The EU is undemocratic. In a democratic country the power of government is spilt between the executive (those who draft the laws), the legislature (those who approve the laws) and the judiciary (those who ensure that people abide by the laws). These three elements act as checks and balances against each other. In the EU this is not the case. The executive (the Commission) is all powerful, the legislature (the Council of Ministers and European Parliament) is a toothless rubber stamping body and the judiciary (the European Court of Justice) is a political, policy making arm, of the executive. It ‘fills in the gaps’ in the laws as well as enforces them. In theory the Council of Ministers is the supreme body in the EU but in practice the real decisions are made before the Council meets by an international body of civil servants stationed at the EU called 'COPEREP' (Committee of Permanent Representatives). Legislation proposed by COPEREP is then 'nodded' through in a meeting of the Council of Ministers that usually lasts for a few hours.

The EU is a rampant bureaucracy. As with all centralised bureaucracies, EU legislation effects every aspect of its citizens’ lives. An indication of this can be found by looking at the Directory of Community Legislation In Force. This document is 1,000 plus pages of small print in double columns listing tens of thousands of directives, regulations, decisions and resolutions. Another example of this is the way existing EU legislation must be adopted by new member states - the principle of 'acquis communautaire'. Currently a new member state must incorporate 80,000 pages of existing legislation into its own legal system before it can join the EU.

Britain is the odd one out. One of the men who saw most clearly how quite unsuited Britain is to the continental way of doing things was President de Gaulle of France. His famous statement in 1963 stated that ‘her nature, her structure, her economic position differs profoundly from those of the continentals’. Winston Churchill supported a United Europe but he did not include Britain in his concept of ‘Europe’. In a speech from 1947 Churchill called upon ‘all responsible statesmen’ to ‘shape and fashion the structure’ of a United Europe but he spoke of Britain being quite separate from continental Europe.

The European Parliament. The European Parliament (EP) is made up of members elected by constituencies in each member nation. It is intended to promote the illusion that the peoples of Europe are directly represented and the EU is democratic. However, the EP is really a parliament in name only.

All topics discussed by the EP fall into one of four 'procedures'. These procedures are; The procedure of 'Consultation', The procedure of 'Co-operation', The procedure of 'Co-decision' and The procedure of 'Assent'. The power that the EP has through these procedures rises from virtually none under the procedure of 'Consultation', using which the EP really is just a debating society, through 'Co-operation' and 'Co-decision' to 'Assent' where the EP's decision is final. In reality the EP's powers are severely limited through the use of the weaker procedures. Additionally the European Commission can withdraw proposed legislation if it doesn't like the way it is being amended and only the European Commission can introduce new proposed legislation to the EP.

The EP is in a Catch 22 situation. To be able to claim to be fully democratic all EU legislation would have to be passed under the procedure of 'Assent'. Which even the most Euro-phile nations like France would balk at and would mean the obvious loss of all of what remains of the member countries' sovereignty. Under any other circumstances the EP and therefore the EU can be described as un-democratic. Any claims to be being nearly 'democratic' can be treated like claims to be being 'a little bit pregnant'!