NO TIME FOR ENDLESS INSTITUTIONAL DEBATES !!!

As national leaders look towards nominating their candidate, they face a decision that will likely determine the future success or failure of the European project. If such a decision were to be degraded into nothing more than a power play between the European Council and the European Parliament, then citizens across the continent would be right to become ever more disillusioned with the EU project.

There is little doubt that the European project needs re-energizing. It needs fresh faces, fresh ideas and, above all, fresh hope and inspiration.  If Europe is to succeed, it needs faces, characters and personalities that can create hope and inspiration for a 21st century future freed from the dull, stultifying bureaucracy of its past.

There needs to be a fresh approach with the EU and there needs to be change. National leaders must ensure that the new president of the European Commission can give a better focus and balance to EU governance. The new president needs to overhaul the structure and scope of the commission. There are 28 commissioners, one from each member state and each with their own policy competence. This is too many. The EU needs a smaller commission with half a dozen policy clusters based on issues such as the single market, trade and energy. There must be tighter limits on the amount of legislation the body can produce. Europe’s leaders also need to begin to explore how the powers of the parliament can be significantly scaled back so as to give a much bigger role to legislatures in member states. National parliaments enjoy the democratic legitimacy that the European Parliament lacks. They need to have a far bigger say in Brussels, especially at the commission, which has the right to propose EU legislation. A programme to reform the EU along these lines is now essential. Europe is at a turning point. It may have seen off the eurozone crisis and economic growth may be returning – if fitfully. But the European elections have reflected the deepening popular resentment across the continent at political interference by Brussels in national affairs. If Europe’s leaders are to confront this populist challenge, they need to ensure that the institutions in Brussels are more efficient, more nimble and show a confident new face to the EU’s 500m citizens.