tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
Would you say the British Cabinet is unelected?
Europe - a mess to come
- Thread starter gosub
- Start date
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
What a ridiculous thing to say. Cameron with under 40% of the vote having a popular mandate? Heads of state with cobbled together coalitions in which their party has 30% or under of the popular vote.
So, the council could vote for a new eu-wide cameron dictatorship and it's been democratically elected. Popularly mandated.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
You want to think very hard about doing this. The cabinet is conventionally made of elected MPs. It doesn't need to be.
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
It's constitutionally accepted, yes. Your issue seems to be more with parliamentary democracy tbh.
no, because it doesn't have the powers to do so.
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
Let's assume it's fully made up of elected MPs. Is the Cabinet still unelected?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
No, there is no such thing constitutionally as being a PM by popular mandate. Plain wrong.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Yes of course it is. Are you arguing that the council is the equivalent of the cabinet?
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
Ok, I was fast and loose with 'constitutional'. 'Democratic legitimacy' would have been better.
It is similar inasmuch as it's a body made up of people who have been elected to a different role. Arguably less democratic because not all of the people elected get appointed. Same with select committees etc and really anything that is not the full house of the Commons.
I still consider the chair of the PAC or the Health Secretary to be elected. I fear we will therefore not find common ground.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
But the point of your defense was the idea of popular mandate, that cameron and all head of states have it - regardless of what you call it. Defend that idea.
Yeah, all non elected bodies.
Why are you posting this shit?
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
No, heads of government actually. There's a difference - you can read about it here. Why are you getting that shit mixed up, you poor naive fool? [there, did I do Urban knobbery properly?]
The head of government in every EU MS is the individual deemed, via the electoral process of that country, to best reflect the will of the electorate. This may be direct, as in say the French presidential election, or indirect via a prime minister who is answerable to their parliament. From a point of view external to the country, that leader is seen as representing the views of that country. Therefore, sitting on the Council, the French leader or whoever is seen as representing the views of the French people, via the representative powers conferred on him by the electoral process.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Change head of govt for head of state - you still have the same problem despite my terminological slip-up. Look at this drivel from you - cameron wasnlt elected head of govt, nor did his party receive any popular mandate - this is the norm across the EU. party stich ups decide who becomes head of govt.
What good is it describing to me how the EU views it's own democratic legitimacy when i'm questioning that very legitimacy? What you have to do is answer my queries and then align them with the EU guff you blow. Get to it.
Last edited:
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
No let's not, 12 members of the House of Lords were either full cabinet members or attended meetings regularly during the last Labour govt (2005-10) and there are at least 3 now.
gosub
~#
You can go further which is what i have been saying, Juncker gets it and he's as elected as Cameron is Prime Minister. Except, the MEP's didnt stand on what they would do, more a barometer of national politics, and you could n't even directly vote for Juncker in the UK, the EPP didn't put up candidates. Apparently BBC Parliament did show at least one of these Presidential debates, but who knew. We didn't even get a say on this new system that came in under Lisbon as a tidying up exercise. Was slightly different on the continent but even in German only 7% linked vote CDP get Juncker, the literature had Merkel all over it.
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
Cameron was the only one who could form a majority in parliament, which means he becomes head of government according to the British electoral process. He is answerable to Parliament and currently enjoys the support of the elected representatives of the UK electorate.
As I said above, your fundamental issue appears to be with parliamentary (or rather representative) democracy rather than the formation of the Council.
Because what you're questioning is not the EU, but representative democracy. The point I made was that the Council is elected because it is made up of democratically elected leaders, who are on the Council by dint of that elected position. You're looking at it from the other end by questioning their legitimacy to their national position. But I don't think that the Council would have any more legitimacy that it does now if every European leader were elected via direct presidential election (on the basis that heads of government sit on the Council so the election would also be for who you want to be your Council representative).
The EU bases its democratic legitimacy, ultimately, on representative democracy. If you want to go on to question the legitimacy of representative democracy, fine, but that's a larger point.
Following your logic, a publicly owned utility, for example, would only be democratically controlled if its leader was elected in a direct national election. I would accept it as democratically controlled if its leadership was overseen/constrained by a government minister (or worker-owned but then it wouldn't be publicly owned).
e2a: my fundamental point is that within the system of European representative democracy the EU is fairly democratic and that attempts to introduce direct elections would take authority away from national elected governments. I can't say anything on the merits of representative democracy.
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
yes, I agree that this whole 'respect the democratic will of the people and choose Juncker' line is complete bollocks.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Right, what you're now doing is making a political judgement on what should have happened. And no he couldn't form a majority in parliament - that's that's why he was forced into what is called a ..COALITION. If you want me to explain that term just ask. Also if, you want me to explain the British electoral process i'm up for it. Maybe get clued up before doing this though - pro- tip.
The point i destroyed was that the council is elected. You suggested a rubric for election (popular mandate - see above) that most fail - only one needed. It's not elected - democratically or otherwise.
I'm going to ignore the last lines in the hope of saving you embarrassment.
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
ffs. Yes, he could form a majority in parliament, by entering a coalition. The coalition has a majority. No-one else in parliament was able to form a majority of MPs.
My suggested rubric for elected leader was 'the individual deemed, via the electoral process of that country, to best reflect the will of the electorate,' which every leader in the EU meets.
You posit that no role can be filled democratically unless there is a direct election to it - again, your issue is with representative democracy.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
He couldn't form a majority full stop - so suggesting that he could, as you did, gives him a popular mandate falls by your own logic.
As i said, yours is tautological nonsense - the people the eu deems fit to be the elected leaders are the elected leaders. And then you post it.
I posit no such thing - i posit that your claim that the members of the council are elected - is nonsense that boils down to them being elected to another body entirely and a pretty shitty attempt at suggesting the council has democratic legitimacy.
All quite simple.
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
Yes, popular mandate was the wrong phrase to use with the PM. But he was able to form a majority of elected representatives by entering a coalition. Where are you getting 'couldn't form a majority full stop' from? The majority does not need to come from just his party. Are you denying that the coalition has a majority in the Commons? He was able to command a majority, form a government and head it.
But the individual countries determine the way they deem their own leader. Also you are misrepresenting me as tautological because you have put it completely arse about face: the elected national leaders deemed that they were fit to be the elected leaders within in the Council, not the other way around. So basically each country presents the person that they have decided will represent them. You may question how they decided that, of course.
I posit that if two roles are explicitly linked, with the holder of the first automatically holding the second, being elected to the first is sufficient to make the second democratic. Especially so if any authority in the second is explicitly and wholly derived from the democratic legitimacy of the first. The second is in effect wholly dependent on the first and would cease to have any authority if the first lost its. I think that conditionality is key.
for instance, my view is that the commander-in-chief of the US armed forces is a democratically elected role because it is always taken by the President, who must win an election. Were it to be taken by an unelected person, it would probably entail a collapse in US government structures. You might argue that people do not explicitly vote for someone to be the commander-in-chief (well, possibly in American politics but I'm making the general point), instead voting for a president who automatically gains the role, but tbh I think that is a technicality that misses the bigger issue - the role is always filled by someone who is democratically elected, and elected with the awareness that they will take up that role. The person chosen by the people to be their representative, through whatever process, controls the armed forces.
I am interested in how you reject this without requiring the second role to be elected itself, but I am going to bed now so will only pick it up at some point tomorrow. sleep well!
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
I gonna fuk yu up. tmw then.
DairyQueen
Well-Known Member
Anyone know the real reason Cameron is going crazy about Juncker's appointment? Is it just the pro-European thing? Why does Clegg supporting Cameron too?
gosub
~#
because a Commisson President with a democratic mandate (of sorts) is loads more powerful than one that hasn't got one. And even more annoying if getting that mandate is done in a way that reduces the EUropean Council to rubber stamp
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
I used to be a liscened assnt manager for an unwins branch. They closed the company dow when it hemorrhaged money.
DownwardDog
Riding a Brompton with a power meter.
Because he's trying to define himself in opposition to Old EU interests in a futile attempt to stem the purple tide of Ukipification. A prime of example of a Tony Blair style "Where's the fight?" strategy.
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
And why does that bother you? In butcher's world there's no difference between an mp and a lord sitting on cabinet
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
What bothered me was the casual assumption that all cabinet ministers are elected. For the first 40 years after WW2 that was a reasonable assumption, increasingly it is not.
gosub
~#
- http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/341be3f6-eb3c-11e3-bab6-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz33khPBB6n
Declaring himself the “People’s President” Jean-Claude Juncker, holder of the Grand Cross of Greek Order of the Redeemer, emerged to greet the crowds assembled around the Manneken Pis statue and assert his right to be European Commission president. He called on supporters to take to the streets to show their outrage at the way the Brussels elite was ignoring the wellspring of support for one of the continent’s best-loved unknown politicians.
His appeal had an immediate effect. Many tweeted support with the hashtag #jollymiffedaboutJuncker. In France, the Champs-Elysées was closed in case thousands of furious voters turned up. Elsewhere, Europeans sullenly milled around major squares, in what some are calling the Grey Revolution and others the Spitzenkandidaten Spring. Allies see this as the first stirring of a supranational protest and warn the milling could turn mildly irritable at any moment if EU leaders do not bow to their will and appoint the “people’s Jean-Claude”.
There are already barricades outside the European Parliament in Strasbourg. Supporters have vowed not to move from there – except in accordance with the parliamentary calendar, when the proceedings move to Brussels. There have been suggestions that the military might move in to disperse the protesters but a spokesman for the civil authorities said that while the crowds were a bit of nuisance, “we can always walk round them”.
Crowds have been building during the night, many wearing the grey ribbons that have become the symbol of the uprising. A small tent city has sprung up in Strasbourg with the slogan “Nous sommes l’un pour cent”. In a sign of the rising tension, its leaders are insisting that the EU leaders comply with point 7 of article 9D in Title III of the Lisbon treaty which made clear that EU leaders had to “take account” of the outcome of the European elections in which 24 per cent of the 43 per cent who bothered to vote backed parties that supported his candidacy.
In a speech to the assembled crowds – some of whom had been there for 25 minutes since missing the previous tram – Mr Juncker said the people of Europe had spoken with one voice and were “ready to rise up for the Spitzenkandidaten”........
Last edited:
King Biscuit Time
Well-Known Member
He's fucking desperate to surf the current purple and yellow coloured wave of Euroskepticism and to find an excuse to bring his 2017 EU referendum forward to before the 2015 General Election because it will make him look like he's actually done something tangible this term and will help him pinch votes off of the kipper for the GE. Any pretext will do.
tbtommyb
Well-Known Member
That was an assumption for the sake of an example, not an assumption that it is true.
J Ed
Follow Back Pro Expropriation
Sorry but none of this is true, Cameron has had so many opportunities to do as he has promised multiple times in the past - have a referendum on the issue. He is a political realist and knows that big business and the US do not want Britain to leave the EU, there is no way that an EU referendum will ever be held under any of the three main parties at any time.
Similar threads
