An idea that’s been doing the rounds regarding how elections to the European Parliament should be staged is for transnational electoral districts to be established – constituencies that is, which cover parts of different national entities.
Parties which compete in such elections would have to obtain for their candidates wider support than what they stand to garner from their own country alone. In this way, it has been claimed, European peoples will feel closer to each other, as they find themselves forming part of one wider political community.
French President Macron was among those who went upfront to champion this proposal. It has been endorsed by a number of socialist deputies in the European Parliament.
Personally I believe it is a clumsy initiative that makes no sense in the European context, especially for small countries. Just imagine if Malta were merged in one constituency with some part of Italy. Numerically, Italian voters would surely swamp voters from the Maltese bit.
To remedy for this, proponents are arguing that the small countries should be included in transnational constituencies with other small countries – such as Malta with say, Slovenia. But then just imagine how Maltese citizens would flock to vote for Slovenian candidates about whom they would know next to nothing...!
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WHEN THINGS ARE NOT DONE WELL
In the governance of public affairs, we are continually discovering how things need to be done better. And when they are not being done well, hopefully we are understanding how matters should be corrected. The challenge does not only arise in Malta... though here it often comes to life with a bang... but indeed in most European countries and elsewhere.
The challenge also is to ensure that those who are charged with monitoring public governance are well above all suspsicion and themselves free of the faults they find in others.
This point came up in recent weeks in controversies about whether the Maltese Ombudsman is himself employing persons of trust in as arbitrary a manner as he has accused the government of doing; and about whether the President of the European Court of Auditors has been financially milking the privileges granted to him by virtue of the job he holds.
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RIDICULOUS
I had believed that the turbulence triggered by the guidelines being drafted by the directorate led by Helena Dalli as European Commissioner would dissipate in a few days. However efforts were made to keep the matter on the boil, with claims that the guidelines amounted to an attempt to stifle the European identity. The extreme right took this line, and the right then continued with the game.
The guidelines seek to regulate how European officials should express themselves in official communications to reflect the reality of a contemporary Europe that encompasses diverse identities and beliefs, which should all be given recognition and respect in a spirit of tolerance. Not only is there nothing out of this world in such an intention and such an approach; to the contrary, they deserve support not demonisation.
Much of the criticism directed against Dalli outside Malta, including in the European Parliament, and more and more in Malta, deserves to be qualified as simply – ridiculous.