At our last Seckford Meeting, the question was asked how MEPs are elected to the EU Parliament. The above graphic explains the system which is used in the UK other than Northern Ireland. It is named after the man who devised it, Victor d’Hondt. Here in Suffolk we are part of the Eastern Region which returns a total of seven MEPs, so the system will cover seven rounds (rather than the five as in the worked example).
It is important to remember that the seven MEPs represent the whole of The Eastern Region which are the counties of Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire and Herfordshire. After the last EU elections held in 2014, the Eastern Region elected three Conservatives, three UKiP and one Labour MEP. Probably most of us would be hard pushed to name all seven MEPs!
Another feature of the EU Parliamentary election system is that you are voting for a party rather than a named individual. Each party can select candidates up to the number of seats available. So in this part of the country, the main parties each put forward up to seven candidates to represent them. The names are in ranked order so if that party wins one seat then only the person on the top of their list will be elected. Someone can stand as an independent but because the region is so large that individual has little chance of being elected unless they are a well known celebrity.
The deadline for nominations is on Thursday 25th April and after that date we will know who is standing, and hopefully we will have some idea of their policies. As the Suffolk EU Alliance is a cross-party grassroots group campaigning to Remain in Europe we will be working to ensure as many voters as possible are given the opportunity to challenge all the candidates on the position regarding our future in Europe. We will be campaigning in the streets, leafleting households and holding a hustings meeting to which we’ll invite all candidates to have the opportunity to engage with the electorate.
Your support will be vital in promoting the Remain cause. The committee looks forward to any assistance you can offer, small or large, that you can offer in the forthcoming intense campaign.