credentials of the group, while not providing any alternatives on how to solve the Eurozone crisis.
Harms (Greens/EFA) hit out against the lack of action on sustainable development since 2007/8 when it was considered a priority, calling the proposals: "Small scale measures, taken too late". Bisky (United Left Leader) said he supported the Commission as far as it brings in good financial regulation, FTT and Eurogroup measures. He also spent a lot of time criticising the intergovernmental approach to solving the crisis. Farage (EFD) said that Barroso was doing more of the same of what was failing, and attacked him for being unelected. He said that people wanted trade, European co-operation, to work in other European capitals and Erasmus but without the EU. I've already written about the differences between free trade and the internal market: what Farage is proposing seems to be the end of the internal market - if so, he should come out and say it and campaign on it, instead of pretending that the same level of trade can be maintained without the EU structures. In his responce, Barroso retorted that Farage had failed to get elected to the UK Parliament, and that he should campaign for withdrawing from the EU there, since the European Parliament couldn't grant it.
Scoring Parliament
It was hardly the most inspiring parliamentary response. Little attention was paid to the actual policies (effectively limited to the ECR rejection of FTT and the Greens/EFA criticism that the project bonds plan and other measures weren't good enough), but there was a lot of time wasted on bashing the Council for being too intergovernmental. They had the Commission President in front of them! This was their opportunity to stake out their policy positions for the year - what they wanted to see happen, what they thought of the Commission's plans - but they failed to articulate an alternative. This might not be too serious for the EPP and ALDE (or even the ECR), which supported Barroso as Commission President, and are essentially the Commission's political base for delivering its economic and market policy. However the S&D, Greens and United Left should have been doing more do provide an alternative.
Verhofstadt and Farage have essentially become copies of each other for this set piece event on their respective sides. However Farage can rest easy knowing that he's done his political job by delivering a punchy speech, even if it doesn't do much in holding the Commission to account. Verhofstadt, on the other hand, advocates a position that needs strong and clear articulation, and which also demands a role of questioning the Commission and holding it to account (even as a pro-Commission party). He didn't measure up to this role.
(How did you score in Barroso Buzzword Bingo? You can read the Twittersphere comments on the speech here: #SOTEU).
The speech had two themes: the economic crisis and the EU's role in the world. On the economic crisis, Barroso proclaimed the Commission to be the economic government of Europe, and announced several measures on market regulation and on jobs and support for growth. Barroso reminded the Parliament of the Single Market Act announced last year, and urged that it be fast-tracked through the legislative process. He also pointed out that the services legislation had not yet been fully implemented by Member States, and claimed that implementation would spur growth in the economy.
The most notable announcements marked a shift leftwards - perhaps made possible by the leftwards shift of the EPP following the departure of the British Conservatives, and the economic and political pressures of the crisis. Growth is a goal. Barroso announced that the European Investment Bank needed to be reinforced so it could lend to the real economy (though no detail was given on how), and called on an "Erasmus for jobs" which would help with youth unemployment by making more internships and work experience available (however no plan has been put forward yet, apart from calling for industry, national governments and the EU to work together on such a scheme). Project bonds will be launched to finance green projects and transport projects, which will stimulate the economy, while Barroso noted that the Commission will bring forward Eurobond proposals. Some forms of Eurobond will require a treaty change, while others won't. The treaty-friendly Eurobond was coined the "Stability Bond".
The biggest announcement was his support for a Financial Transaction Tax (FTT). This was were Barroso showed the most rhetorical energy on the economy: it is a matter of fairness that the financial industry contributes when the ordinary taxpayer has pumped so much into the sector. Is it fair, Barroso asked, to make the farmer pay more in taxes when they have already contributed so much? However such a tax would require unanimity in the Council, and where it would face a lot of opposition. Given that tax sovereignty was such a big issue in Ireland during the Lisbon Referendums, it might even lead to a referednum, should it come to a Council vote.
This leftward shift is not all it might seem, however. Parts of this plan are hard for the Commission to deliver and may not actually happen (the FTT being the most obvious). But Barroso made passing reference to the need to reform the labour market and pension funds. As no actual plans, or even a direction, were given to these reforms, it will be interesting to see what proposals will surface.
Finally, Barroso made a few more general points on Europe and Europe's place in the world. The Commission would protect citizens' rights, including their free movement and Schengen rights. Nobody wants to see a G2 (of the US and China), but the EU needs to play its part in the world and take more responsibility. The COmmission's role in foreign policy - hard foreign policy, rather than development aid and trade - is quite limited, so Barroso could wax rhetorically here about Europe's potential role without making concrete proposals. He did, however make reference to the need for a European defence industry: though nothing was announced, maybe there will be some form of market reforms of further industry co-operation through the European Defence Agency.
Overall the speech was better than last year's - now we need to see how much progress will be made on these promises.
The Parliamentary Response:
Daul (EPP Leader) improved his performance this year. Though still a pro-Commission waffle (leading me to wonder whether Ashton was listening to improve her French or just tuning out), he said his group would support more public-private partnership in education, training and R&D, where more investment was needed, as well as a job erasmus.
Schulz (S&D Leader), who gave one of the better parliamentary speeches last year, floundered this year. Maybe it was because the key issue of the FTT was taken by Barroso, but there was no discussion or analysis of the proposals Barroso put forward, and no questions on the labour and pension reforms Barroso mentioned in passing. Instead of playing a good opposition, Schulz critiqued the use of "19th centuary Vienna Congress methods" of diplomacy which was being "bullied by the markets" - it may be true, but Schulz should be holding Barroso to account, and proposing alternatives, rather than devoting the whole speech to talking about the "other place". Politically, Schulz even failed to stake a claim on the FTT, despite the Party of European Socialists (that make up the vast majority of the S&D group in Parliament) campaigning on the issue.
Verhofstadt (ALDE), the Liberal group leader, has become the federalists' Farage, and focused entirely on a pro-intergration message. Like the S&D, the Liberal leader's central policy idea of the Eurobond was given a place in Barroso's speech, so maybe it left him without anything to say on the actual policies in the speech. The best line he delivered pointed out that it was all very well telling the Parliament about these plans, but "Now you have to say it in the other place" - the "other place" being the European Council.
Zahradil (ECR leader) is the only change in leader since the last speech (an indication of the political turbulance in the right wing group over the last year). While he agreed with Barroso's market measures, he attacked the proposed FTT, saying it would drive financial industries abroad. The rest of the speech attacked the federalism of the other groups, and the Euro, asking if some countries would leave the currency union and if other countries would reconsider their commitment to joining. Though he did not want the Euro to fail, he sharply criticised any of the proposals to change things in the Eurozone as increasing the EU's powers. This provides a handy political cover for playing up the anti-federalist credentials of the group, while not providing any alternatives on how to solve the Eurozone crisis.
Harms (Greens/EFA) hit out against the lack of action on sustainable development since 2007/8 when it was considered a priority, calling the proposals: "Small scale measures, taken too late". Bisky (United Left Leader) said he supported the Commission as far as it brings in good financial regulation, FTT and Eurogroup measures. He also spent a lot of time criticising the intergovernmental approach to solving the crisis. Farage (EFD) said that Barroso was doing more of the same of what was failing, and attacked him for being unelected. He said that people wanted trade, European co-operation, to work in other European capitals and Erasmus but without the EU. I've already written about the differences between free trade and the internal market: what Farage is proposing seems to be the end of the internal market - if so, he should come out and say it and campaign on it, instead of pretending that the same level of trade can be maintained without the EU structures. In his responce, Barroso retorted that Farage had failed to get elected to the UK Parliament, and that he should campaign for withdrawing from the EU there, since the European Parliament couldn't grant it.
Scoring Parliament
It was hardly the most inspiring parliamentary response. Little attention was paid to the actual policies (effectively limited to the ECR rejection of FTT and the Greens/EFA criticism that the project bonds plan and other measures weren't good enough), but there was a lot of time wasted on bashing the Council for being too intergovernmental. They had the Commission President in front of them! This was their opportunity to stake out their policy positions for the year - what they wanted to see happen, what they thought of the Commission's plans - but they failed to articulate an alternative. This might not be too serious for the EPP and ALDE (or even the ECR), which supported Barroso as Commission President, and are essentially the Commission's political base for delivering its economic and market policy. However the S&D, Greens and United Left should have been doing more do provide an alternative.
Verhofstadt and Farage have essentially become copies of each other for this set piece event on their respective sides. However Farage can rest easy knowing that he's done his political job by delivering a punchy speech, even if it doesn't do much in holding the Commission to account. Verhofstadt, on the other hand, advocates a position that needs strong and clear articulation, and which also demands a role of questioning the Commission and holding it to account (even as a pro-Commission party). He didn't measure up to this role.
(How did you score in Barroso Buzzword Bingo? You can read the Twittersphere comments on the speech here: #SOTEU).
Wednesday, 8 September 2010
The Commissarial Speech
Yesterday we had Barroso's first State of the Union speech (though it's not the first State of the Union speech we've had in the EU). The Euroblogosphere's reviews have been very critical (see coverage by the critical Grahnlaw, Eurogoblin; and the neutral-critical Rose, and Charlemagne, for example, though Eva en Europa (in Spanish) has written a good defence). So was it any good?
The State of the Union
The title of the speech caused the most problems; both in the image it conjured of the US State of the Union speech and the Euroblogosphere's (and perhaps also the MEP's) low expectations. When the speech ended, Schulz (S&D) and Kaminski (ECR) exclaimed: You did not mention the state of the union! Indeed, the structure, tone and content of the speech reveals a lot more about the state of the union and what kind of expectations we should have. Because this wasn't a State of the Union speech - it was a Commissarial Speech.
What do I mean by a "Commissarial Speech"? If the style was US-Presidential, then the substance and tone was European-constitutional-monarchial. It struck me as a kind of Queen's Speech; that Barroso is setting out the kind of policies his Commission will strive for, rather than an assessment of the state of the union by a strong executive. In this regard the Commission isn't even as powerful as a European parliamentary cabinet government: though it has formally the same legitimacy, it doesn't have the same, whipped, dependable parliamentary majority that most member states have.
A Step Towards a Parliamentary Europe:
This left its mark throughout the speech, with Barroso talking about a special relationship between the EP and the Commission, of own resources and economic governance. The budget plan of 7 years, recently defended by the Commission, was subject to a compromise to the EP's argument that it should be in line with its term: Barroso proposed a 10 year budget plan, with a halfway break to bring it in line with "both institution's terms". The implied emphasis on Parliament was again shown when Schulz derided the speech as being all things to all parties. Though Barroso is justly accused of giving in to the Franco-German alliance, this overlooks the fact that the Commission now needs a parliamentary base to function effectively in an independent fashion (defining "independent" as independent of the Council or a small group of member states). Barroso's appeals to the Parliament aren't just hollow - though it falls into the trap of aiming at a "pro-European majority", something that I've criticised before - if Barroso is to achieve what he has set out to do in this speech, he will need the strong and articulate support of the European Parliament.
After all, on Barroso's big day, the Twitter-sound-bite and idea that became most meme-like was from the EP President Buzek:
Parliamentary Reactions:
The speech itself actually wasn't that bad, if you dropped your preconceptions about the State of the Union imagery. As Honor Mahony pointed out, it was quite good as a work programme speech (particularly for a Barroso-speech). There will be a Single Market Act to close over 100 legal bottlenecks in the single market, EU Project Bonds to help finance European projects, obligitory mention of green-collar jobs, and proposals against organised crime and to strengthen external border policing. On human rights, abuses outside the EU were specifically mentioned, but unfortunately, the Roma situation was only implied. If Barroso wanted to make a real splash with his speech, then speaking out against the French deportation policy would have certainly got more people listening!
And the reactions of our EP party leaders? Daul (EPP) waffled agreement and included a veiled attack on Ashton when he criticised the EU's invisibility in the Middle Eastern Peace Process (in fact, his speech was so boring that I found myself watching the MEPs in seat numbers 33 & 34 behind in their not-so-secret attempts to read their newspapers). Verhofstadt (ALDE) talked about Trans-European networks and own resources. He also mentioned an 86% support for economic governance in Eurobarometer - blatent spin! Sadly Verhofstadt seems as focused on a "pro-European majority" instead of articulating a coherent party vision for the EU as Barroso. (Numbers 33 & 34 used this time to text someone).
Cohn-Bendit (Greens/EFA) talked about the battle between intergovernmentalism and supranationalism/the Community method, and criticised Barroso for the invisibility of the Commission throughout the crisis. He also oddly talked about the Greek defence budget, which spent €50 billion on weapons over 10 years, and said that it was a waste of money that could be stopped/reduced if Turkey became an EU member state (though noting this can't really add anything to the actual membership debate). Kaminski (ECR) agreed with pretty much all of what Barroso said (it seems to be a regular occurance for the EU's "first official opposition"!), but worried aloud about the effect of regulation on business. Given that Barroso spoke about simplifying regulation and a Single Market Act, this seemed strange to me, but then the ECR have a habit of opining on the cost of regulation at every opportunity to maintain their free market image, even if it's not really an issue.
Binsky (United Left) spoke about the opinion polls and thought that people wanted a more social Europe. Money on education and training was needed, and there should be a ban on bank speculation. Farage (EFD) attacked Barroso as unelected and unpopular compared to his US counterpart and spoke about the unloved EU institutions; he also countered claims of a desire for "more Europe". One of the more listenable and entertaining speeches, even if I disagree with him most of the time.
Schulz (S&D), though I don't like his shouting-speech style, actually gave the best party-leader speech, in my opinion, though this may be because he came after Daul (who cannot seem to give a good pro-government speech to save his life). He demanded a financial transaction tax, and said the PES (the party is distinct from the group) would try and force the Commission to consider it via the Citizen's Initative if it didn't introduce the policy. Pledging to support the Commission against the Council, in what seems to be a constructive-opposition style speech, he also heavily criticised Barroso's Commission for being invisible during the last few months, and for only being "technically active" [my words] through releasing a statement here or there, but not taking any really public action. All parties except the EPP and EFD (I think) spoke out on the Roma.
Schulz made it clear that Barroso would be judged on his progress on the promises in his speech. but this is a bit unfair. Barroso cannot hope to do most of this without strong parliamentary support. It is up to the Europarties to try and articulate their visions for the EU, to stand up and explain the policies and decisions that need to be taken, beyond the empty appeals for pro-European feeling. The European Parliament has won mouch power in the last few years, and it now the strongest supranational institution. Whether or not a parliamentary EU develops or Barroso's policies are adopted will depend largely on the European Parliament.
The question is not if Barroso can do it, but if the European Parliament can deliver.
The State of the Union
The title of the speech caused the most problems; both in the image it conjured of the US State of the Union speech and the Euroblogosphere's (and perhaps also the MEP's) low expectations. When the speech ended, Schulz (S&D) and Kaminski (ECR) exclaimed: You did not mention the state of the union! Indeed, the structure, tone and content of the speech reveals a lot more about the state of the union and what kind of expectations we should have. Because this wasn't a State of the Union speech - it was a Commissarial Speech.
What do I mean by a "Commissarial Speech"? If the style was US-Presidential, then the substance and tone was European-constitutional-monarchial. It struck me as a kind of Queen's Speech; that Barroso is setting out the kind of policies his Commission will strive for, rather than an assessment of the state of the union by a strong executive. In this regard the Commission isn't even as powerful as a European parliamentary cabinet government: though it has formally the same legitimacy, it doesn't have the same, whipped, dependable parliamentary majority that most member states have.
A Step Towards a Parliamentary Europe:
This left its mark throughout the speech, with Barroso talking about a special relationship between the EP and the Commission, of own resources and economic governance. The budget plan of 7 years, recently defended by the Commission, was subject to a compromise to the EP's argument that it should be in line with its term: Barroso proposed a 10 year budget plan, with a halfway break to bring it in line with "both institution's terms". The implied emphasis on Parliament was again shown when Schulz derided the speech as being all things to all parties. Though Barroso is justly accused of giving in to the Franco-German alliance, this overlooks the fact that the Commission now needs a parliamentary base to function effectively in an independent fashion (defining "independent" as independent of the Council or a small group of member states). Barroso's appeals to the Parliament aren't just hollow - though it falls into the trap of aiming at a "pro-European majority", something that I've criticised before - if Barroso is to achieve what he has set out to do in this speech, he will need the strong and articulate support of the European Parliament.
After all, on Barroso's big day, the Twitter-sound-bite and idea that became most meme-like was from the EP President Buzek:
"This is the first time we have a debate on the State of the Union. It is a step on the road to a parliamentary Europe."
Parliamentary Reactions:
The speech itself actually wasn't that bad, if you dropped your preconceptions about the State of the Union imagery. As Honor Mahony pointed out, it was quite good as a work programme speech (particularly for a Barroso-speech). There will be a Single Market Act to close over 100 legal bottlenecks in the single market, EU Project Bonds to help finance European projects, obligitory mention of green-collar jobs, and proposals against organised crime and to strengthen external border policing. On human rights, abuses outside the EU were specifically mentioned, but unfortunately, the Roma situation was only implied. If Barroso wanted to make a real splash with his speech, then speaking out against the French deportation policy would have certainly got more people listening!
And the reactions of our EP party leaders? Daul (EPP) waffled agreement and included a veiled attack on Ashton when he criticised the EU's invisibility in the Middle Eastern Peace Process (in fact, his speech was so boring that I found myself watching the MEPs in seat numbers 33 & 34 behind in their not-so-secret attempts to read their newspapers). Verhofstadt (ALDE) talked about Trans-European networks and own resources. He also mentioned an 86% support for economic governance in Eurobarometer - blatent spin! Sadly Verhofstadt seems as focused on a "pro-European majority" instead of articulating a coherent party vision for the EU as Barroso. (Numbers 33 & 34 used this time to text someone).
Cohn-Bendit (Greens/EFA) talked about the battle between intergovernmentalism and supranationalism/the Community method, and criticised Barroso for the invisibility of the Commission throughout the crisis. He also oddly talked about the Greek defence budget, which spent €50 billion on weapons over 10 years, and said that it was a waste of money that could be stopped/reduced if Turkey became an EU member state (though noting this can't really add anything to the actual membership debate). Kaminski (ECR) agreed with pretty much all of what Barroso said (it seems to be a regular occurance for the EU's "first official opposition"!), but worried aloud about the effect of regulation on business. Given that Barroso spoke about simplifying regulation and a Single Market Act, this seemed strange to me, but then the ECR have a habit of opining on the cost of regulation at every opportunity to maintain their free market image, even if it's not really an issue.
Binsky (United Left) spoke about the opinion polls and thought that people wanted a more social Europe. Money on education and training was needed, and there should be a ban on bank speculation. Farage (EFD) attacked Barroso as unelected and unpopular compared to his US counterpart and spoke about the unloved EU institutions; he also countered claims of a desire for "more Europe". One of the more listenable and entertaining speeches, even if I disagree with him most of the time.
Schulz (S&D), though I don't like his shouting-speech style, actually gave the best party-leader speech, in my opinion, though this may be because he came after Daul (who cannot seem to give a good pro-government speech to save his life). He demanded a financial transaction tax, and said the PES (the party is distinct from the group) would try and force the Commission to consider it via the Citizen's Initative if it didn't introduce the policy. Pledging to support the Commission against the Council, in what seems to be a constructive-opposition style speech, he also heavily criticised Barroso's Commission for being invisible during the last few months, and for only being "technically active" [my words] through releasing a statement here or there, but not taking any really public action. All parties except the EPP and EFD (I think) spoke out on the Roma.
Schulz made it clear that Barroso would be judged on his progress on the promises in his speech. but this is a bit unfair. Barroso cannot hope to do most of this without strong parliamentary support. It is up to the Europarties to try and articulate their visions for the EU, to stand up and explain the policies and decisions that need to be taken, beyond the empty appeals for pro-European feeling. The European Parliament has won mouch power in the last few years, and it now the strongest supranational institution. Whether or not a parliamentary EU develops or Barroso's policies are adopted will depend largely on the European Parliament.
The question is not if Barroso can do it, but if the European Parliament can deliver.
Monday, 19 July 2010
Northern Ireland MEPs in the Wider European Parliament
My posts on the Northern Ireland MEPs' first year in the 7th European Parliament mostly focused on highlighting what their priorities/key policy areas are with a bit of analysis (mostly a loose comparison between their performance and the "models" of the Independent and Party MEPs). However, as Grahnlaw has highlighted, the 3 NI MEPs belong either to no Europarty or to one of the smaller ones, which affects their influence and the work they do:
So I thought I should provide a bit of wider context about the European Parliament that our MEPs are working in and how that affects their roles.
Currently the EP is centre-right leaning (the centre-right won the Euro elections before as well):
European People's Party (Centre-Right Christan Democrats/conservatives) - 265 MEPs
Socialists and Democrats (the biggest centre-left party) - 184 MEPs
Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (centrist) - 85 MEPs
European Greens (plus regionalists and the Pirate Party) - 55 MEPs
European Conservatives and Reformists (the Tory party's new EP grouping & party of James Nicholson) - 54 MEPs
European United Left - Nordic Green Left (far-left & Bairbre de Brún's party) - 35 MEPs
Europe of Freedom and Democracy (far right/nationalists) - 31 MEPs
Non-Aligned (Diane Dodds is in this group) - 27 MEPs
(Total: 736 MEPs - though this could be soon increased to bring it more into line with the Lisbon Treaty amendments of 751 MEPs)
None of the NI MEPs belong to the big 3: the EPP, S&D and the Liberals (ALDE), or even the 4th biggest, the Greens. James Nicholson belongs to the 5th biggest (or 3rd smallest) and Bairbre de Brún belongs to the 6th biggest (or 2nd smallest). The number and size of the parties gives an immediate impression of how hard it would be for an independent to get elected to a prominent Parliamentary position or to get an amendment passed, as the Europarties maneuver for influence (which is why I defined the Independent and Party MEPs as I did).
Belonging to the big parties has some advantage in that MEPs can try to influence the negotiating positions of the big players. And the European Parliament is increasingly important, so it does matter - for example, the EPP proposed Barroso for re-election as Commission President. Barroso was re-elected Commission President by the EP because the EPP won the election (though I don't think there were any EPP parties running for election in the NI or the rest of the UK when the Tories and UUP pulled out of the EPP). This was also partly due to the disarray of the S&D group, who couldn't agree on a candidate.
However, as the Commission is separate from the Parliament, the Parliament works more like a multi-party version of the US House of Representatives than the UK or Irish Parliaments as it's not controlled by the executive. So the parties generally make issue-to-issue coalitions. This means that the ECR isn't necessarily a key player in a pro-government coalition that can influence policy outcomes, so it can be outmaneuvered by the big 3. Indeed, that's what the VoteWatch.eu report on the EP's first 6 months has shown: there tends to be a centre-left winning bloc on civil rights (ALDE + S&D) and a centre-right one on the economy (EPP + ALDE). The ECR hasn't been a big part of winning centre-right coalitions, but has been left out of the loop a lot - indeed the EPP hasn't been on the winning side as often as its dominance would suggest. Perhaps this will change as the term continues if the EPP and ECR draw closer together.
As there's a hierarchy of parties, the bigger parties can get their MEPs on the important rapporteur-ing jobs, etc. Now I'm not suggesting that there's anything wrong with voting for the smaller parties or for independents - they play a role too, and you should vote for the party you want to strengthen in Parliament or the person you want to represent you - but we should be aware that the political battle-lines in Northern Ireland do not necessarily translate into the outcome we want in the European Parliament. If we don't discuss the question of Europarties at the Euro elections, then the election debate looses a lot of its potential value - and we have to ask if we're really making the most of our vote in that situation.
Lack of discussion of Europarties during the elections is widespread throughout the EU, but Northern Ireland is a rare example of a constituency that only returned MEPs that didn't belong to any of the main parties. I'd urge people to check up on their MEP (VoteWatch.eu is a very handy tool for this), and other bloggers and Eurobloggers to check up on and write about their MEPs.
The MEPs' profiles on the Parliament website give links to the speeches, etc., that each MEP has made. I read through these for the NI MEP series (speeches in the EP are generally set at about 1-1.5 minutes long), but for other MEPs in the bigger parties, the rapporteur drafts and Committee work could/should be bigger and provide better meat for investigation. Further into the term there should be more information for a better qualitative analysis.
"Besides influence in the political group and EP bodies, the drafting of committee reports (and opinions to other committees) would in my view constitute a crucial element when evaluating the influence of an MEP. There are huge differences in importance between reports, so here qualitative analysis is called for, and it is feasible due to the low number of significant reports and opinions drafted even by a well respected and connected MEP."
So I thought I should provide a bit of wider context about the European Parliament that our MEPs are working in and how that affects their roles.
Currently the EP is centre-right leaning (the centre-right won the Euro elections before as well):
European People's Party (Centre-Right Christan Democrats/conservatives) - 265 MEPs
Socialists and Democrats (the biggest centre-left party) - 184 MEPs
Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (centrist) - 85 MEPs
European Greens (plus regionalists and the Pirate Party) - 55 MEPs
European Conservatives and Reformists (the Tory party's new EP grouping & party of James Nicholson) - 54 MEPs
European United Left - Nordic Green Left (far-left & Bairbre de Brún's party) - 35 MEPs
Europe of Freedom and Democracy (far right/nationalists) - 31 MEPs
Non-Aligned (Diane Dodds is in this group) - 27 MEPs
(Total: 736 MEPs - though this could be soon increased to bring it more into line with the Lisbon Treaty amendments of 751 MEPs)
None of the NI MEPs belong to the big 3: the EPP, S&D and the Liberals (ALDE), or even the 4th biggest, the Greens. James Nicholson belongs to the 5th biggest (or 3rd smallest) and Bairbre de Brún belongs to the 6th biggest (or 2nd smallest). The number and size of the parties gives an immediate impression of how hard it would be for an independent to get elected to a prominent Parliamentary position or to get an amendment passed, as the Europarties maneuver for influence (which is why I defined the Independent and Party MEPs as I did).
Belonging to the big parties has some advantage in that MEPs can try to influence the negotiating positions of the big players. And the European Parliament is increasingly important, so it does matter - for example, the EPP proposed Barroso for re-election as Commission President. Barroso was re-elected Commission President by the EP because the EPP won the election (though I don't think there were any EPP parties running for election in the NI or the rest of the UK when the Tories and UUP pulled out of the EPP). This was also partly due to the disarray of the S&D group, who couldn't agree on a candidate.
However, as the Commission is separate from the Parliament, the Parliament works more like a multi-party version of the US House of Representatives than the UK or Irish Parliaments as it's not controlled by the executive. So the parties generally make issue-to-issue coalitions. This means that the ECR isn't necessarily a key player in a pro-government coalition that can influence policy outcomes, so it can be outmaneuvered by the big 3. Indeed, that's what the VoteWatch.eu report on the EP's first 6 months has shown: there tends to be a centre-left winning bloc on civil rights (ALDE + S&D) and a centre-right one on the economy (EPP + ALDE). The ECR hasn't been a big part of winning centre-right coalitions, but has been left out of the loop a lot - indeed the EPP hasn't been on the winning side as often as its dominance would suggest. Perhaps this will change as the term continues if the EPP and ECR draw closer together.
As there's a hierarchy of parties, the bigger parties can get their MEPs on the important rapporteur-ing jobs, etc. Now I'm not suggesting that there's anything wrong with voting for the smaller parties or for independents - they play a role too, and you should vote for the party you want to strengthen in Parliament or the person you want to represent you - but we should be aware that the political battle-lines in Northern Ireland do not necessarily translate into the outcome we want in the European Parliament. If we don't discuss the question of Europarties at the Euro elections, then the election debate looses a lot of its potential value - and we have to ask if we're really making the most of our vote in that situation.
Lack of discussion of Europarties during the elections is widespread throughout the EU, but Northern Ireland is a rare example of a constituency that only returned MEPs that didn't belong to any of the main parties. I'd urge people to check up on their MEP (VoteWatch.eu is a very handy tool for this), and other bloggers and Eurobloggers to check up on and write about their MEPs.
The MEPs' profiles on the Parliament website give links to the speeches, etc., that each MEP has made. I read through these for the NI MEP series (speeches in the EP are generally set at about 1-1.5 minutes long), but for other MEPs in the bigger parties, the rapporteur drafts and Committee work could/should be bigger and provide better meat for investigation. Further into the term there should be more information for a better qualitative analysis.
Northern Ireland's MEPs: One Year On
The 7th European Parliament is a year into its first term since the June 2009 elections, so I’ve decided to take a look at the performance of the 3 Northern Ireland MEPs in the European Parliament over the last year. To do this I’ve looked over the questions and speeches of the MEPs from their plenary adventures on the European Parliament website, and the statistics of their voting patterns and parliamentary work from VoteWatch.eu. The articles on the 3 MEPs are summaries with analysis at the end, so this post will be an overview and contents page for the series.
The “reviews” of the MEPs are supposed to be neutral, and I try to summarise what the focus of each MEP’s work is and some of their general stances and look at the number of questions. All 3 MEPs had submitted under 10 written/oral questions to the Commission that were answered later (or are awaiting an answer). This is in line with MEPs in general: the vast majority seem to have asked 10 questions or less so far (with a few asking a lot more). Since they’re so close in the number of questions, I’ve looked at the “quality” of the questions (how specific they are) and, when assessing them in general, whether they are “party” or “independent” MEPs.
The model of “party” and “independent” MEP is generally:
- Party MEP: an MEP who is part of a Europarty group in the EP. Relevant to this role is how often they vote along with the party (since it shows how far voting for this MEP in elections is voting for that party and their policies/ideological leanings). Party MEPs would have more resources and are likely to be more specialised (focusing on a certain policy) and might depend on other MEPs in the group to deal with other policy areas. Party MEPs would be expected to be more likely to be spokespeople for their parties on issues and/or rapporteurs for the Parliament for a legislative proposal. (A rapporteur writes a report on the legislation and conducts negotiations between the parties to find an acceptable final package to put to the vote). In short: higher profiles and (assumed) greater influence but with less independence.
- Independent MEP: an MEP that doesn’t have the resources of the MEP as they sit outside the party groups. Assumed to be a more “generalist” MEP with time to focus on issues important to the constituency. So less rapporteuring, etc., and more time for asking questions and making speeches.
Nicholson (ECR/UCU-NF) and de Brún (GUE-NGL/Sinn Féin) are party MEPs and Dodds (No Group/DUP) is an independent MEP.
I’ve decided not to pass judgment on the low number of questions in this series – the general aim of the series is to give a loose assessment to show what the MEPs are doing (and give some criticism). This should show what policies they’re focusing on (because the EP does have power and it does do something!), and then you can decide how they’re doing and if you want to test them out for yourself with questions and constituency work. It should be noted that the info this is based on doesn't detail constituency work, so a lot of important contact with constituents isn't included. Nicholson and de Brún get a general “thumbs up” while I would question heavily the value and number of the questions Dodds has submitted.
Running through it is the theme of “independent” versus “party” MEP. I think that in a chamber of 700+ MEPs, having a party and connections is vital to get things done and influence legislation – not to mention providing some form of meaningful choice to the voter. That said, there are always arguments for and against.
James Nicholson (European Conservatives and Reformists/UCU-NF)
Bairbre de Brún (United Left [GUE-NGL]/Sinn Féin)
Diane Dodds (Non Aligned/DUP)
UPDATE: I've added another post to the series, this time looking at the wider context of the European Parliament, and why the bigger parties matter more.
P.S. VoteWatch.eu recently did a study on how the Europarties voted over the first 6 months of the Parliament. I’ve blogged about it here.
The “reviews” of the MEPs are supposed to be neutral, and I try to summarise what the focus of each MEP’s work is and some of their general stances and look at the number of questions. All 3 MEPs had submitted under 10 written/oral questions to the Commission that were answered later (or are awaiting an answer). This is in line with MEPs in general: the vast majority seem to have asked 10 questions or less so far (with a few asking a lot more). Since they’re so close in the number of questions, I’ve looked at the “quality” of the questions (how specific they are) and, when assessing them in general, whether they are “party” or “independent” MEPs.
The model of “party” and “independent” MEP is generally:
- Party MEP: an MEP who is part of a Europarty group in the EP. Relevant to this role is how often they vote along with the party (since it shows how far voting for this MEP in elections is voting for that party and their policies/ideological leanings). Party MEPs would have more resources and are likely to be more specialised (focusing on a certain policy) and might depend on other MEPs in the group to deal with other policy areas. Party MEPs would be expected to be more likely to be spokespeople for their parties on issues and/or rapporteurs for the Parliament for a legislative proposal. (A rapporteur writes a report on the legislation and conducts negotiations between the parties to find an acceptable final package to put to the vote). In short: higher profiles and (assumed) greater influence but with less independence.
- Independent MEP: an MEP that doesn’t have the resources of the MEP as they sit outside the party groups. Assumed to be a more “generalist” MEP with time to focus on issues important to the constituency. So less rapporteuring, etc., and more time for asking questions and making speeches.
Nicholson (ECR/UCU-NF) and de Brún (GUE-NGL/Sinn Féin) are party MEPs and Dodds (No Group/DUP) is an independent MEP.
I’ve decided not to pass judgment on the low number of questions in this series – the general aim of the series is to give a loose assessment to show what the MEPs are doing (and give some criticism). This should show what policies they’re focusing on (because the EP does have power and it does do something!), and then you can decide how they’re doing and if you want to test them out for yourself with questions and constituency work. It should be noted that the info this is based on doesn't detail constituency work, so a lot of important contact with constituents isn't included. Nicholson and de Brún get a general “thumbs up” while I would question heavily the value and number of the questions Dodds has submitted.
Running through it is the theme of “independent” versus “party” MEP. I think that in a chamber of 700+ MEPs, having a party and connections is vital to get things done and influence legislation – not to mention providing some form of meaningful choice to the voter. That said, there are always arguments for and against.
James Nicholson (European Conservatives and Reformists/UCU-NF)
Bairbre de Brún (United Left [GUE-NGL]/Sinn Féin)
Diane Dodds (Non Aligned/DUP)
UPDATE: I've added another post to the series, this time looking at the wider context of the European Parliament, and why the bigger parties matter more.
P.S. VoteWatch.eu recently did a study on how the Europarties voted over the first 6 months of the Parliament. I’ve blogged about it here.
James Nicholson MEP: One Year On
[Part of the series on the Northern Irish MEPs' first year in the 7th European Parliament]
James Nicholson (ECR) (UUP). Member of the Agriculture Committee, Vice-Chair of the Delegation to the ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly. (Substitute for the Environment Committee, Regional Development Committee, and Delegation for relations for the Korean Peninsula).
Statistics:
Attendance in plenary: 98.28%
Loyalty to Europarty: 91.58%
Loyalty to national majority: 81.14%
Speeches: 29
Parliamentary Questions: 6
Motions for resolutions: 6
Written declarations: 0
Reports Amended: 10 (Mostly on the CAP and agriculture, but also on cancer, organ donation and transport, and food information for consumers).
Drafted Reports: 0
Opinions: 0
Nicholson’s speeches mainly focus on agriculture and food security, but he has also given speeches on cancer, organ transplants and donations, animal transport, the South Korean Trade Agreement, and on CFP reform. He’s spoken on behalf of the ECR group a surprising number of times: on the debate on agriculture in non-diary sectors, the EU-South Korean Trade Agreement, on Europol (deputising for the ECR rapporteur), the regulation on agriculture in the outermost regions of the Union, and the transportation of animals (he was in this case the “opposite number” Bairbre de Brún, the rapporteur for this piece of legislation – at least for this debate).
James Nicholson’s main focus is agriculture (where he, for instance, supports country of origin logos and opposes an EU logo), and, from these speeches, supports a limited role for Europol (stressing the sovereignty of member states), considers the 2002 CFP reform a failure, and is supportive of the legislation on animal transport and the report on organ donation and transport.
The 6 Parliamentary questions cover negotiations with Mercosur, property ownership in Spain, EEC pensions, tyre pressure safety regulations and the EU strategy against organised crime. Some of the questions are oral and some are written. Some of the written questions are fairly detailed, but all seem specific – asking about the details of EEC pension payouts, impact assessments of Mercosur trade and agricultural imports, etc.
The motions for resolution are mainly to wind up the debate on a topic or used to make a political statement, e.g. on North Korea or the diary crisis. The amendments to reports are mostly agricultural, and several are for the Future of the CAP After 2013 report. There are also amendments to the reports on organs, consumers and agricultural product quality.
Analysis:
James Nicholson’s national party, the Ulster Conservatives and Unionists – New Force, is part of the European Conservatives and Reformists, so his role is that of a party MEP. Groups get certain resources and being part of a political group increases your chances of forming alliances and getting high profile roles such as rapporteur, etc. So the role of the party MEP would be different to an independent MEP. Nicholson hasn’t acted as a rapporteur in the first year of this Parliament, though he has deputised for one in plenary and he has spoken on behalf of the ECR group on several issues. The questions seem to be specific and show the concern for free trade agreements and anti-red tape stance that you might expect from the right-to-centre-right, free trade, sovereigntist-leaning ECR, and the focus on agriculture in his speeches and his position on the Agriculture Committee echoes the rural interests of the constituency. The high attendance rate and high loyalty rate with the ECR group shows that he supports the ECR Europarty – an advantage in that you can vote for him or not based on the policies/ideology of the party and that the group is a voting bloc that can form alliances (whether or not it’s very successful at that is another question). According to his website: “Due to his experience and expertise in this field, Jim was appointed as coordinator for the ECR group for this policy area at the beginning of the new legislature.” Other constituency work isn’t measured on VoteWatch.eu or put on the European Parliament website.
The number of questions and report amendments seem to both be generally 10 or under for most MEPs (though there are a few that ask a lot more). Though the number is low, it’s roughly equivalent to the performance of the rest of the MEPs. I think that Nicholson is generally doing a good job as a party MEP.
[For analysis on the other Northern Ireland MEPs and an overall analysis: link]
James Nicholson (ECR) (UUP). Member of the Agriculture Committee, Vice-Chair of the Delegation to the ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly. (Substitute for the Environment Committee, Regional Development Committee, and Delegation for relations for the Korean Peninsula).
Statistics:
Attendance in plenary: 98.28%
Loyalty to Europarty: 91.58%
Loyalty to national majority: 81.14%
Speeches: 29
Parliamentary Questions: 6
Motions for resolutions: 6
Written declarations: 0
Reports Amended: 10 (Mostly on the CAP and agriculture, but also on cancer, organ donation and transport, and food information for consumers).
Drafted Reports: 0
Opinions: 0
Nicholson’s speeches mainly focus on agriculture and food security, but he has also given speeches on cancer, organ transplants and donations, animal transport, the South Korean Trade Agreement, and on CFP reform. He’s spoken on behalf of the ECR group a surprising number of times: on the debate on agriculture in non-diary sectors, the EU-South Korean Trade Agreement, on Europol (deputising for the ECR rapporteur), the regulation on agriculture in the outermost regions of the Union, and the transportation of animals (he was in this case the “opposite number” Bairbre de Brún, the rapporteur for this piece of legislation – at least for this debate).
James Nicholson’s main focus is agriculture (where he, for instance, supports country of origin logos and opposes an EU logo), and, from these speeches, supports a limited role for Europol (stressing the sovereignty of member states), considers the 2002 CFP reform a failure, and is supportive of the legislation on animal transport and the report on organ donation and transport.
The 6 Parliamentary questions cover negotiations with Mercosur, property ownership in Spain, EEC pensions, tyre pressure safety regulations and the EU strategy against organised crime. Some of the questions are oral and some are written. Some of the written questions are fairly detailed, but all seem specific – asking about the details of EEC pension payouts, impact assessments of Mercosur trade and agricultural imports, etc.
The motions for resolution are mainly to wind up the debate on a topic or used to make a political statement, e.g. on North Korea or the diary crisis. The amendments to reports are mostly agricultural, and several are for the Future of the CAP After 2013 report. There are also amendments to the reports on organs, consumers and agricultural product quality.
Analysis:
James Nicholson’s national party, the Ulster Conservatives and Unionists – New Force, is part of the European Conservatives and Reformists, so his role is that of a party MEP. Groups get certain resources and being part of a political group increases your chances of forming alliances and getting high profile roles such as rapporteur, etc. So the role of the party MEP would be different to an independent MEP. Nicholson hasn’t acted as a rapporteur in the first year of this Parliament, though he has deputised for one in plenary and he has spoken on behalf of the ECR group on several issues. The questions seem to be specific and show the concern for free trade agreements and anti-red tape stance that you might expect from the right-to-centre-right, free trade, sovereigntist-leaning ECR, and the focus on agriculture in his speeches and his position on the Agriculture Committee echoes the rural interests of the constituency. The high attendance rate and high loyalty rate with the ECR group shows that he supports the ECR Europarty – an advantage in that you can vote for him or not based on the policies/ideology of the party and that the group is a voting bloc that can form alliances (whether or not it’s very successful at that is another question). According to his website: “Due to his experience and expertise in this field, Jim was appointed as coordinator for the ECR group for this policy area at the beginning of the new legislature.” Other constituency work isn’t measured on VoteWatch.eu or put on the European Parliament website.
The number of questions and report amendments seem to both be generally 10 or under for most MEPs (though there are a few that ask a lot more). Though the number is low, it’s roughly equivalent to the performance of the rest of the MEPs. I think that Nicholson is generally doing a good job as a party MEP.
[For analysis on the other Northern Ireland MEPs and an overall analysis: link]
Friday, 2 July 2010
Votewatch's Report on the European Parliament's First 6 Months
Votewatch.eu have released a report on the status of the Euro-parties in the European Parliament (PDF; as reported in the EUobserver and flagged up by Writing for (y)EU).
Like in the last Parliament, Europarties in the 7th Parliament are increasingly cohesive along Europarty lines rather than national lines. The big increases in cohesiveness were on budget and civil liberties, and deceases in environment and agriculture. The general trend is towards increased cohesion along ideological, Europarty lines, meaning that it's more important for voters to know which Europarty their candidates will sit in when they're electing them.
The big surprise is that, despite the big gains in the 2009 elections and the collapse of the S&D vote, the centre-right EPP is less successful in terms of being on the winning sides of votes than in the last Parliament. Likewise, the S&D group is marginally more successful. How did this happen? The answer is that ALDE, the liberal group, is aligning itself more with the S&D group, particularly when it comes to the budget and civil liberties - important areas, given the increased power of the EP in the justice and home affairs and budget areas of policy. Perhaps the centre-left are the overall/marginal "winners" of the Lisbon-era powers of the European Parliament (at least in the first 6 months)? What is known is that the Liberals' kingmaker position is stronger than ever, since with fewer EPP-S&D coalitions, the position of ALDE in forming coalitions with either party usually decides an issue. So this Parliament is general centre-left on civil liberties and the budget, but centre-right on internal market and industry.
The ECR, though I never expected them to be very successful, have turned out to have had a disappointing first 6 months. Despite saying that they will vote with the EPP when they have common interests, it doesn't seem as if the party has been able to form many coalitions with the EPP (or should that be vice-versa?). It should be noted that the ECR has fallen behind the Greens on size since the start of Parliament. The ECR are one of the least successful parties, just ahead of the far-left United Left and the Europe of Freedom and Democracy Group (the latter trials as the least successful and cohesive group).
But the question is, will the resilience of the centre-left continue to be as successful over the next six months or over the rest of the Parliament's mandate? The ECR and EPP may grow closer together as time passes and the wounds of the Tory-EPP split are put behind them. With the Tories in a coalition government in the UK (a strange ECR-ALDE coalition in EP terms), and a voice in the Council, the ECR may draw closer to the EPP and general Council line, encouraging more centre-right coalitions. On the other hand, if the centre-left continue to build stronger links between them, perhaps come election time there could be more common campaigning (perhaps even coalition campaigns for the Commission presidency?)? (Of course, that's pure speculation - the Europarties have to decide on how common their own campaigns can be first...)
Like in the last Parliament, Europarties in the 7th Parliament are increasingly cohesive along Europarty lines rather than national lines. The big increases in cohesiveness were on budget and civil liberties, and deceases in environment and agriculture. The general trend is towards increased cohesion along ideological, Europarty lines, meaning that it's more important for voters to know which Europarty their candidates will sit in when they're electing them.
"In the current European Parliament, MEPs vote primarily along transnational political lines rather than along national lines, as in EP6. Proof of this is the fact that cohesion rates of the four largest European political groups (EPP, S&D, ALDE, and G/EFA) are invariably higher than the cohesion scores of member states’ delegations of MEPs. The only policy area where this does not hold is on agriculture: here, the European political groups are significantly less cohesive than on other policy issues and some national parties (particularly the French and the Scandinavians) vote independently of their group colleagues."
The big surprise is that, despite the big gains in the 2009 elections and the collapse of the S&D vote, the centre-right EPP is less successful in terms of being on the winning sides of votes than in the last Parliament. Likewise, the S&D group is marginally more successful. How did this happen? The answer is that ALDE, the liberal group, is aligning itself more with the S&D group, particularly when it comes to the budget and civil liberties - important areas, given the increased power of the EP in the justice and home affairs and budget areas of policy. Perhaps the centre-left are the overall/marginal "winners" of the Lisbon-era powers of the European Parliament (at least in the first 6 months)? What is known is that the Liberals' kingmaker position is stronger than ever, since with fewer EPP-S&D coalitions, the position of ALDE in forming coalitions with either party usually decides an issue. So this Parliament is general centre-left on civil liberties and the budget, but centre-right on internal market and industry.
The ECR, though I never expected them to be very successful, have turned out to have had a disappointing first 6 months. Despite saying that they will vote with the EPP when they have common interests, it doesn't seem as if the party has been able to form many coalitions with the EPP (or should that be vice-versa?). It should be noted that the ECR has fallen behind the Greens on size since the start of Parliament. The ECR are one of the least successful parties, just ahead of the far-left United Left and the Europe of Freedom and Democracy Group (the latter trials as the least successful and cohesive group).
But the question is, will the resilience of the centre-left continue to be as successful over the next six months or over the rest of the Parliament's mandate? The ECR and EPP may grow closer together as time passes and the wounds of the Tory-EPP split are put behind them. With the Tories in a coalition government in the UK (a strange ECR-ALDE coalition in EP terms), and a voice in the Council, the ECR may draw closer to the EPP and general Council line, encouraging more centre-right coalitions. On the other hand, if the centre-left continue to build stronger links between them, perhaps come election time there could be more common campaigning (perhaps even coalition campaigns for the Commission presidency?)? (Of course, that's pure speculation - the Europarties have to decide on how common their own campaigns can be first...)
Tuesday, 16 March 2010
Edward McMillian-Scott joins the LibDems
Edward McMillan-Scott, who ran for - and won - one of the Vice President posts of the European Parliament ahead of the ECR's preferred choice, Kaminski (now ECR leader in the EP), has now joined the Liberal Democrats (who are part of ALDE in the EP). McMillan-Scott had been expelled from the ECR after winning the VP post, and has now been expelled from the Tory party altogether. Instead of appealing the decision, the MEP has joined the LibDems and publicly bashed the Tory party as a "nasty party" - exactly the image party leader David Cameron has been trying to dispel:
Nick Clegg has appeared alongside McMillan-Scott to portray the LibDems as a credible and pragmatic European party in comparison to the Conservatives. Labour has also been bashing the Conservatives and using the party's European policy as a means of showing them up as a unpragmatic, nasty party.
So this could hurt the Tories, though it's unclear how far it would affect public opinion. McMillan-Scott could be portrayed by the party as a malcontent who disobeyed party orders and is lashing out now that he has to pay the price - but then again, this is hard to square with his success in the EP. How can a successful parliamentarian with enough support to win against the ECR's preferred candidate be a dangerous radical opposed to sensible party policy? His methods of political engagement seem to work better in the EP than current Tory policy, and MEPs such as Daniel Hannan are far more radical and potentially dangerous to the Tory's image than McMillan-Scott (particularly as Hannan played a poster-boy role in the US Republican's campaign against health care reform by portraying the NHS [a holy of holies in UK politics] as a national disaster). Explaining how radicals such as Hannan are protected while McMillan-Scott can be so easily ousted may be uncomfortable, even if he did disobey the ECR/Tory whip.
McMillan-Scott has written a column in the Observer hitting out against the Tories' euroscepticism.
""David Cameron shields his europhobes," he writes. "No murmur was made when last weekend Lord Tebbit in effect encouraged Conservatives to vote Ukip in the general election against the Speaker, John Bercow. The dog whistle is really at a lower pitch: that Ukip supporters know that there is a real home for them, back in the Conservative party.""
Nick Clegg has appeared alongside McMillan-Scott to portray the LibDems as a credible and pragmatic European party in comparison to the Conservatives. Labour has also been bashing the Conservatives and using the party's European policy as a means of showing them up as a unpragmatic, nasty party.
So this could hurt the Tories, though it's unclear how far it would affect public opinion. McMillan-Scott could be portrayed by the party as a malcontent who disobeyed party orders and is lashing out now that he has to pay the price - but then again, this is hard to square with his success in the EP. How can a successful parliamentarian with enough support to win against the ECR's preferred candidate be a dangerous radical opposed to sensible party policy? His methods of political engagement seem to work better in the EP than current Tory policy, and MEPs such as Daniel Hannan are far more radical and potentially dangerous to the Tory's image than McMillan-Scott (particularly as Hannan played a poster-boy role in the US Republican's campaign against health care reform by portraying the NHS [a holy of holies in UK politics] as a national disaster). Explaining how radicals such as Hannan are protected while McMillan-Scott can be so easily ousted may be uncomfortable, even if he did disobey the ECR/Tory whip.
McMillan-Scott has written a column in the Observer hitting out against the Tories' euroscepticism.
Sunday, 4 October 2009
Does time heal all policy wounds?
David Cameron's European policy seems purely aimed at placating the anti-EU wing of the Conservative party, perhaps the sole aspect of the unappealing Old Tory party that has been openly embraced by Cameron, who has tried to modernise the party and shift it towards the centre. This has given the policy an ad hoc quality, and has allowed it to be driven largely by shadow foreign minister William Hague and Tory MEP Daniel Hannan. I say ad hoc because, though the Tories' European policy can easily be identified as Euroskeptic, it's harder to see the actual goal of the policy. And surely to have a successful policy, you need to know where you want to go?
The policy - insofar as it exists as a conscious policy - is also ad hoc because the principles behind it that are on display, aren't really backed up with action after the symbolic move has been taken. Though the Tories have tried to present the ECR Group in the European Parliament as the "first real opposition" and the separation from the EPP as the opportunity to give people a chance to vote for a sceptic, non-withdrawalist grouping, scant attention has been paid to the ECR apart from its scandals (of which it has quite a few for such a young party). In fact, the Group doesn't even have it's own website - this was brilliantly exposed by Jon Worth's cybersquatting. But then, the aim was never to advance a political ideology, but to bin Europe as an issue in the Tory party altogether. The move to the ECR will therefore result in a loss of influence in the European Parliament, while not advancing any clear political vision. It has also started to damage relations with former EPP sister parties like the CDU - as the BBC reports:
Though pragmatism will mean that the UK won't be completely isolated in the Council under a Tory government, the Tories will have to work and lobby harder to construct issue-by-issue alliances.
The promise of a referendum over the Lisbon Treaty brings the Tory dilemma over European policy to a head (though it naturally won't be resolved given the dangers the issue poses to party unity). Since the UK Parliament has already ratified the Treaty, it would be an incredible reversal of UK foreign policy to push for its retrospective rejection in a referendum - especially if the Treaty has come into force. Tearing up (or attempting to tear up) a painstakingly negotiated compromise is also unlikely to help with mending fences after the EPP split. Perhaps most importantly for Cameron's likely government: it would also open a can of worms for the Tory government - with no clear party vision on what it wants out of Europe, and with the fragile unity the party has on Europe, can a Tory government seriously renegotiate a relationship with the EU that's: (a) acceptable to the whole Conservative party; (b) acceptable to the other member states; and (c) legally and practically possible? And that's without taking into account the vast economic problems the Cameron government would have to face, as well as the questionable populism with which the Conservatives are approaching constitutional reform in general.
So what's Tory policy towards the EU if the Treaty is in force if/when they come to power? Either there's a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty or on EU membership, or there's an attempt at renegotiating back competences, which would require a clear idea of what exactly the Conservatives want, and what they think the EU is for. It would have been better for Cameron if Ireland had voted No and taken the flak for binning the Treaty, so that the Tories could advance their aims, such as they are, without a loss in diplomatic, political capital and party unity. But now Cameron has to make a choice.
At the heart of the Tory dilemma is that it wants to see reform the EU, without exactly knowing what it wants from the EU. Presumably withdrawalism, though vocal in the form of Cash and Hannan, remains a minority opinion in the party since the ECR is more geared towards retaining and advancing the single market aspects of the EU while supporting deregulation and reversing integration. Yet the die-hard anti-EU wing of the party has managed to exert considerable influence on European policy, because the withdrawalists are the only wing of the party that have a clear vision of the UK's relationship with the EU and also enough momentum in the form of the policy concessions they've won from the party leadership to drive their agenda.
Cameron effectively lost control of European policy from day 1 when he promised that the Conservatives would leave the EPP, since he can't push for a more moderate form of scepticism. This creates real problems for him, because the belligerent style of current Tory policy makes progress on even moderate aspects of Tory European policy almost impossible to achieve. The European question won't go away - time won't solve this one. Splitting from the EPP means that Cameron can't hide from the European question by just muddling along as before. Cameron has signalled a change in Tory policy toward Europe, even if substantive change wasn't intended, and with little control over the expectations his party creates, Cameron is likely to be dogged by the issue if he can't deliver.
The policy - insofar as it exists as a conscious policy - is also ad hoc because the principles behind it that are on display, aren't really backed up with action after the symbolic move has been taken. Though the Tories have tried to present the ECR Group in the European Parliament as the "first real opposition" and the separation from the EPP as the opportunity to give people a chance to vote for a sceptic, non-withdrawalist grouping, scant attention has been paid to the ECR apart from its scandals (of which it has quite a few for such a young party). In fact, the Group doesn't even have it's own website - this was brilliantly exposed by Jon Worth's cybersquatting. But then, the aim was never to advance a political ideology, but to bin Europe as an issue in the Tory party altogether. The move to the ECR will therefore result in a loss of influence in the European Parliament, while not advancing any clear political vision. It has also started to damage relations with former EPP sister parties like the CDU - as the BBC reports:
"Joint policy groups have been scrapped and an annual meeting has been cancelled. [...] Mr Altmaier [from the CDU] acknowledged that the working groups had concluded their work, but added that when the time came to form new ones the CDU would be looking to their partners in the EPP. [...] He added that, for the same reason, no Tory MPs had been invited to come to Germany as observers during the recent election campaign, as they usually would have been."
Though pragmatism will mean that the UK won't be completely isolated in the Council under a Tory government, the Tories will have to work and lobby harder to construct issue-by-issue alliances.
The promise of a referendum over the Lisbon Treaty brings the Tory dilemma over European policy to a head (though it naturally won't be resolved given the dangers the issue poses to party unity). Since the UK Parliament has already ratified the Treaty, it would be an incredible reversal of UK foreign policy to push for its retrospective rejection in a referendum - especially if the Treaty has come into force. Tearing up (or attempting to tear up) a painstakingly negotiated compromise is also unlikely to help with mending fences after the EPP split. Perhaps most importantly for Cameron's likely government: it would also open a can of worms for the Tory government - with no clear party vision on what it wants out of Europe, and with the fragile unity the party has on Europe, can a Tory government seriously renegotiate a relationship with the EU that's: (a) acceptable to the whole Conservative party; (b) acceptable to the other member states; and (c) legally and practically possible? And that's without taking into account the vast economic problems the Cameron government would have to face, as well as the questionable populism with which the Conservatives are approaching constitutional reform in general.
So what's Tory policy towards the EU if the Treaty is in force if/when they come to power? Either there's a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty or on EU membership, or there's an attempt at renegotiating back competences, which would require a clear idea of what exactly the Conservatives want, and what they think the EU is for. It would have been better for Cameron if Ireland had voted No and taken the flak for binning the Treaty, so that the Tories could advance their aims, such as they are, without a loss in diplomatic, political capital and party unity. But now Cameron has to make a choice.
At the heart of the Tory dilemma is that it wants to see reform the EU, without exactly knowing what it wants from the EU. Presumably withdrawalism, though vocal in the form of Cash and Hannan, remains a minority opinion in the party since the ECR is more geared towards retaining and advancing the single market aspects of the EU while supporting deregulation and reversing integration. Yet the die-hard anti-EU wing of the party has managed to exert considerable influence on European policy, because the withdrawalists are the only wing of the party that have a clear vision of the UK's relationship with the EU and also enough momentum in the form of the policy concessions they've won from the party leadership to drive their agenda.
Cameron effectively lost control of European policy from day 1 when he promised that the Conservatives would leave the EPP, since he can't push for a more moderate form of scepticism. This creates real problems for him, because the belligerent style of current Tory policy makes progress on even moderate aspects of Tory European policy almost impossible to achieve. The European question won't go away - time won't solve this one. Splitting from the EPP means that Cameron can't hide from the European question by just muddling along as before. Cameron has signalled a change in Tory policy toward Europe, even if substantive change wasn't intended, and with little control over the expectations his party creates, Cameron is likely to be dogged by the issue if he can't deliver.
Wednesday, 1 July 2009
On Phone Chargers
The EU has managed to get the top 10 mobile phone companies to agree to adopt a single phone charger that will be compatible across their brands. The companies include:
The story has been covered by Stephen Spillane and Gulf Stream Blues.
There will be no legislation to enforce this; the move is an agreement between the companies and it won't be enforceable in law. However, the agreement only came about when the EU applied pressure by threatening to introduce legislation in this area - which would probably pass in the Council and the European Parliament, just like the roaming charge cap.
The benefits of such a move will be mostly environmental, since there will be less electrical waste of old, incompatible chargers being thrown away, but there will also be benefits to the consumer in terms of convenience.
Dave Keating at Gulf Stream Blues touched on what could be one of the most interesting aspects of this story as it (might) develop:
If the single charger is adopted by these companies outside of the EU, it will demonstrate the economic power that comes with the single market. As the economy globalises, it's likely that market access will become more essential in the calculations of the economic and political consequences of regulation. The bigger the market, the more insulated that market is from the negative economic effect of regulation: so it's easier for big markets such as the EU to set higher standards than small (and sometimes even medium) states as the relative economic power of big companies is reduced when they want to ensure they have market access.
Not that the EU should go mad regulating, and I'm not denying that EU regulation can have negative effects on the economy - it all depends on the regulation, and views on particular examples of regulation will vary depending on political priorities. But the single market enables states to re-assert (some of) their political power and relevance at a time when economic power is growing and limiting the political options of states.
Another thing to note is that the Tories in the EP have welcomed this new move:
Perhaps an attractive aspect of this deal for the Conservatives is that it was reached without any actual legislation (though it's still strange to hear the Tories hailing a European move as a victory for "common sense"), but it shows that there is recognition in the Conservative party that the single market is worth something as a working reality, and not just a free-market ideal to pay lip-service to - and what's more, there's a recognition that common rules/policies mean something.
Now it could easily be countered that the Tories could hardly mean anything else when they say they support the single market as you can't have a single market without common rules. Still, the recent political message of the Conservatives gives a different impression. If the Tories are serious about this new group, and are serious about the single market, they will have to show in their rhetoric that some decisions need to be made in Brussels. They also need - and this is a big step that they might never take - to accept that it follows that there should be some form of political contest in the EU, since the question of economic governance is a left-right issue. They will have to accept the value of politics while (if they remain committed to the ECR) rejecting political union itself.
A coherent political vision from the ECR will probably never occur to anyone within the group, let alone see the light of day, yet that is what they'll need if they don't want to be outflanked by withdrawlists and if they wish to avoid being cornered into policies that will weaken the single market itself. In other words, their political group at the very least needs to get political. Politics isn't bad, you know.
"...Apple, LG, Motorola, Nokia, Samsung, and Sony Ericsson – [and they] represent 90 percent of Europe's mobile phone market."
The story has been covered by Stephen Spillane and Gulf Stream Blues.
There will be no legislation to enforce this; the move is an agreement between the companies and it won't be enforceable in law. However, the agreement only came about when the EU applied pressure by threatening to introduce legislation in this area - which would probably pass in the Council and the European Parliament, just like the roaming charge cap.
The benefits of such a move will be mostly environmental, since there will be less electrical waste of old, incompatible chargers being thrown away, but there will also be benefits to the consumer in terms of convenience.
Dave Keating at Gulf Stream Blues touched on what could be one of the most interesting aspects of this story as it (might) develop:
"Since most of these companies also design phones in the US and the rest of the world, I would assume that this standardization will eventually spread to the rest of the world. After all, why would they make phones with different electrical input jacks specifically for Europe?"
If the single charger is adopted by these companies outside of the EU, it will demonstrate the economic power that comes with the single market. As the economy globalises, it's likely that market access will become more essential in the calculations of the economic and political consequences of regulation. The bigger the market, the more insulated that market is from the negative economic effect of regulation: so it's easier for big markets such as the EU to set higher standards than small (and sometimes even medium) states as the relative economic power of big companies is reduced when they want to ensure they have market access.
Not that the EU should go mad regulating, and I'm not denying that EU regulation can have negative effects on the economy - it all depends on the regulation, and views on particular examples of regulation will vary depending on political priorities. But the single market enables states to re-assert (some of) their political power and relevance at a time when economic power is growing and limiting the political options of states.
Another thing to note is that the Tories in the EP have welcomed this new move:
"British Conservative MEP Malcolm Harbour, member of the consumer affairs committee in the European Parliament, also welcomed the agreement.
"The days of drawers full of useless old mobile phone chargers will soon be over. Common sense has prevailed," Mr Harbour stated.
"We will no longer have to worry about forgetting our chargers and having to ask around to find one that is compatible. This agreement will also encourage more chargers to be recycled, preventing electronic waste," he added."
Perhaps an attractive aspect of this deal for the Conservatives is that it was reached without any actual legislation (though it's still strange to hear the Tories hailing a European move as a victory for "common sense"), but it shows that there is recognition in the Conservative party that the single market is worth something as a working reality, and not just a free-market ideal to pay lip-service to - and what's more, there's a recognition that common rules/policies mean something.
Now it could easily be countered that the Tories could hardly mean anything else when they say they support the single market as you can't have a single market without common rules. Still, the recent political message of the Conservatives gives a different impression. If the Tories are serious about this new group, and are serious about the single market, they will have to show in their rhetoric that some decisions need to be made in Brussels. They also need - and this is a big step that they might never take - to accept that it follows that there should be some form of political contest in the EU, since the question of economic governance is a left-right issue. They will have to accept the value of politics while (if they remain committed to the ECR) rejecting political union itself.
A coherent political vision from the ECR will probably never occur to anyone within the group, let alone see the light of day, yet that is what they'll need if they don't want to be outflanked by withdrawlists and if they wish to avoid being cornered into policies that will weaken the single market itself. In other words, their political group at the very least needs to get political. Politics isn't bad, you know.
Wednesday, 24 June 2009
European Conservatives and Reformists
The UK Conservatives, Polish Law and Justice Party, and the Czech Civic Democrats have formed a new grouping called the European Conservative and Reformist Group. The new conservative grouping in the European Parliament will be officially formed/recognized on July 14th when the EP holds its first meeting after the elections. Their manifesto/values can be found here.
The news has been well covered in the Euro-Bloggosphere over the last few days, by Nosemonkey, Jon Worth, Julien Frisch, Grahnlaw, to name a few. The ability of the new group to hold itself together over the next Parliament has been called into question by Jon Worth and Nosemonkey after the Finnish member decided to stick with ALDE instead of making the leap to the ECR.
The Group has 55 members, making it the fourth biggest group in the EP, outstripping the European Greens-EFA by a narrow margin. At the same time, in order to fulfill the EP's rules on group formation, the Group has no less than 5 individual MEPs from several countries in order to show some element of the pan-European support necessary to justify the civil service and funding support they will get as a group from the EP.
As Nosemonkey has commented:
Now, the Tories have come under attack for the strange parties they would likely have to get into bed with to form the new group. This attack hasn't worked out for those who oppose the new grouping because the Tories could point to a few strange MEPs in all of the main EP groupings. I agree, however, with Jon Worth's assessment that it's the percentage of nuts in your party that counts.
Still, there are a number factors which will give rise to arguments that the Conservatives will have a harder time ignoring.
1. Committees:
In the EP, committees count. There parties can play a key role in shaping legislation, and as the fourth largest party, the ECR will only be entitled to 1 committee and 1 sub-committee, and they won't get one of the more prized ones as under the D'Hondt system the bigger parties get the first few picks. It is likely that the Conservatives and the Law and Justice party will get the two chairs as the biggest parties within the group, but in return they may have to give the "independent" MEPs of the group more of the group's speaking time in plenary sessions.
Fewer Committees means less influence. And more speaking time won't offset that.
2. Cohesion:
The new group is unlikely to be cohesive when the loss of 2 "independent" MEPs would result in the collapse of the group. The relevance of the group naturally depends on the cohesion of its vote. If the group cannot muster its votes for common policies/stances on legislation, then it doesn't lend the ECR much weight. It also affects some of the other factors.
3. Alliances:
The Conservatives have said that they will work together with the EPP when they can find agreement. The ECR, however, may not be an attractive partner if it cannot display a good level of cohesion - why bother chasing votes if they'll slip away when it comes to the vote? The EPP may turn back to the traditional alliance with the PES and ALDE out of habit and reliability. The ECR will have influence, however, and it would be a mistake to discount it completely. It is, after all, mainly made up of 3 parties and if they can stick together for votes then an alliance with the ECR on several issues will be worth something - I doubt that the "independents" will threaten dissolution too much if they're satisfied with talking time and office facilities.
4. Opposition:
Federalism or integrationism is hardly ever a part of the work of the EP, given that the member states decide on the level of integration and on the competences of the EU and the EP. Most of what the Parliament does has a left-right divide to it, and this will probably mean that the ECR will end up - or the Tories will end up - supporting the Commission a surprising amount of the time. In other words, they're more likely than not to be a pro-Government party, despite the rhetoric of being the "first real opposition".
This will depend on the PES to a degree - the more the PES can influence legislation, the more the ECR is likely to oppose it. Still, the Commission will be dominated by conservatives for the next five years, and is likely to produce legislation that the ECR will - or could bring itself to - vote for. There will be more regulatory impulses now due to the economic crisis, but Barroso is likely to propose quite weak regulations, and the ECR will probably try to resist attempts by other parties to strengthen Commission proposals. The ECR could end up voting the Commission's way more than its rhetoric lets on.
Also, if (when) the Tories get into government it will be harder to be obstructionist in the EP, since they can hardly build good diplomatic relations by making deals in the Council and then trying to torpedo them in Parliament.
Conclusion:
I think that the ECR will have some influence: it will be periodically sidelined and have occasional moments when it can wield real influence - depending, of course on its ability to capitalise on such moments. The ECR could be quite an "establishment" party, in the sense that it will probably seek to back up the more conservative Council and Commission's position in Parliament, unless it sets out to be purely obstructionist. This could give rise to a strange situation where the "first real opposition" ends up defending Commission positions in times of division in the Parliament.
Finally, the lifespan of the group is hard to tell, but I'd say that it will probably survive at least until the Tories come to power in the UK, since it will be easier to indulge the "independents" while in opposition, and the collapse of the group would be a damaging story the Tories would want to avoid before the election. So failing a group crisis where it would be more embarrassing for the Conservatives to make the sacrifices necessary to keep the group going, I think it will stay alive this side of a UK general election.
The news has been well covered in the Euro-Bloggosphere over the last few days, by Nosemonkey, Jon Worth, Julien Frisch, Grahnlaw, to name a few. The ability of the new group to hold itself together over the next Parliament has been called into question by Jon Worth and Nosemonkey after the Finnish member decided to stick with ALDE instead of making the leap to the ECR.
The Group has 55 members, making it the fourth biggest group in the EP, outstripping the European Greens-EFA by a narrow margin. At the same time, in order to fulfill the EP's rules on group formation, the Group has no less than 5 individual MEPs from several countries in order to show some element of the pan-European support necessary to justify the civil service and funding support they will get as a group from the EP.
As Nosemonkey has commented:
"...that’s five individual MEPs that the new group has to keep sweet in order to maintain the requirement for all groups to have members from at least seven member states. They can afford to lose one, and that’s it. Any more and their new group is kaput."
Now, the Tories have come under attack for the strange parties they would likely have to get into bed with to form the new group. This attack hasn't worked out for those who oppose the new grouping because the Tories could point to a few strange MEPs in all of the main EP groupings. I agree, however, with Jon Worth's assessment that it's the percentage of nuts in your party that counts.
Still, there are a number factors which will give rise to arguments that the Conservatives will have a harder time ignoring.
1. Committees:
In the EP, committees count. There parties can play a key role in shaping legislation, and as the fourth largest party, the ECR will only be entitled to 1 committee and 1 sub-committee, and they won't get one of the more prized ones as under the D'Hondt system the bigger parties get the first few picks. It is likely that the Conservatives and the Law and Justice party will get the two chairs as the biggest parties within the group, but in return they may have to give the "independent" MEPs of the group more of the group's speaking time in plenary sessions.
Fewer Committees means less influence. And more speaking time won't offset that.
2. Cohesion:
The new group is unlikely to be cohesive when the loss of 2 "independent" MEPs would result in the collapse of the group. The relevance of the group naturally depends on the cohesion of its vote. If the group cannot muster its votes for common policies/stances on legislation, then it doesn't lend the ECR much weight. It also affects some of the other factors.
3. Alliances:
The Conservatives have said that they will work together with the EPP when they can find agreement. The ECR, however, may not be an attractive partner if it cannot display a good level of cohesion - why bother chasing votes if they'll slip away when it comes to the vote? The EPP may turn back to the traditional alliance with the PES and ALDE out of habit and reliability. The ECR will have influence, however, and it would be a mistake to discount it completely. It is, after all, mainly made up of 3 parties and if they can stick together for votes then an alliance with the ECR on several issues will be worth something - I doubt that the "independents" will threaten dissolution too much if they're satisfied with talking time and office facilities.
4. Opposition:
Federalism or integrationism is hardly ever a part of the work of the EP, given that the member states decide on the level of integration and on the competences of the EU and the EP. Most of what the Parliament does has a left-right divide to it, and this will probably mean that the ECR will end up - or the Tories will end up - supporting the Commission a surprising amount of the time. In other words, they're more likely than not to be a pro-Government party, despite the rhetoric of being the "first real opposition".
This will depend on the PES to a degree - the more the PES can influence legislation, the more the ECR is likely to oppose it. Still, the Commission will be dominated by conservatives for the next five years, and is likely to produce legislation that the ECR will - or could bring itself to - vote for. There will be more regulatory impulses now due to the economic crisis, but Barroso is likely to propose quite weak regulations, and the ECR will probably try to resist attempts by other parties to strengthen Commission proposals. The ECR could end up voting the Commission's way more than its rhetoric lets on.
Also, if (when) the Tories get into government it will be harder to be obstructionist in the EP, since they can hardly build good diplomatic relations by making deals in the Council and then trying to torpedo them in Parliament.
Conclusion:
I think that the ECR will have some influence: it will be periodically sidelined and have occasional moments when it can wield real influence - depending, of course on its ability to capitalise on such moments. The ECR could be quite an "establishment" party, in the sense that it will probably seek to back up the more conservative Council and Commission's position in Parliament, unless it sets out to be purely obstructionist. This could give rise to a strange situation where the "first real opposition" ends up defending Commission positions in times of division in the Parliament.
Finally, the lifespan of the group is hard to tell, but I'd say that it will probably survive at least until the Tories come to power in the UK, since it will be easier to indulge the "independents" while in opposition, and the collapse of the group would be a damaging story the Tories would want to avoid before the election. So failing a group crisis where it would be more embarrassing for the Conservatives to make the sacrifices necessary to keep the group going, I think it will stay alive this side of a UK general election.
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