The proposals to change the way we elect our representatives in European elections from 2014 has failed to attract the attention it deserves by the media. The draft report on a motion for a European Parliament Resolution, still in committee stage, is by MEP Andrew Duff (Liberal group) on behalf of the Constitutional Affairs Committee.

Among others, it contains two significant proposals. One is to introduce EU-wide transnational lists to run alongside national party lists. Another proposal is for member States to adopt “semi-open lists” rather than the currently prevalent “closed lists”. A third proposal is for the voting age to be lowered from 18 years to 16.

Lowering the voting age

Starting with this third proposal, which I personally agree with, the reason for lowering the voting age stems from the first of three aims specified in the report – that of “enhancing the popularity of parliament across the Union”. Given that the voter turnout in European elections has decreased from an average of 63 per cent in 1979 to less than 46 per cent in 2004, it is thought that starting 16-year-olds with the voting habit should increase future turnouts. Voting develops into a habit, the argument goes, and it is easier to induce 16-year-olds into voting than two years later, when life becomes more turbulent and other interests prevail.

Although this in itself is debatable, other unspoken reasons exist. It is thought, for example, that younger voters are less EU-critical – which to most europhiles means they are less “anti-EU” – so lowering the voting age would be expected to help the “pro-EU” vote.

But this too is debatable. For although younger voters do not necessarily fall in the traditional “nationalistic” fold, they are generally more critical inasmuch as centralised EU power is concerned. In other words, they are EU-critical not because they are nationalists, but because the “message of freedom” that has resonated across the Internet for these past couple of years, is more popular with the younger generations who tend to distrust federal control. So younger persons who are politically motivated, and therefore more prone to go out and vote, would be expected to vote for EU-critical MEPs, even if they readily accept the single market and the “four freedoms of movement”. This highly contrasts with older “Eurosceptic” voters who have traditionally ignored European elections and voted in lesser numbers.

Further to this, there is an added phenomenon: electorates across the EU tend to vote differently at a European level from their national party lines, with a disposition that highly favours the critical side. So we find that, for example, in the Irish referendum last June, all the major parties campaigned heavily with the government for a Yes to the Lisbon Treaty, yet the majority of their followers still voted No. This deviation is also reflected when comparing opinion polls from across the EU on the Lisbon Treaty (where citizens are prevalently against), with the way their representatives voted in national parliaments, with large majorities in favour. This is essentially the reason why a substantial number of EU-critical MEPs were elected in 2004 – over 130 MEPs (17 per cent of the parliament), if one goes by the parliament vote on the Lisbon Treaty itself. So peculiar is this phenomenon, that it was recently the subject of a study by the Max Planck Institute for Social Studies in Cologne, which took the form of an empirical comparison and analysis of national and European elections, confirming the prevalence of this occurrence across the EU.

Semi-open party lists

The second proposal concerns the introduction of “systems of preferential voting” – “semi-open” party lists – where voters have the possibility to vote for individual candidates and not just party lists. In Malta we do not have closed lists. Whereas in an open list the candidates are listed in alphabetical order, in a closed list, the order is crucial, as this reflects the party’s preferences. So if a party has a 10-candidate list and it garners enough votes proportionately to elect four candidates, the top four on that party’s list are automatically elected MEPs.

The open list system is believed to be more democratic since it prevents political marginalisation. It gives voters more choice by limiting the opportunities for central party politics to determine the outcome. As Andrew Duff told TheParliament.com earlier last month, closed lists are “okay for people at the top of voting lists but scarcely appeal to voters who would, I believe, prefer to have the chance to vote for a particular candidate.”

Various mixed versions of the semi-open system proposed by Duff’s report already exist in some member States, often, as in Sweden, by giving weight to candidates’ personal votes, as well as their placing on the party list. Others, such as the UK, only allow votes for political parties and not individual candidates on the party lists.

Critics of semi-open lists seem to have little basis for a democratically sound argument. In an interview to EurActiv, Professor Cees Van der Eijk of the University of Nottingham, who had previously described European elections as “second-order national elections,” said that “if people are forced to look at candidates rather than parties, they tend to learn less” as they would have to “re-learn the world” at each election. Party policies, he maintains, teach the electorate for they are consistent. This is all debatable, of course, depending on one’s point of view. But one cannot agree with such a statement if one believes in democratic inclusivity and plurality.

Professor Van der Eijk gives a second reason: “There is also a negative connotation between candidate-centred elections and policy orientation,” he said. “These elections tend to become ‘beauty contests’: heavy on personality, light on detail.”

Again depending on viewpoint, this statement is at best a generalisation, if not downright elitist, more so when one considers that mainstream party policies are becoming less varied and diverse, not more so.

Transnational party lists

The introduction of transnational party lists is the crux of this would-be Resolution. The idea here is to create “an additional single constituency… of the whole territory of the European Union” with semi-open, candidate-based transnational lists. These lists would be fielded by the European political parties, which may form Groups in the European Parliament. This EU constituency would add 27 MEPs elected from the transnational lists, together with the nationally elected 750 MEPs. Although ‘27’ reflects the number of member States, it does not mean that from this EU constituency there would be an MEP from each member State. Although each transnational list would be made up of candidates from at least seven member States, no guarantees exist for any MEP nationality.

With this system, voters may choose to cast a vote on the EU-wide lists in addition to their preferences on the national lists. Likewise, the same candidate can be simultaneously on both an EU-wide list and a national party list.

The underlying aim of this proposal is of course to federalise Union politics by “develop(ing) the role of the European political parties” and eventually creating an American-style political field. Other aims are “to enlarge voter choice” and “to strengthen the European dimension of the electoral campaigns”.

A much-criticised aspect of this report is the proposed “electoral authority” that would also be authorised “to verify the credentials of MEPs elected from that list”. Verifying the credentials of elected representatives sounds rather anti-democratic – if a candidate was eligible to stand, then once elected no authority can verify anything. Queried by TheParliament.com about this strange inclusion, Andrew Duff denied that it was an attempt “to muzzle the eurosceptic voice in Parliament,” pointing out that the European Parliament now had “sufficient maturity and experience” to perform this task.

This may or may not be the case. More important is that as far as direct representation at EU level goes, for a small member State like ours, the more European elections move towards EU-wide lists, the less are the chances for Maltese nationals to fill EP seats. If you take it to the absolute maximum, where all lists are EU-wide with no national quotas, then it would be safe to assume that there would generally be not one single Maltese national in the European Parliament.

This is not Duff’s intention, of course. But the direction is clear, and, as in anything European, it is a step-by-step process. It is important that in the quest to federalise European politics, the underlying objective of direct representation is not lost. Before European parties’ policies can be compiled and sold to the people for their votes, the people themselves need to be represented by those experiencing the same locality and its specific circumstances.

Ms Ellul-Bonici is a prospective MEP candidate with the Malta Labour Party and currently works in the European Parliament.

[email protected].