The General Election

Discussion in 'U.K. Politics' started by Balbus, Nov 13, 2019.

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  1. Vladimir Illich

    Vladimir Illich Lifetime Supporter Lifetime Supporter

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  2. NaturistJames

    NaturistJames Members

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    That's quite nasty of you Vladimir, not very diplomatic at all lol
     
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  3. Vladimir Illich

    Vladimir Illich Lifetime Supporter Lifetime Supporter

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    I've never professed to be a diplomat - I call a spade a spade, not a shovel !!!
     
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  4. It's fine by him. He hates the scumbag nasty party.
     
  5. Vladimir Illich

    Vladimir Illich Lifetime Supporter Lifetime Supporter

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  6. Balbus

    Balbus Senior Member

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    James

    LOL – think about that you haven’t got anything rational to say in favour of Brexit nothing, really think about that.

    As to the adverse effects of Brexit the government’s own analysis along with numerous independent ones have highlighted the negative impacts.

    I love my country and can’t work out why leavers want to hurt it.

    Many of the people that pushed for Brexit think British workers are lazy and several including Dominic Raab wrote about in a book saying "Once they enter the workplace, the British are among the worst idlers in the world," They wished to ‘incentivise’ British workers through cutting workers’ rights and reducing welfare.

    Again this just makes it clear that you have nothing rational to say in favour of Brexit.

    Already companies are relocating and inward investment is falling it the long term trend that has to be looked at here and a lot of time money and energy has been wasted trying to mitigate the effects of Brexit that could have been profitably spent elsewhere.
     
  7. NaturistJames

    NaturistJames Members

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    Typical ignorance of the big point I've made numerous times

    WE WILL TAKE CONTROL OF OUR OWN DESTINY

    shall I shout it louder for you or will you just keep ignoring the facts
     
  8. Balbus

    Balbus Senior Member

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    A popular claim by many supporters of the Leave campaign is that the EU is undemocratic or is run by ‘unelected bureaucrats’.

    How much truth is there behind these claims?

    This claim mainly refers to the EU Commission: the EU’s executive body. It is true that the Commission President and the individual Commissioners are not directly elected by the peoples of Europe. So, in that sense, we cannot “throw the scoundrels out”. It is also true that under the provisions of the EU treaty, the Commission has the sole right to propose EU legislation, which, if passed, is then binding on all the EU member states and the citizens of these member states.

    But, that’s not the end of the story. First, the Commission’s power to propose legislation is much weaker than it at first seems. The Commission can only propose laws in those areas where the EU governments have unanimously agreed to allow it to do under the EU treaty. Put another way, the Commission can only propose EU laws in areas where the UK government and the House of Commons has allowed it to do so.

    Also, ‘proposing’ is not the same as ‘deciding’. A Commission proposal only becomes law if it is approved by both a qualified-majority in the EU Council (unanimity in many sensitive areas) and a simple majority in the European Parliament. In practice this means that after the amendments adopted by the governments and the MEPs, the legislation usually looks very different to what the Commission originally proposed. In this sense, the Commission is much weaker than it was in the 1980s, when it was harder to amend its proposals in the Council and when the European Parliament did not have amendment and veto power.

    Part of the misunderstanding about the power of the Commission perhaps stems from a comparison with the British system of government. Unlike the British government, which commands a majority in the House of Commons, the Commission does not command an in-built majority in the EU Council or the European Parliament, and so has to build a coalition issue-by-issue. This puts the Commission in a much weaker position in the EU system than the British government in the UK system.

    Second, the Commission President and the Commissioners are indirectly elected. Under Article 17 of the EU treaty, as amended by the Lisbon Treaty, the Commission President is formally proposed by the European Council (the 28 heads of government of the EU member states), by a qualified-majority vote, and is then ‘elected’ by a majority vote in the European Parliament. In an effort to inject a bit more democracy into this process, the main European party families proposed rival candidates for the Commission President before the 2014 European Parliament elections. Then, after the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) won the most seats in the new Parliament, the European Council agreed to propose the EPP’s candidate: Jean-Claude Juncker.

    The problem in Britain, though, is that this new way of ‘electing’ the Commission President did not feel very democratic. None of the main British parties are in the EPP (the Conservatives left the EPP in 2009), and so British voters were not able to vote for Juncker (although they could vote against him). There was also very little media coverage in the UK of the campaigns between the various candidates for the Commission President, so few British people understand how the process worked (unlike in some other member states). But, we can hardly blame the EU for the Conservatives leaving the EPP or for our media failing to cover the Commission President election campaign!

    Then, once the Commission President is chosen, each EU member state nominates a Commissioner, and each Commissioner is then subject to a hearing in one of the committees of the European Parliament (modelled on US Senate hearings of US Presidential nominees to the US cabinet). If a committee issues a ‘negative opinion’ the candidate is usually withdrawn by the government concerned. After the hearings, the team of 28 is then subject to an up/down ‘investiture vote’ by a simple majority of the MEPs.

    Finally, once invested, the Commission as a whole can be removed by a two-thirds ‘censure vote’ in the European Parliament. This has never happened before, but in 1999 the Santer Commission resigned before a censure vote was due to be taken which they were likely to lose. So, yes, the Commission is not directly elected. But it is not strictly true to say that it is ‘unelected’ or unaccountable.

    And, in many ways, the way the Commission is now chosen is similar to the way the UK government is formed. Neither the British Prime Minister nor the British cabinet are ‘directly elected’. Formally, in House of Commons elections, we do not vote on the choice for the Prime Minister, but rather vote for individual MPs from different parties. Then, by convention, the Queen chooses the leader of the largest party in the House of Commons to form a government. This is rather like the European Council choosing the candidate of the political group with the most seats in the European Parliament to become the Commission President.

    Then, after the Prime Minister is chosen, he or she is free to choose his or her cabinet ministers. There are no hearings of individual ministerial nominees before committees of the House of Commons, and there is no formal investiture vote in the government as a whole. From this perspective, the Commissioners and the Commission are more scrutinised and more accountable than British cabinet ministers.

    So, it is easy to claim that the EU is run by ‘unelected bureaucrats’, but the reality is quite a long way from that. Although, having said that, I would be one of the first to acknowledge that the EU does not feel as democratic as it could or should be – as I have spent much of my academic career writing about this issue. But, this is perhaps more to do with the stage of development of the EU than because of the procedures that are now in place for choosing and removing the Commission, which are far more ‘democratic’ than they were 5 or 10 years ago.


    Simon Hix is Harold Laski Professor of Political Science at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
     
  9. Balbus

    Balbus Senior Member

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    Undemocratic EU - what about an Undemocratic UK?

    I’m not saying the EU is perfect but I don’t think any system is - yes there is a certain amount of ‘democratic deceit’ in the EU but that is also true for the UK.

    The parliamentary, constituency and first past the post electoral system in the UK for example means that political Party’s that get control of the government usually have power in excess (often far in excess) to their mandate.

    For example even though Margret Thatcher as leader of the Conservatives won three elections the Tory’s never polled more than 43% of the popular vote. I’ve been told that that the last time a UK government was elected with more than 50% of the popular vote was back in 1931.

    This means that we get things like the 2015 election when the Conservatives got only 36.9% of the popular vote but 50.9% of the Parliamentary seats.

    Also remember we do not vote directly on who is going to be Prime Minister, people vote for a party and the party decides who is going to be the leader, and if that political party is in power then they chose who is to be Prime Minister – I mean who remember when ‘we’ the people voted for Boris Johnson to be ‘our’ Prime Minister - no because ‘we’ didn't - only about only 160,000 Conservative members had that choice.
     
  10. Vladimir Illich

    Vladimir Illich Lifetime Supporter Lifetime Supporter

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    Yeah right !!! - Try telling that to Trump and the rest of the American delegation negotiating a trade agreement !!!
     
  11. NaturistJames

    NaturistJames Members

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    We're leaving, that's that, time to stop the whingeing and moaning and get on with a new era
     
  12. Balbus

    Balbus Senior Member

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    James

    You can shout it as many times as you want but since you don’t seem able to back it up in any rational way it is meaningless gibberish

    What control are you talking about and in what way do you think it would benefit the UK?
     
  13. NaturistJames

    NaturistJames Members

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    Sorry Mr nasty, you are sooo right in everything you say lol. I am not worthy of having my opinion in this thread, I bow down to everyone's greatness in knowing the future.
    Honestly I give up, no talking to people who choose not to listen, enjoy you're miserable negative life
     
  14. Balbus

    Balbus Senior Member

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    James

    But if your saw someone about to hurt themselves do you try to stop them or just let them get hurt?

    I mean if you saw a young child juggling with a very sharp knife would you take the knife away, the child doesn’t understand the danger and there is a slim possibility that the child will not get hurt, but any rational person will see the danger and the probability of the child getting hurt and so would act?

    Those that have looked at Brexit in a rational way believe that the probability of it adversely affecting the UK is very high (it has already done so) so the rational thing to do is to try and warn people against it.

    As I’ve said NO leaver has been able to explain in any rational way why Brexit would be good for the UK – like many others you are choosing to run away when confronted with that.

    But think about it you can’t think of any rational reason for having Brexit – so why do you want it?
     
    Last edited: Dec 13, 2019
  15. mallyboppa

    mallyboppa Senior Member

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    Are you on Drugs ?
     
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  16. Vanilla Gorilla

    Vanilla Gorilla Go Ape

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    I will be interested to see what the voter turnout for 18-24 year olds actually was
     
  17. Vanilla Gorilla

    Vanilla Gorilla Go Ape

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    Picture a Gorilla in a deck chair sipping a Pina Colada, soaking up a few rays from all the butthurt
     
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  18. No you are dumbarse. Shut your gob
     
  19. Keep it civil hey?
     
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  20. Wow. Unignored for now :tonguewink:
     
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