CHARTER OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS OF THE EU

34 EXTENSIONS OF QUALIFIED MAJORITY VOTING

Europeans Against the Nice Summit

The government and their BBC allies are spinning Nice as a ‘victory for Blair’, in much the same way that John Major claimed Maastricht was ‘game, set, and match’ to Britain.

Just as Major tried to focus attention on his (apparent) opt-out from the Social Chapter, so Blair is claiming that the fact that Qualified Majority Voting has not been extended to new tax areas, social policy, and four other ‘red line’ areas, signifies that the EU is not on course to achieving ‘Superstate status.

New Labour would rather public attention was not drawn to those areas where the decision making power of the EU has been extended (on top of the numerous areas of control Brussels has gained control over since 1972). Blair has conceded control in the areas discussed below.

CHARTER OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS OF THE EU

This is the EU’s new constitution. The Minister for Europe, Keith Vaz, has said that the charter will have no more legal significance than ‘the Beano’. The European Court of Justice, the Commission, and the European Parliament have all contradicted this claim.

They have made it clear that the court can take the charter into account when arriving at decisions, in much the same way that the ECJ has referred to the preambles in the treaty to inform their judgements (even though the preambles are not, formally, legally binding articles). Therefore, the charter as it stands is ‘judiciable’ despite the self-serving protestations of the government to the contrary.

The Charter is so broad ranging and so loosely worded that, potentially, it gives the EU the capacity to interfere in virtually every area of policy regardless of which specific competences have, or have not, been formally transferred to Brussels. As one of the Irish Commissioners has pointed out, articles 34 and 35 potentially give the EU the right to impose spending commitments regarding social policy and healthcare.

The infamous article 52 opens the door to suppress civil liberties such as freedom of speech, the right of assembly, and the right to stand in elections if these ‘limitations are necessary and genuinely meet objectives of general interest recognised by the Union’.

Tightening up the Capacity to Suspend the Voting Rights of Allegedly Illiberal Member Governments.

Suspension of member country’s voting rights. New article 7 introduces an interesting change to the post-Amsterdam situation. Previously, the EU could only act suspend voting rights if it could ‘determine the existence of a serious and persistent breach by a Member State’ of human rights and democracy. Now, Brussels can act if it determines ‘that there is a clear risk of a serious breach:’

34 EXTENSIONS OF QUALIFIED MAJORITY VOTING

These include:

Borders policy. The government stipulated that it would not hand over the veto in this area. Well, it just has. The new article 62.2.(a) will mean Britain loses its capacity to deny access to ‘citizens of the EU or nationals of third countries’. 63.1 (a,b,c,d) establishes the EU’s right to determine the rules governing asylum.

Bailing out countries that get into economic difficulties. New article 100 blows apart the claim by the EU-statists that British taxpayers could never be made to pay for the crises experienced by other member states (including, possibly, the pensions liability problems that are looming in France, Italy, Germany, Greece, and elsewhere).

Employment law. New article 137 extends the EU’s capacity to interfere in the internal labour markets of the member countries.

Industrial policy. New article gives the Commission and the Council of Ministers to interfere with the minutiae of economic policy, including research and development.

Redistribution of funds between EU regions. New article 159 commits member states to reduce ‘disparities between the levels of the various regions’. The EU will work for what it refers to as greater ‘economic and social cohesion’ using various funds.

Political parties. New article 191 states that ‘Political parties at European level are important as a factor for integration within the Union.’ This sentence should be born in mind (together with the Council of Minister’s earlier decision to send the Austrian government ‘to Coventry’ because it did not approve of the Freedom Party’s inclusion in a democratically elected and formed coalition administration) when interpreting the rest of this article: ‘The Council shall lay down the regulations governing political parties at European level and in particular the rules regarding their funding.’

Europeans Against the Nice Summit

Enlargement as a cover up

French and Italian opposition

Norway's losers contradict themselves

Nigel Farage, British EU-critical MEP, criticized the enlargement rhetoric: ‘We are told now that the Nice Treaty is there for the sake of the enlargement. The enlargement is a cover-up for a deepening of the EU.

After half an hour of flaming speeches against the Nice Treaty and ‘Brussels Europe’ the participants went out to collect signatures and create "photogene" demonstrations.

Almost 200 audience and 20 panellists had gathered in a hotel in Nice to mobilize against the Nice Treaty that was at the same time being created in the nearby Congress Centre. The French hosts had invited participants from EU countries, not-EU countries and East European Countries.

It was a hard programme, and if it had been possible to overturn the Nice Treaty by means of torrents of words it would have been dead as a doornail after three hours of specifying against it.

After the long time spent sitting on chairs the participants were rested and fit for fight in the streets. The goal was to disperse all over Nice for a couple of hours collecting signatures for keeping the French Franc rather than the Euro. At the same time, a handful of young people dressed up as convicts with their feet in blue chains with golden stars made their contribution in honour of the press photographers.

Enlargement as a cover up

French and Italian opposition

Lionel Bell, secretary general in the British Anti Maastricht Alliance, spoke ironically about the attitude of his own government: ‘Mr. Blair wants the EU to be a superpower, but not a super state. It looks as if he cannot understand that he cannot get one without the other.

Mr. Blair wants the Euro but not a centralized government. He does not understand that he cannot have one without the other.’ Bernard Chalumeau, secretary general of ‘Alliance pour la Souveraineté de la France’ was of the opinion that we are ‘governed by an oligarchy of international officials’ in the EU. - With this arrangement we have wanted to show the French public that we are not alone but fight side by side with many others all over Europe’, he said.

The Italian representative made away with the myth of the Italians being a country of super unionists. It is no longer like that. She told, that the support of the Euro has fallen from 90 % to about 60%. It is a piece of news that has not reached the political class in Italy, she added.

Norway's losers contradict themselves

Up In Arms About Nice

A one-way street towards the EU-state in 2004

One step forward and three steps backward

The leader of Norway's Nei til EU (No to the EU), Sigbjørn Gjelsvik, emphasized the importance of the Norwegians not feeling that they are the only people to criticize the EU. " We still have a debate, although we have voted No twice. It seems that the losers find it hard to accept the result, to accept not to be able to hobnob with the great ones and pose on the family photos from the summits, Mr. Gjelsvik said. "Before our last referendum we were told that that we would lose 100.000 jobs, if we voted No.

Now the same people are telling us that we shall have to import labour. Before the Danish Euro referendum we were told that it would be of the greatest importance for Norway. After the No we were told that the Danish referendum was of no importance. They continually produce new arguments, but they will NOT discuss the essential question: That the EU is being transformed into the United States of Europe."

Up In Arms About Nice

A one-way street towards the EU-state in 2004

Norway's losers contradict themselves

- All results point in the direction of further centralisation, integration and 'more Union,' says TEAM co-ordinator, Hans Lindqvist, representing 40 EU critical organizations across Europe. The direction is clear. The EU summit in Nice is a new step on the one-way street that will constitute the European Union state in a new treaty in 2004. The one who does not see this must be blind, says coordinator Hans Lindqvist of TEAM, The European Anti-Maastricht Alliance, which represents more than 40 EU critical organizations across Europe in a comment to the Nice summit result.

All results point in the direction of further centralisation, integration and 'more Union':

- A two-tier Europe, where the most eager states can push for a federation.

- an EU-force close to NATO.

- Schengen with harder border controls for people outside the Union.

- the EU-charter as the base for a new constitution.

- a political court saying it will use the charter as a legal base for its rulings.

- a new statute for European political parties.

- strengthen possibilities to remote member states voting rights.

- a European public prosecutor on the top of the Europol.

- more of quality majority voting abolishing the national vetoes.

Written by TEAM, Hans Lindqvist Edited by Lisbeth Kirk

One step forward and three steps backward

Nice result: Votes in the Council

TOTAL 345 votes

The Danish June Movement considers that the net result is one step forward and three steps backward after the Nice summit ended negotiations Monday morning.

The result of tonight's Summit is new steps towards more Union and less Democracy. The Nice Treaty means new transfer of power from the European voters to civil servants and ministers in Brussels. Consequently, the Danish Constitution demands a referendum about the Nice Treaty, according to the June Movement.

The step forward is the agreement reached on the weighting of votes for the candidate countries. They are written into a special protocol, which the June Movement supports wholeheartedly.

On the other hand, the Nice Treaty means a great number of new decisions by majority vote, where the national parliaments lose their veto. The June Movement recommends that this be rejected.

The Nice Treaty means a reinforced co-operation where the Danish referendum institution will be without meaning, as it will be possible just to go on without asking the people.

Worst of all, after the enlargement the Commission will become a real European government in which member states will have no guarantee for a Commissioner. In actual fact, Mr. Nyrup Rasmussen has taken part in the selling out of the principle of one Commissioner for each country. This principle was given up in Nice in the year 2000, it will be said hereafter.

Decisions about modernization of the social security arrangements, about the financing of the supranational EU and about the salaries of European parliamentarians are particularly unpleasant, according to the June Movement. The members of the European Parliament will now be taxed by the EU and thus become representatives of the EU in Denmark instead of being the Danish voters' representatives in the EU.

Written by Lisbeth Kirk, Luise Hemmer Pihl
Edited by Lisbeth Kirk

Nice result: Votes in the Council

TOTAL 345 votes

One step forward and three steps backward

The result also includes a declaration, which states that from now on and until the enlargement is completed and EU has 27 member states a qualified majority vote is achieved as it is currently with 71 per cent of the votes. After enlargement the QMV is obtained with approximately 73 per cent (the exact figures are still not available).

A qualified majority is obtained if there is 71 per cent of the votes and a simple majority of member states in favour. If a member state wants it, it can ask for a majority of 62 per cent of the total population.

Link To A National Democracy Letter From Spain

Received from the Democracy Movement on 11th December 2000.(Copyrights reserved by the authors).

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