Comment by Nursie
2 days ago
As much as Brexit was a footgun, this has always seemed to me a very valid criticism of the EU that the remain side of that debate never really tackled. There is a huge democratic deficit in the organisation.
The Council, made up of heads of state, set the direction.
The Commission, made up of whoever is nominated by those heads of state, usually some mate of theirs with no democratic accountability or mandate of their own (see: Peter Mandelson), is the body that decides on and creates legislation.
The Parliament, made up of the actually elected members, seems to exist just to rubber-stamp the output of the other bodies. Or occasionally not, but look what happened here, they were asked again until they did * .
Don't get me wrong, I think there's a lot that's good about the EU too, but it's in need of serious reform before it can claim to be a truly democratic set of bodies.
(* Which is incidentally another criticism of the EU, mostly centred around the time of the Lisbon treaty, which was first put forward as the new EU constitution but, after rejection in some popular referenda in some countries, was renamed the Lisbon Treaty and pushed through again. In the UK this caused waves because the populace was not asked at all about the treaty and Gordon Brown was reported to have snuck-off and signed it into law on the quiet)
> because the populace was not asked at all about the treaty
Well, the UK has only been asked about Europe twice - once to join and once to leave. Unlike many other European countries that frequently ask their populace as a way of standard governance.
The only other UK referendum in my lifetime was the 'alternative vote'
The UK government (no matter the party) just doesn't seem to like asking the public's opinion, on things. And after 2016, I'd be very surprised to see another referendum on anything, any time soon as the outcome of that was opposite to what the 'establishment' wanted (cue the last decade of squabbling). They will instead use the excuse: 'you gave us the mandate choosing us at the General Election'.
Both EU referendums were about whether to leave. Labour took Britain in without a referendum and only held one on reversing it due to the outrage that caused.