Only a couple of days until the excitement of selecting who gets the first class seats on the Euro Gravy Train. Turnout is generally pretty poor in the European elections, except in Luxembourg, with the majority choosing apathy, if they can be bothered.
One can argue that if you don’t vote, you don’t have the right to complain. One can also argue that whatever the outcome, nothing changes, so why bother?
This is the only place I have ever worked where my net salary is bigger than my gross one’, thanks to all the perks that go with the job….MEP
It is easy to see why people in Spain have little interest. There are two main parties, pretty similar in many ways. Self-serving career politicians who will say or do anything to stay in power, government administrations at all levels seemingly riddled with corruption from top to bottom. New or ongoing corruption cases tend to dominate the press.
The European External Action Service will be on strike this Wednesday until 5.30pm, before the summer party. If you are coming from Luxembourg, you can claim a travel allowance.
Is not voting the answer? It shows a lack of faith in the system or the major parties, but also gets rather mixed in with general apathy or other reasons for not voting.
Being ‘less important’ – or considered less important/ meaningless by many – is it not perhaps a better idea to cast one’s vote for one of the many alternative parties? Rather than having a 60% ‘didn’t bother’ figure, passed off under the banner of ‘low turnout’, wouldn’t a 60% vote against the major parties be more meaningful? If the major parties were unable to claim victory or support, maybe (just maybe) it would be a bit of a wake-up call.
This is an organisation that contains an estimated 3,325 officials — more than 7 per cent of its establishment — whose salaries exceed that of British Prime Minister David Cameron.
It is almost certainly the case that the majority of Europeans are not content with the way the EU is run and the astonishing waste of (taxpayer) money year after year, but apathy certainly won’t change anything. Then again, it is such a Gravy Train that now maybe nothing will.
In 2012, a high level meeting was held in Brussels, attended by 76 officials as well as the President of the European Parliament — simply to agree the name for a corridor in one of its buildings. Farcically, the meeting failed to reach a decision.
So, to bother or not?