Every vote counts

I refer to the letter by Sandro Schembri Adami (October 17) who stated that "the right for every Maltese to vote does little to Malta's position in the European parliament, unless and until our country manages to win more seats".

The claim that the vote of the Maltese electorate does not count disregards the importance of the free choice of Maltese voters. Particularly in the case where a country's electorate is represented by a limited number of MEPs, these representatives should be of outstanding quality. Being a citizen of a smaller member state myself (the Netherlands), it is my experience that MEPs from smaller member states can be very influential in the European parliament if they operate cleverly and participate actively in the parliament's work. The personal abilities of an MEP are therefore of utmost relevance. Furthermore, if elected by a high turnout, MEPs will have a stronger popular backing to do their work than their colleagues will from countries where turnout is low.

But there is another reason why voting is important. MEPs do not sit in national delegations in the parliament, but in multinational political groups. The political composition of the European parliament will strongly determine the direction the EU is heading for in the coming years. It therefore counts which political party one votes for.

One has also to realise that the parliament's powers have rapidly expanded over the last years. Together with the Council (the member states) it has the final say with regard to the EU budget and other important issues such as the internal market, the environment, consumer protection, transport, energy and research and development. A vote for a parliament that is the only parliament in the world that is directly elected across national borders and will represent 450 million European citizens from 25 countries is worthwhile.

As for Malta's claim to have six MEPs, the European parliament has always supported this position which, however, will depend on the outcome of the negotiations between the 15 current and 10 future member states in the so-called intergovernmental conference (IGC). One also has to bear in mind that the smaller countries are already privileged in the European parliament: Luxembourg has six seats (one MEP for 75,000 citizens) against 99 for Germany (one MEP for 800,000 German citizens).

Regarding the language issue, the current Maltese observers in the European parliament have the enormous advantage of being fluent in English, that is increasingly used in the EU institutions. But for the functioning of a democratically elected European parliament one has to understand that it remains crucial that members can express themselves in their own language, even though this causes practical problems and financial burdens.

It is also essential that citizens can take notice of the work done in the EU in their own language, for example to be able to consult EU laws or follow debates in the European parliament via the internet in Maltese. There is a story dating back to 1973 when the Danes joined the EU. They were asked the question to give up their own language in an expanding Community and confine themselves to just English or French. They said that they were willing to accept, on condition that the French would speak English and the English French. The issue was never brought up again...