The role of national parliaments in the EU: building or stumbling blocks?

Among the things that Prime Minister David Cameron achieved in his renegotiation in February 2016 was a so-called ‘red card’ to enable national parliaments to block draft EU legislation. Some of the EU’s critics think that national parliamentarians are better placed than Commission officials, who prepare draft laws, to judge whether EU legislation would benefit their citizens. Cameron believed
that with a red card mechanism for parliaments, he could claim to have made the EU more democratic, and hence convince some of the more moderate eurosceptics to back his campaign to keep Britain in the EU. This policy brief argues that Cameron placed too much emphasis on obtaining a collective veto right for parliaments, as opposed to pushing parliamentarians to be involved in EU policy-making in a more positive way.

• Primary Source

ESO: Background information: The EU Deal http://www.europeansources.info/record/the-eu-deal/

ESO: Background information: How the ‘red card’ system could increase the power of national parliaments within the EU http://www.europeansources.info/record/how-the-red-card-system-could-increase-the-power-of-national-parliaments-within-the-eu/

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