European elections, handbook for sovereignists without sovereignty

The electoral campaign for the next European elections has long since started dripping with words with which to dress up nothing. In particular, in the sovereign lexicon of the yellow-green government bellicose and high-sounding resolutions abound to change this Europe, to send the Brussels bureaucrats home, to make Italy count for more, and so on.

As already experienced in the electoral campaign that led to the birth of this government, there is never a mention of the tools to be adopted to achieve such results. Given the modest credibility of the current coalition, it seems entirely impossible that it can exert sufficient pressure to bring other governments and other alignments to its side. In particular, the sovereignists are silent that to "change Europe" it is necessary to lose sovereignty by individual states. Unless to increase one's sovereignty one wants to imitate the shaky United Kingdom without even having the memory of the facts of the empire. Memory that in the case of Italy does not lend itself to moving the masses even in the most reductionist vernacular of the failures of Mussolini's twenty years.

Since many of the obstructionists' proposals can only pass through the EU budget, it is appropriate to remind their potential voters that the provisions of the treaties governing the EU budget have roots in the past, the result of purely political and non-bureaucratic decisions. In this case, historical memory could require sovereignists to dress words with content.

In fact, the preparation, management and control of the EU's annual budget have their legal basis in the Union treaties that have followed one another over time.

It is a long story that begins with the Treaty of Rome of 1957 where both the first procedures for consulting the European Parliament by the European Commission for formation and the budget were defined, and the constraint of a balanced budget: i.e. that the budget it is financed entirely from own resources. This was followed by the Treaty of Luxembourg in 1970 and the Single European Act which defined new procedures for codecision and cooperation between the Community institutions and the European Parliament. Finally, the Treaty of Lisbon in 2007 awarded to the European Parliament a new role on the Union budget previously assigned only to the European Commission (EU Consolidated Treaties, art.14). It is a long history that has always maintained the strict constraint of the balanced EU budget.

Meanwhile, new states have joined the EU. Today there are 28 of them waiting, if it happens, for the UK to leave the EU.

Add that the The Lisbon Treaty has set some new formal and general (perhaps generic) objectives which the Union budget must be finalized (EU, Consolidated Treaties, Title 1. Common provisions. art.2, art. 3). In particular, the following objectives should be mentioned: an area of ​​freedom, security and justice; sustainable development based on balanced economic growth; a highly competitive social market economy aiming at full employment, social progress and environmental quality; scientific and technological progress; economic, social and territorial cohesion. These are necessarily long-term budgetary policy objectives which would also require quantitative specifications to be programmed over time, but which unfortunately are lacking.

Let sovereignists not forget to warn their constituents that for the pursuit of such objectives, following the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon, the European Parliament shares, not only with the Commission but also with the European Council, the power, albeit not binding, to decide on the entire annual budget of the EU in compliance with the objectives, constraints and very complex procedures governed by the Treaty itself. For example, the exercise of the powers governing the EU budget starts each year with the EU Council adopting the EU's annual budget together with the European Parliament through a special legislative procedure, based on a proposal from the Commission . However, the Council can correct the adopted annual budget, together with the European Parliament and formulates a recommendation addressed to the Parliament itself on the advisability of acknowledging the implementation of the annual budget by the Commission (EU. European Council, 2016).

In fact, the sovereignists remind their electors, the balance achieved between the multiple powers that govern all phases of the Union's budget is nothing more than the final result of the combination of the most diverse negotiations between the States. It follows that a government like the yellow-green one, whose public budget is always subject to potential sanction procedures, will not have much weight in defining the new balances, whatever parliamentary majority will emerge from the next European elections. But it is also true that this balance is nothing more than the consequence of the only partial transfer of sovereignty by the member states in favor of the powers of the Union. Hence the risk of stagnation and/or bureaucratic/procedural delays in the Union's action, especially in the case of failed negotiations and the consequent lack of unanimity.

The most significant examples of the risk of potential immobilisation in tackling the economic and social problems emerging within the Union or of crystallization of the Union's action itself mainly concern the procedures for the adoption of the MFF-Multiannual Financial Framework, (EU 2010. Consolidated Treaties, Title II, Chapter 2.). This document in fact constitutes the real architrave and constraint for the preparation and management of the annual budget (EU 2010, Consolidated Treaties, Chapter 3).

The case is similar for resolutions relating to the Union's own resources (EU 2010. Consolidated Treaties, Title II, art. 310, paragraph 4); like that for the approval of the amendments made to the annual budget during the parliamentary examination (EU 2010, Consolidated Treaties, art. 294, paragraph 9).

In the first case, it is the European Council that must unanimously decide on the approval of the MFF (EU 2010. Consolidated treaties, art. 312, paragraph 2), subject to the approval of the Parliament which instead pronounces itself by a majority of its members. In this case, to illustrate a possible conflict, it may happen that the parliamentarians of a member state do not vote on the MFF and that their representative in the European Council, for political coherence with the vote of its parliamentarians, also does not approve the MFF, thus minus the unanimity of the voters.

In the second case, that which concerns the provisions relating to the Union's own resources system, it is once again the Council which must act according to a special legislative procedure which provides for the unanimity of votes of its members, after only consulting the Parliament European Union (EU. 2010. Consolidated Treaties art. 311). It should be added that any decision to establish new categories of own resources or to abolish an existing one: enters into force only after approval by the Member States in accordance with their respective constitutional requirements.

Lastly, the sovereignists should not forget that the treaty, finally, provides for a special and complex procedure for amendments that have been approved by a majority of the members of the European Parliament. In this case, the draft budget thus amended is forwarded to the Council and the Commission so that they can reach a shared solution. But in case a conflict arises on the content of the amendments it is up to the Council alone to decide unanimously su the amendments (EU 2010. Treaties, consolidated art. 294, paragraph 9), approving or rejecting them. In other words, the unanimous will of the heads of state or government prevails over that of the members of the Commission and Parliament.

Finally, it must be remembered a series of rules and constraints for the management of expenses and revenues of the Union budget concerning: a) compliance with the principle of budget balance (understood as a balanced budget) which requires the Union to ensure that expenditure is financed within the limits of the Union's own resources (EU 2010 Consolidated Treaties Title II, article 310, paragraphs 1 and 4); b) compliance with the principle of annuality of budgets, whereby expenditure entered in the budget is only authorized for the duration of the annual financial year (

At the end of this handbook for potential sovereign voters the sovereignist government of the yellow-green type must be reminded that in order to stop dressing nothing with words, it will have to convince its potential electors that in order to "change the EU" one must lose (alas!) internal sovereignty and that in order not to be an irrelevant minority in the parliament will have to be politically credible and accountable to other countries and their elites.

An uphill road for those who shouldn't lie to Italian and European voters with words that dress nothing, who resort to public spending galore for short-term consensus; which neglects any mention of the scandalous tax evasion whose proceeds could be reserved for the reduction of the stock of public debt in an amount much more substantial than the announcements on the growth of the GDP.