Tuesday, February 06, 2007

Roman Red Regeerakkord


Ripe, originally uploaded by CharlesFred.

The elections were in the middle of November, the results were strange but now, at the start of February, we now know what Government policy will be for the next four years. The two biggest parties, the Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats have joined up with the sixth largest party, the Christian Union, to form a Roman Red coalition.

The parties in the coalition seem to be happy but those outside, predictably are not. Tremendoes hypocrisy from at least the Socialist Party and Green Links, as both had the chance to join the coalition, but decided that they coudl score better by throwing tomatoes than taking responsibility.

Anywy, I am suere there are many sites one can look at to see what is or what is not going to be government policy. Unfortunately, I have not yet been able to find out what is so Christian about the new government as it seems as if the main ethical questions of abortion, euthanesia and same-sex marriage are going to be left alone, as they surely should.

The main thing which caught my eye was a decision that the Dutch Government will try to avoid seeking another referendum on the subject of the European Constitution. When the time comes they will defer to the Council of State for a decision on whether or not they can get away with not calling a referendum.

I am sorry, but i find it highly undemocratic to call a referendum and, once they have got the 'wrong' result in that the public voted against teh wishes of the political classes, these political classes look for ways to get around it.

The vote of the Dutch people against the European Constitution was a sign of the failure of the political classes to take the public with them on the European project. This was the first chance the people had been given a direct say in this process and they said 'nee, dank je'.

The immediate reaction was to completely ignore the issue and not to even mention Europe at all, and ceratinly never during the election campaign, the thought being that any time a politician mentioned the 'Eu' word, it would cost their party votes at the election. In other words a total lack of respect for the voters.

Is it any wonder that voters feel more and more estranged from the political establishment, when they are ignored in such a blatant way, over such a major issue?

There was a meeting two weeks ago of 18 countries which had ratified the Constitution and they made it clear that they had no wish to have any changes made to the draft Constitution. Very big of them, but how many governments actually bothered to ask their voters? And those which did, how many are large net direct recipients of EU money?

It is frightening to think that all over the EU we are allowing a super-state to be created without any input from the common people of Europe. There are many benefits for sure, but these never or rarely ever get explained just as there a many costs. Unless we address them up front we will be storing up problems for the future and we can expect to see more and more of the strange election results like to Dutch one of last November.


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