Thread: 'President' Blair waits on voters of Ireland

http://europa.eu/lisbon_treaty/faq/index_en.htm

This bit may interest you Jagman:

European Citizens Initiative: guidelines for implementation
In case the Lisbon Treaty enters into force, the Commission should put forward proposal to adopt the European citizens' initiative with no delay, says the European Parliament.
The Treaty of Lisbon would introduce the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI), whereby EU citizens can collect one million signatures, from a significant number of Member States, to ask the Commission to submit a proposal on any matters of competence of the Union.
On Thursday, MEPs approved the report by Sylvia-Yvonne Kaufmann (GUE-NGL, DE), by 380 votes in favour, 41against and 29 abstentions which provides details guidelines for the implementation of the European Citizens' Initiative.
No rejection on political grounds
According to MEPs, A citizens’ initiative should be admissible if concerns an EU competence and it is not contrary to the general principles of the EU.
MEPs also agree that it should not take more then two months since the submission of the ECI for the Commission to decide on its admissibility. Registrations could be rejected only on legal grounds and not on grounds of political expediency, says the approved text.
To be accepted, the request must be supported by at least one million Union citizens, who are nationals of at least one quarter of the Member States, with the number of nationals of each Member State concerned amounting to at least 1/500 of that Member State’s population,
say MEPs.

You just need to get 1 in 500 of Europes population to sign your petition - should not be too hard?

Originally Posted by Alsacien

http://europa.eu/lisbon_treaty/faq/index_en.htm

This bit may interest you Jagman:

European Citizens Initiative: guidelines for implementation
In case the Lisbon Treaty enters into force, the Commission should put forward proposal to adopt the European citizens' initiative with no delay, says the European Parliament.
The Treaty of Lisbon would introduce the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI), whereby EU citizens can collect one million signatures, from a significant number of Member States, to ask the Commission to submit a proposal on any matters of competence of the Union.
On Thursday, MEPs approved the report by Sylvia-Yvonne Kaufmann (GUE-NGL, DE), by 380 votes in favour, 41against and 29 abstentions which provides details guidelines for the implementation of the European Citizens' Initiative.
No rejection on political grounds
According to MEPs, A citizens’ initiative should be admissible if concerns an EU competence and it is not contrary to the general principles of the EU.
MEPs also agree that it should not take more then two months since the submission of the ECI for the Commission to decide on its admissibility. Registrations could be rejected only on legal grounds and not on grounds of political expediency, says the approved text.
To be accepted, the request must be supported by at least one million Union citizens, who are nationals of at least one quarter of the Member States, with the number of nationals of each Member State concerned amounting to at least 1/500 of that Member State’s population,
say MEPs.

You just need to get 1 in 500 of Europes population to sign your petition - should not be too hard?

I haven't got a petition! But I get your point.
In principle yes its an excellent idea, a million signatures? I'm not sure there is a realistic prospect of getting that many people to sign up for anything, especially with the provison that signatories must come from at least 7 different nations.
The other proviso that kind of renders it a little toothless is that a petition will be rejected if it is contrary to the general prinicipals of the EU, that pretty much means anything the EU Parliament doesn't like the sound of can be rejected, contrary to the point that nothing can be rejected on political grounds.
Like so many EU ideas, great ideas rendered useless by careful wording. So yes, in principal its a very fine notion but in those few paragraphs are a caveat included to make sure it means nothing.

Originally Posted by Alsacien

http://europa.eu/lisbon_treaty/faq/index_en.htm

This bit may interest you Jagman:

European Citizens Initiative: guidelines for implementation
In case the Lisbon Treaty enters into force, the Commission should put forward proposal to adopt the European citizens' initiative with no delay, says the European Parliament.
The Treaty of Lisbon would introduce the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI), whereby EU citizens can collect one million signatures, from a significant number of Member States, to ask the Commission to submit a proposal on any matters of competence of the Union.
On Thursday, MEPs approved the report by Sylvia-Yvonne Kaufmann (GUE-NGL, DE), by 380 votes in favour, 41against and 29 abstentions which provides details guidelines for the implementation of the European Citizens' Initiative.
No rejection on political grounds
According to MEPs, A citizens’ initiative should be admissible if concerns an EU competence and it is not contrary to the general principles of the EU.
MEPs also agree that it should not take more then two months since the submission of the ECI for the Commission to decide on its admissibility. Registrations could be rejected only on legal grounds and not on grounds of political expediency, says the approved text.
To be accepted, the request must be supported by at least one million Union citizens, who are nationals of at least one quarter of the Member States, with the number of nationals of each Member State concerned amounting to at least 1/500 of that Member State’s population,
say MEPs.

You just need to get 1 in 500 of Europes population to sign your petition - should not be too hard?

1 million in total, comprising at least 1/500th each of the population of at least 7 member states? Meaning that, if you only get, say, 21,000 signatures in Belgium, all 21,000 are out.

They might as well have said "twelvty trillion"!

Do the maths: 1/500th of the population of the 7 most populous countries (Germany, France, UK, Spain, Poland, Romania, Netherlands) doesn't even get you to 661,000.

This is not democracy. It's not the soviet union either, but it is not democracy. It allows them to say "a look, we have a pretty construction that looks like the EU can response to popular demand", and then set the bar so high as to make it unattainable. But because most people are innumerate these days, they won't notice.

Originally Posted by Track_Link

Originally Posted by tropper66

Classic,just classic

And at the same time very deeply disturbing!

Might need the spelling of 'Fuhrer' corrected before going into mass production; but I'd buy one!

"Not contrary to the principles of the EU" would include anything with the faintest whiff of Euroscepticism.

Jagman - from reading what was written, the threshold for inclusion in the petition is 1/500th of each member state from which signatures are coming, which must number at least 7, with a total of 1 million.

This is essentially unattainable. 1/500th of the 7 most populous member states looks like this:

DE: 164,436
FR: 128,964
UK: 122,000
ES: 93,324
PL: 76,230
RO: 42,997
NL: 32,944

Total: 660,877

The only way you would realistically achieve the thresholds is an enormous quantity of signatures from one or more of the big countries, plus small numbers which still beat the 1/500th threshold from 5 or 6 of the tiny countries.

And then they'll throw it out anyway as "against the principles of the EU"

Originally Posted by Markintime

Excellent. Any chance you could do that again, without the spelling mistakes and the slogan in the original correct Nationalist Socialist Party order so I can have it made.

See - I am a spelling Nazi!




What? Is that taxi for me?

Originally Posted by stoatman

"Not contrary to the principles of the EU" would include anything with the faintest whiff of Euroscepticism.

Jagman - from reading what was written, the threshold for inclusion in the petition is 1/500th of each member state from which signatures are coming, which must number at least 7, with a total of 1 million.

This is essentially unattainable. 1/500th of the 7 most populous member states looks like this:

DE: 164,436
FR: 128,964
UK: 122,000
ES: 93,324
PL: 76,230
RO: 42,997
NL: 32,944

Total: 660,877

The only way you would realistically achieve the thresholds is an enormous quantity of signatures from one or more of the big countries, plus small numbers which still beat the 1/500th threshold from 5 or 6 of the tiny countries.

And then they'll throw it out anyway as "against the principles of the EU"

Yes, reading through your figures it is designed to be pretty much unatainable.
The conditions attatched to what is in principal a good idea are designed to make it meaningless.

The EU Parliament, much the same as our own domestic politicians, have failed to grasp that times have changed over the last couple of years. people do examine what the politicians say and are no longer quite so easily fooled.
Whats your take on this Asacien? I know you presented article but you didn't comment much.
I confess I didn't do the sums but read the smallprint, both are evidently designed to make any petition ineffective/impossible.

Originally Posted by jagman

Originally Posted by stoatman

"Not contrary to the principles of the EU" would include anything with the faintest whiff of Euroscepticism.

Jagman - from reading what was written, the threshold for inclusion in the petition is 1/500th of each member state from which signatures are coming, which must number at least 7, with a total of 1 million.

This is essentially unattainable. 1/500th of the 7 most populous member states looks like this:

DE: 164,436
FR: 128,964
UK: 122,000
ES: 93,324
PL: 76,230
RO: 42,997
NL: 32,944

Total: 660,877

The only way you would realistically achieve the thresholds is an enormous quantity of signatures from one or more of the big countries, plus small numbers which still beat the 1/500th threshold from 5 or 6 of the tiny countries.

And then they'll throw it out anyway as "against the principles of the EU"

Yes, reading through your figures it is designed to be pretty much unatainable.
The conditions attatched to what is in principal a good idea are designed to make it meaningless.

The EU Parliament, much the same as our own domestic politicians, have failed to grasp that times have changed over the last couple of years. people do examine what the politicians say and are no longer quite so easily fooled.
Whats your take on this Asacien? I know you presented article but you didn't comment much.
I confess I didn't do the sums but read the smallprint, both are evidently designed to make any petition ineffective/impossible.

I don't really have a take as I'm off to France now - but I think the detail is still to be decided, so perhaps sending Stoatmans figures to your MEP for clarification would be worth a shot?

Here we go again without the spolling mistook



As far as I'm aware it's in the original and correct order but, if it isn't, let me know the correct order and I'll change it.

Sorry to ruin the party - but the huge amount of pressure being put on the Irish by not only the EU, but their own fcuking PM is quite absurd, with terrible tales of disaster for Ireland if it doesn't vote, and bankruptcy etc etc.

I think that, with the added voting fraud to secure it, they will vote 'YES' this time. The reason is - the EU and the bosses of Ireland, and the people backing Bliar cannot afford for it to be a 'no' vote.

Face it folks, or volkes - he's going to be Presidente!

I've just done my bit and voted NO.

The reason I voted NO was because that Ballot paper did not have a "Go f**k yourself, we already said NO" option.

TRGH

Originally Posted by Turnrightgainheight

I've just done my bit and voted NO.

The reason I voted NO was because that Ballot paper did not have a "Go f**k yourself, we already said NO" option.

TRGH

Good for you, but I'm not convinced there's going to be enough of you.

Originally Posted by Biped

Originally Posted by Turnrightgainheight

I've just done my bit and voted NO.

The reason I voted NO was because that Ballot paper did not have a "Go f**k yourself, we already said NO" option.

TRGH

Good for you, but I'm not convinced there's going to be enough of you.

I think that the result is a forgone conclusion. Sadly for the Irish and tragically for the UK.
Makes you sonder why all that blood was shed for Irish independence doesn't it?

Originally Posted by jagman

Originally Posted by Biped

Originally Posted by Turnrightgainheight

I've just done my bit and voted NO.

The reason I voted NO was because that Ballot paper did not have a "Go f**k yourself, we already said NO" option.

TRGH

Good for you, but I'm not convinced there's going to be enough of you.

I think that the result is a forgone conclusion. Sadly for the Irish and tragically for the UK.
Makes you wonder why all that blood was shed for Irish independence doesn't it?

And wonder why so much more blood, Irish, British, Commonwealth, Empire and European, was shed to be free from European tyranny.

Now we just give in because 'bribes' from Brussels overwhelm the Irish!

Sorry Grampas - both of you; sorry Dad and sorry to two of your brothers; and sorry to the millions who died for FREEDOM - just so a grinning'spiv' can appear to be 'important' and countless unelected functionaries may guzzle even more of our tax money!!!!!!!!!!

Originally Posted by Biped

Sorry to ruin the party - but the huge amount of pressure being put on the Irish by not only the EU, but their own fcuking PM is quite absurd, with terrible tales of disaster for Ireland if it doesn't vote, and bankruptcy etc etc.

I think that, with the added voting fraud to secure it, they will vote 'YES' this time. The reason is - the EU and the bosses of Ireland, and the people backing Bliar cannot afford for it to be a 'no' vote.

Face it folks, or volkes - he's going to be Presidente!

What fucking voter fraud?....we're not Nigeria

BTW take it up with Intel, they placed full page ad's in every major newspaper and on TV for a yes vote....I wonder why a huge US company would do that?......maybe for fun?.

We already had the Irish American business council come out for it, one of the reasons we have all that FDI is because we are so close to the EU, and confidence in that is one of the drivers to keep them here and more besides.

PS we don't have a PM.....