Why should we vote yes?

Meh

Originally posted by seedot
OK this is a bit shortsighted. Water and waste management are PUBLIC GOODS. If people other than the govt. to pay for them, then some people don't get them. This is a public health issue. We managed to sort this out in the 19thC when cities took on waste and water - to roll this back now in the name of competition is ridiculous. This is not a moral or ethical issue - I don't want to live next door to someone with no water and no bin collection.

And you won't have to. Just as social welfare pays for gas, electricity and heating for people who can't afford them at the moment, social welfare will pay for water/refuse collection for people who can't afford them in the future.

Yoda

I can't think of any reason to vote Yes to this flawed treaty, any more than I could the first time. I am of course even more inclined to vote No when presented it to me unaltered a second time as though I hadn't done a proper job the first time, but that's not why I voted No the first time.

I am unhappy with the way the voting weights are juggled about all for the sake of keeping the number of participants in the parliament low. I do understand, that the way things are right now, where Ireland has a higher percentage of weighted votes per capita than Germany does, was a way to ensure that the small countries not be swamped by the large. But one can understand the large countries' being annoyed a bit too.

So here we are with Nice. It figures out how many new countries there are and juggles the figures around so they seem fair. But they're not. It's still a system based on bad analysis.

Personally I believe a bicameral parliament would serve Europe's needs best. A House of Representatives, where every 400,000 people (say) would get a representative -- a truly constituency based chamber. On the other side or Parliament then, a European Senate, where each member country had the same number of senators -- three, five, however many.

Yes, that's the US model. It works admirably to represent California and Rhode Island alike -- just the same problem we have in Europe.
I have many friends in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Bulgaria. I have nothing against enlargement. But the treaty of Nice which Ireland rejected last time is not the best way forward. It is sinister of the government and the EU to try to convince us that upon this particular set of words the whole future of Europe for the next three centures rests. When Nice was rejected by Ireland the last time, the correct thing to do would have been to renegotiate the treaty. If Nice is rejected again by Ireland this time, then it will have to be renegotiated.

That, in my view, is what is best for all members of the EU, and all countries aspirant to join. That is why I am voting No again on 19th October.

Meh

Originally posted by Yoda
Personally I believe a bicameral parliament would serve Europe's needs best. A House of Representatives, where every 400,000 people (say) would get a representative -- a truly constituency based chamber. On the other side or Parliament then, a European Senate, where each member country had the same number of senators -- three, five, however many.

Europe already has a system analogous to this -- the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers. The European Commission acts as a hybrid between these two models, with population-based qualified majority voting for some matters and unanimous voting for critical matters.

Yoda

That's what's wrong with it -- the mix 'n' match.

bonkey

Originally posted by Yoda
That's what's wrong with it -- the mix 'n' match.

Yes...you're clearly right. Your version of mixing n matching is obviously far preferable to the version the people using it have thought would be practical.

jc

Yoda

"My" version of mixing 'n' matching has the virtue of having been implemented in other jurisdictions with considerable success. It seems fairer to me (giving populations representation in one house while giving states/nations equal representation in the other) than the number-juggling proposed in the Treaty of Nice.