Parliamentary sketch – Euro election test

Question: Please tell me how many Members of the European Parliament there are for the South West and what are their names?

You can’t! They’ve been representing you since 2009, so I’m sure it won’t be difficult! (No cheating! Put down that electronic device. No Googling…)

So you can’t do it either. Can you name one?

I have made my point. The elections for MEPs to represent you in Brussels are upon us and hardly anyone knows the name of any of the six MEPs who have represented them for the past five years!

Anti Europeans claim that 75% of all laws are made in Europe. So why do we show such disinterest?

The reality is that those electors who do turn out and vote in the European elections (Thursday 22nd May by the way!) correctly (in my view) perceive that few of the laws which affect our lives are actually made in the European Parliament.

We don’t know our MEPs because they represent a vast multi member constituency stretching from the Isles of Scilly to Swindon.

It’s no wonder electors see these elections as an opportunity to protest against the Westminster political parties; UKIP does well in elections for an institution it is keen to destroy, though has no representation at Westminster.

In the days when Cornwall had its own MEP (improperly and grudgingly shared with Plymouth) most people knew who their MEP was. Not now.

It would be better for the 73 UK representatives to the European Parliament to be selected (on a proportional basis) from the excessive number of Westminster MPs. Like a Commons Select Committee, they could be packed off to Brussels once a month to do the UK’s bidding and return to the UK Parliament to report back.

-o0o-

There must be an election coming. I bumped into Labour Party activists petitioning in Penzance at the weekend. I congratulated them on their campaign against the privatisation of the NHS. I had opposed the then Labour Government’s NHS privatisation (and I oppose this Government’s plan too!). I was pleased they had “changed their mind” and were now petitioning against privatisation!

I can tell there’s an election coming when I find my website hacked, being the subject of frenzied Internet trolling and fictitious correspondents to the local newspaper accusing me of everything under the sun…

You can contact Andrew George by email: andrew.george.mp@parliament.uk.  His constituency office can be contacted at Trewella, 18 Mennaye Road, Penzance, Cornwall, TR18 4NG.  Telephone: 01736 360020.

Andrew George MP

Kernow a’n West ha Syllan

West Cornwall and the Scillies

Kwartron Porthia

Constituency of St Ives

Tel:  01736 360020

Fax:  01736 332866         6th May 2014