European parliament should be abolished, says Jack Straw

The directly elected European Parliament should be abolished after failing to achieve its purpose of bridging the divide between the European people and the European Union, the former foreign secretary Jack Straw said in February 2012.

He was speaking at an Institute for Public Policy Research seminar at which poll findings were released showing only 8% of the population believed their voice counted in the European Union, with 78% disagreeing.

The thinktank had launched a project on the future of Europe. The European project was in crisis. The events that have engulfed the Eurozone since 2010 had raised fundamental questions about what the EU was for. The old arguments for European integration no longer seemed as valid or sufficient as they once were.

Three issues in particular made it clear that a new narrative was needed:

+ First, the sovereign debt crisis had exposed the limitations of monetary union
+ Second, ‘social Europe’ had not delivered
+ Finally, the very legitimacy of the EU was at stake

• Primary Source

IPPR: Research project: After the Euro crisis: Where next for the European Project? http://www.ippr.org/research-project/44/8095/after-the-euro-crisis-where-next-for-the-european-project

Huffington Post, 21.2.12: Jack Straw Calls For Direct Elections To The European Parliament To End Due To 'Democratic Deficit' http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/02/21/jack-straw-european-parliament_n_1290771.html

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