Hungary’s Gyorgy Schopflin, from the European People’s Party, has said the trans-national list (TNL) is a bad idea.
He says that if it goes through there will be 27 MEPs in the European Parliament belonging nowhere. The supporters of the TNL claim that they will represent all the citizens of Europe.
Schopflin argues that European citizens haven’t asked to be represented in the TNL way. These ‘floating’ 27 MEPs would sit in the European parliament and be answerable to no one, with no structure for holding them accountable.
He said it’s a “top-down, elite-driven” plot by the project’s largest member states.
“I want to focus on the trans-national lists, I have made no secret in my view that as far as I’m concerned the trans-national list is a bad idea,” he said.
“Here are my reasons, there are several: First, the trans-national list is based on an idea that out there somewhere, there is a European demos just waiting to be represented and the trans-national list will do just this.
“This is an error, there is no European demos and to claim the contrary is an illusion. Have European citizens ever been asked if they want to be represented by a trans-national list? Again, the answer is no.”
According to the Daily Express, he said it would be a “fatal assumption” to believe the trans-national lists would bring European even closer after Brexit.
He said MEPs would be above the electorate and have “power without responsibility”.