European pirate party

This wikipage is outdated. Please visit european-pirateparty.eufor up-to-date information.

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This page shall help in founding an European pirate party (short PPEU) and inform about the current progress.

Contact

• from Germany, Jens Seipenbusch
• from Sweden, Rick Falkvinge
• from Spain, Carlos Ayala

Open Questions

1. 2009 is close. How does a timetable for founding Eu.PP looks like?
2. What are the legal details of founding a european wide party?
   1. What form/legal body should the party have? e.g.:
      • loosely constituted of national pirate parties (where existing)
      1. • This would be a fraction in the European Parlament. This is what most partys do.SIB
      • separate body in one/some/all EU countries
      1. • There is only one example for this. The European Green Party (EGP). They set up an international nonprofit organisation in Belgium. Members of this Federation are the partys of the european memberstates. Check out their Statutes[1] for more info. -- SIB 18:46, 8 July 2007 (CEST)
   2. Wich laws apply?
      1. I donno if the rules of society law do also apply to political partys, but I think they do. Then the law of the State in which the party has been registered in would be applicable. -- SIB 18:46, 8 July 2007 (CEST)

political Parties in the European Union

Article 191 EC[2] (1) Political parties at European level are important as a factor for integration within the Union. They contribute to forming a European awareness and to expressing the political will of the citizens of the Union. (2) The Council, acting in accordance with the procedure referred to in Article 251, shall lay down the regulations governing political parties at European level and in particular the rules regarding their funding.

The regulations mentioned in Art. 191 (2) EC are:

• Regulation (EC) No 2004/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 4 November 2003 on the regulations governing political parties at European level and the rules regarding their funding[3]
• Decision of the Bureau of the European Parliament of 29 March 2004 laying down the procedures for implementing Regulation (EC) No 2004/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the Regulations governing political parties at European level and the rules regarding their funding[4]

Election Details

Each country may define it's own election process for the EU election. It might be worth comparing them.

are you sure about that? I think they changed the election system for 2009 to have EU-wide election rules, didn't they? --Juxi 09:40, 2 May 2007 (CEST)

Do you have any source for that? The German Bundeswahlleiter shares only media about the 2004 election -- Jan Huwald 13:48, 2 May 2007 (CEST)

As far as I have heard, the minimum quota to being elected to EU Parliament was 4% in Sweden and I know it is 5% in Germany, so this would make the election system different for different nations.--Tonnerkiller 15:42, 15 June 2009 (CEST)

General

There is no uniform voting system for the election of MEPs; rather, each member state is free to choose its own system, subject to three restrictions:

• The system must be a form of proportional representation, under either the party list or Single Transferable Vote system.
• The electoral area may be subdivided if this will not generally affect the proportional nature of the voting system.
• Any election threshold on the national level must not exceed five percent.

Source:

English wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_the_European_Union#Voting_system and its source: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/facts/1_3_4_en.htm

Germany

• pirates have to form a ranked list of candidates (several lists are possible but impractical)
• a list can candidate for single federal state or have a combined candidateship over several or all states
• at least 5% of the votes are necessary for a list to get into the parliament

Source: http://www.bundeswahlleiter.de/europawahl2004/downloads/euwg.pdf (German text)

Gesetz über die Wahl der Abgeordneten des Europäischen Parlaments aus der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Europawahlgesetz - EuWG) http://bundesrecht.juris.de/euwg/BJNR007090978.html

Spain

Rules

• there are 54 seats at stake
• there is a unique national district, instead of a province-driven assignment -found in General Election-
• parties are required to:
  • collect signatures from at least:
    • 50 elected local (city halls), regional (regional assemblies) or national (Congress & Senate) public officers
    • 15.000 eligible voters -an EU citizen, in spite of not being Spanish, can be signatory if resides in Spain; a Spanish citizen, if resides abroad, cannot be a signatory-
  • proposes at least 40 % of candidates of each sex -i.e., minimum 22 candidates of each sex-
• there is no threshold: pure, unique-district, proportional ballot count, the most votes you get, the higher amount of seats you nail; lowest percentage required to get MEPs registered in 1999 (only 1'45 % of valid cast votes); highest percentage registered in 1994 (2'79 % of valid cast votes)

Sources

• Ley Orgánica 5/1985, de 19 de Junio, del Régimen Electoral General (Organic Law 5/1985, published 19th of June, about General Election Regime; Spanish text)
• Ministry of Internal Affairs, Elections Website (Spanish text)

political groups (fractions)

Political groups are always defined in the latest rules of Procedure of the European Parlament. After an election the first thing the Parlament does is to decide about keeping or changing the rules of procedure, which is also done when new memberstates and with them new members of the Parlament join. It is pretty likely that they will keep the current definition of "political group".

Right now you need 19 25 members of Parlament from at least six seven memberstates to form a "political group", according to a change originated by the Corbett report and announced in this Europarliament Press Release.

European Parliament - Rules of Procedure 16th edition July 2004 October 2008[5] (to be changed in July 2009, after 2009 EU Election):

Rule 29

Formation of political groups

1.    Members may form themselves into groups according to their political affinities.

Parliament need not normally evaluate the political affinity of members of a group.
In forming a group together under this Rule, Members concerned accept by definition
that they have political affinity. Only when this is denied by the Members concerned
is it necessary for Parliament to evaluate whether the group has been constituted
in conformity with the Rules.

2.    A political group shall comprise Members elected in at least one-fifth of the
Member States. The minimum number of Members required to form a political group
shall be twenty.

3.    A Member may not belong to more than one political group.

4.    The President shall be notified in a statement when a political group is set up.
This statement shall specify the name of the group, its members and its bureau.

5.    The statement shall be published in the Official Journal of the European Union

Grants to political parties at European level

I'm afraid we do not meet the criteria 2.2 (b) and we would only have thime till 14.11.2007, so no money (for the political party) on this elections. However [6] could be an option for funding international activities bringing Pirate Issues up on the agenda before the elections. See Youth cultural activities Teirdes 22:09, 28 March 2008 (CET)

Call for proposals (No VIII-2008/01) [7]

In order to be eligible for a grant, a political party at European level must satisfy the conditions laid down in Article 3 of Regulation (EC) No 2004/2003, i.e.:

2.2. Eligibility criteria

(a) it must have legal personality in the Member State in which its seat is located;

(b) it must be represented, in at least one quarter of Member States, by Members of the European Parliament or in the 
national Parliaments or regional Parliaments or in the regional assemblies, or it must have received, in at least one 
quarter of the Member States, at least three per cent of the votes cast in each of those Member States at the most
recent European Parliament elections;

(c) it must observe, in particular in its programme and in its activities, the principles on which the European Union is 
founded, namely the principles of liberty, democracy, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and the rule of 
law;

(d) it must have participated in elections to the European Parliament, or have expressed the intention to do so.

4.1 Closing date and submission of applications

The closing date for forwarding the applications is 14.11.2007. Applications forwarded after that date will not be 
considered.

Website

As discussed in June we should put up a EU website specially targeted at the EU level.

Wiki

• wiki.ppeu.net

Design Ideas

• At a risk of not being original :-D what about something that has worked?
  • Obama used deep blue, I suggest -as our primary colors are black & white- black as background color; Obama's website has proven that dark colors also work for websites.

PP-eu

Color / Couleur	Shades of Grey / Niveau de Gris		Black & White / Noir & Blanc
Color / Couleur

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I made this image on my freetime. Please delete, if it's not good. Anttipng 19:41, 12 October 2009 (CEST)

I have some new ones to offer. Now you have to choose. ––lynX 02:05, 20 March 2012 (CET)

Some other alternatives: --collentine 14:00, 4 July 2012 (Mexico)