Euro-abstention
It is reassuring that the onset of the elections to the European Parliament is being greeted with whatever is the opposite of a fanfare. If the main political parties were not guaranteed airtime by our restric- tive broadcasting system, it is doubtful whether the elections would command any public attention at all. Aware of this, and aware that their own parties' policies towards the EEC are confused, Labour and the Conservatives will try to make the elec- tions into a pale version of a General Elec- tion and campaign on confidence (or lack of it) in the Government. The temptation to play along with this idea, and so to take the trouble to vote, should be resisted. The elections, after all, are for a non-British body, mistakenly and presumptuously called a parliament when it is actually a mere assembly; those who vote should therefore vote on the 'European' issues with which the Parliament concerns itself. For unqualified pro-Europeans, the issue is simple: vote Alliance, or for those Conser- vatives that seem to be cornmunautaire. For the sceptic or the definite anti-European, the decision is more difficult. It might appear sensible to vote Labout, in order to get a critical voice at Strasbourg, but the history of the past few years has shown that such criticism, expressed in that forum and so heavily outweighed by Continentals, has no effect, and may do the cause of British reform or of withdrawal from the EEC more harm than good. The wiser choice is not to vote at all. If, as the latest opinion polls are indicating, the turnout in Britain is less than 30 per cent, the Parliament's authority to act in our name will look even less impressive. Those loyal Tories who feel that they must vote could at least extract a promise from their candidates that they will not alter the composition of the Conser- vative group at the Parliament by uniting it with European Christian Democrats and others, so separating it still further from the defence of British interests.
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