Nieuws van de afdeling

20 January 2014

Meddling with Brussels

Since the Lisbon Treaty national parliaments have enjoyed the possibility of opening a dialogue with the European Commission. What seems at least as important is the introduction of a scheme to force the European Commission to reconsider, at an early stage, proposals it has presented. Since Lisbon roughly a third of the national elected representative bodies have reacted to a Commission proposal by saying it would be better not to do it. Known as a ‘yellow card’, this obliges the Commissioner to reconsider its proposal. If more than half of the twenty-eight national parliaments in the European Union brandish the card, it turns into an ‘orange card’, in which case the Commission, should it continue to pursue the proposal, will have the whistle blown on them by the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament.

20 January 2014

Greek Opposition leader Alexis Tsipras: End Europe’s austerity policies

During the public debate on ‘Democracy, Economy and Society’ held on Saturday afternoon at the SP’s Amersfoort headquarters Het Moed (literally, ‘Courage’), Greek opposition leader Alexis Tsipras called for a radical change in Europe’s crisis policies, arguing that they were counterproductive and undermined democracy and support for European cooperation.

16 January 2014

Roemer: 'For cooperation but against the United States of Europe’

if we want to strengthen cooperation in Europe, then we shouldn’t be charging ahead, but lending an ear to the people who don’t go along with this, who say ‘superstate no, cooperation yes’. That was the message of SP leader Emile Roemer in his lecture on Europe and the credit crisis to the Student Association for International Relations (SIB) in Utrecht.

16 January 2014

Roemer: 'For cooperation but against the United States of Europe’

If we wish to strengthen cooperation in Europe, then we should not be charging ahead but lending an ear to those who don’t go along with this, people who sat ‘supersate no, cooperation yes. That was the message from SP leader Emile Roemer in his lecture on Europe amd the credit crisis to the Student Union for International Relations (SIB) in Utrecht, the full text of which can be read below.

15 January 2014

EU rules on public procurement will be made more social and better for small firms, says De Jong

SP Euro-Euro-MP Dennis de Jong has welcomed changes to the European Union Directive to be approved today by the European Parliament. As one of the six MEPs chosen to negotiate the final text, De Jong was closely involved in drawing it up. ‘I fought hard to have the rules adjusted and it paid off,’ he says. ‘The new rules will offer more possibilities for social concerns and considerations of sustainability to be taken into account in tendering procedures, and moreover it will become a lot easier for small and medium-sized businesses to participate in these procedures and to win contracts.’

10 January 2014

Invasion of Iraq was more than a ‘mistake’

The Dutch national daily newspaper nrc.next recently published an editorial on foreign involvement in Iraq which, in the SP’s view, had a euphemistic if not misleading tone. A few days later, on 10th January, 2014, the paper published this brief rejoinder from defence specialist Karel Koster, of the party’s research bureau.

International