EU Election Explainer

Europe goes to the polls later this month. With the rise of the populist, Euroskeptic parties, this parliamentary election matters. Here’s a guide to what’s happening and what’s at stake.

What are the European Union elections, and why is this year’s edition not expected to be the usual bore-a-thon?

Every five years, the EU holds parliamentary elections. They are the second-biggest elections in the world, after India’s, and will be held over three days, ending May 26. But there is less “mass” in this exercise in mass democracy than you might think. Voter turnout has fallen steadily since the first EU election in 1979, and reached a low of 43 percent in 2014, partly because the results have been fairly predictable – the traditional centrist parties would come out on top – and partly because many voters consider the European Parliament a distant and only marginally useful beast, so why bother voting? This election promises to be different. The populist and nationalist Euroskeptic parties, such as Italy’s League to France’s National Rally, have gone from feeble to formidable players in many of the EU’s 28 member states and some polls say they are poised to trigger a political earthquake in typically placid Brussels.

What does the European Parliament actually do?

The Parliament is the EU’s only directly elected institution and comprises 751 members, known as MEPs. It started life as little more than a talking shop, in 24 official languages, although English, German and French are the main working tongues. Today, it is more powerful than ever and passes, or rejects, legislation proposed by the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm. The Parliament has enormous power in some big policy areas (trade in the single market, environment, data protection and immigration, to name a few) but is largely absent from other areas, such as foreign policy and taxation, which remain the turf of the national governments. Among the Parliament’s recent big wins were the fairly robust data-privacy laws, the cap on mobile-phone charges throughout the EU, eliminating extortionate roaming charges and approving CETA, the Canada-EU free-trade agreement. It has been far less effective in other areas, such as asylum reform.

[…]

See Also:

(1) Theresa May ‘RECRUITING’ for Brexit Party by staying in office says Nigel Farage on BBC QT

(2) Farage brilliantly outlines how UK can TRIUMPH under WTO rules – ‘They’ll come running’

(3) Islamic Elementary Schools Teaching Taliban Curriculum

(4) Now even TORY MPs are backing Nigel Farage and the Brexit Party ahead of Theresa May because they’re so furious with the PM

(5) Dominic Grieve faces calls for OUSTING as local party begins uprising