Hurry up and just SLAP GOOGLE, MEPs fume at EU commish The European Parliament took the EU’s executive arm to task on Tuesday for failing to give Google a good kicking resolve the ongoing investigation into Google’s alleged abuse of dominance in the search market. In a statement endorsed by members of the European Parliament (MEPs), it welcomed “further investigations into Google' …
"I think the EU commission is seriously considering the $10 billion bribe that Google has probably offered."Ah, but is the bribe less than they could get from repeated fines! This is an important matter requiring serious thought. You can't rush it ;-)
> MEPs backed him despite having no say whatsoever in resolving EU antitrust cases
MEPs have no say in pretty much everything of importance. The whole system is horribly broken from the point of view of democracy and accountability.
And that, as an aside, is why I favour leaving the EU and striving for the kind of arrangement some of the Nordic countries have going. Open trade area, absolutely nothing else. Because the EU is a democracy in the same way that Google does no evil.
I'm broadly a lefty and pro-europe, but some of the stuff that goes on is crackers to the point of insanity.
My favorite? The monthly 'Strasbourg Shuffle' which is well documented. The costs of maintaining 2 separate parliaments, one of which is used just 4 days a month? Optimistic estimate 100 million euros a year. The reason? French vanity, and wanting the Strasbourg area to cash in. As I say, crackers.
Most of the Left was once anti-EU for jolly good reasons. The EU favoured big business, and rewarded the corrupt.
One by one they got bought off. Roy Jenkins, Peter Mandelson and the Kinnock Family were very well rewarded. Today, even wanting to reform the EU is stigmatised, and the reformers our Out-ers keep quiet.
Peter Jay is Labour through-and-through, you will not read a better short summary of the EU than his foreword to Peter Oborne's Guilty Men pamphlet.
http://www.cps.org.uk/publications/reports/q/id-8/
..leaving the EU and striving for the kind of arrangement some of the Nordic countries have going."
Correct me if I'm wrong but AFAIK all the "Nordic" countries apart from Norway are in the EU.
Norway is part of the EEA (The European Economic Area) and have been known to complain that they have all the obligations of an EU member but none of the decision making powers.
Iceland is also a member of the EEA if your definition of Nordic stretches that far.
Your point is?
The only Nordic country in the Eurozone is Finland, Sweden and Denmark have opted out of the Euro the same as us, so they are basically in exactly the same position as we are.
@nematoad -
Poor research, I suppose. Yes, the kind of arrangement Iceland and Norway have. An open, single market. No legal authorities. No MEPs. No commissioners. No representation on the Council of Ministers. No nett contribution. No CAP. No CFP.
And, you know, so what if the EU does stupid things to itself from then on? Not our problem.
It is sad how socially acceptable absolute ignorance on quesions of how the EU works has become in the UK. You can post obviously wrong statements like the one above and get a lot of confirmation and not a single person would correct the factual errors.
The EP elects the EU commission based on proposals from the Council but most importantly can fire the Commission any time it sees fit. It has a veto power over all budgetary questions of the EU. For all laws which fall under the ordinary legislative procedure (the vast majority of them) the European Parliament is the equal legislator together with the other legislative chamber, the Council (of ministers, which is quite comparable to the German Bundesrat). That means it has the same powers to amend and to scrap/block it alltogether. The few remaining other legaslative areas of the EU are the not very integrated ones where every member states maintains its veto power on its own. Furthermore Parliament has a veto on all international treaties the EU may negotiate. It was the parliament which killed ACTA after civil society across Europe successfully campagined against it (for better or worse, I think for the better) and the parliament will also have the power to kill TTIP if it chooses so.
Put all of this together and the European Parliament is in fact more powerful than some national legislatures which might do de facto no more than rubber stamping governmental decisions. You hate it, you like it, or you don't care, but to say MEPs have no say in almost anything is either complete ignorance on EU issues or deliberate misinformation.
Got any arguments or is that the best you can come up with?
When ACTA was on the table, parliament was initially in favour of passing it, but then civil society made a big fuss about it and that caused a majority of MEPs to vote ACTA down. That would be usually considered democracy at work, and is rare enough on national level anyway. But that doesn't stop people here to talk about how there is no chance of influencing EU politics for common voters.
The toothless MEPs are barking because thats the only thing they can do.
Pathetic? Of course. But it makes them feel useful. And that gives them the fake feeling of being powerful.
Let them bark. They already held a useless vote to break up Google... And then the very same people said that they were making themselves look bad by doing that. The sad part of this is, that should have been blatantly obvious BEFORE they voted to break up Google.
So let them bark.... and bark... and bark... until they fall over dead.
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