Initiative for Europe Handbook 2008

INITIATIVE FOR EUROPE
a) The DD set for the EU
• constitutional initiative right and facultative constitutional referendum right (CI and CR), including
the required signature quorum (2% of the registered electorate), the minimum number of EU
states from which the signatures must come, the minimum number from each state, and the time
allowed for signature collection (12 or 16 months).
• legislative initiative right (LI)
• right of petition to the European Parliament and the EU Commission
• qualification initiative (QuI) as the first phase of CR, CI and LI , which gives a citizens' initiative
the right to financial and other support from the EU.
b) The legislative initiative – a concrete example of DD design for the EU
• the signatures of one million registered voters from at least five different countries, each of which
must contribute at least 10 percent of the total signatures, must be collected and submitted within
18 months.
• supporters give their signature, full name and address, plus the number of their passport or
identity card.
• if ten different countries produce at least 90,000 signatures each, the total of 900,000 signatures
would also qualify the legislative initiative.
• if 50,000 signatures have been collected and verified within six months, with at least 7,000
signatures coming from five different countries, the initiative has the right to receive official
support from the EU.
• 20 citizens from a minimum of seven different countries can submit a formal proposal to the EU
Commission. The (transnational) European popular initiative is officially launched, and the formal
deadlines come into play, once the proposal has been approved as legitimate and has been listed on
the EU citizens' initiative website.
c) EU Citizens' Initiative support rights
Support for EU citizens' initiatives is the genuinely original aspect of the proposals for direct democracy
in the EU. It is designed to take into account the EU's size, diversity and multiplicity of languages and
avoid the risk of democratic rights in the EU being used only by affluent and politically experienced
citizens who have the power of big organisations behind them.
In order to qualify for this assistance – which is not defined primarily in financial terms – an initiative
group must already have done a considerable amount of work and be able to show that the particular
issue on which it is focussing enjoys a certain minimum level of support across Europe. So the first
institutional phase of an EU citizens' initiative is a qualifying period of six months, within which the
initiative group can demonstrate through its own efforts that it deserves the support which can help it
to make a success of the second phase. This idea for a qualifying phase, with the possibility of earning
the right to public support, has not so far been introduced anywhere in the world.
Official support for a European Citizens' Initiative group (ECIG) could take the following forms:
• the ECIG receives a voucher to cover the cost of having text (e.g. the initiative proposal and
supporting rationale) up to a maximum specified size (say 10,000 characters) translated into 20
languages.
• the ECIG is offered assistance in building a website which functions in 20 languages.
• the ECIG receives vouchers for train and/or air travel for up to five meetings of a maximum of 20
activists in a city within the EU – to enable face-to-face meetings, which are very different in quality
from 'virtual' meetings.
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