EU Court upholds Rock's voting rights

Published on Mon 18th Sep 2006

Last week's ruling in the European Court of Justice that the UK is free to decide which Gibraltar citizens can vote in European elections is great news. It comes as a fitting finale to Gibraltar's National Day celebrations, which I attended on Saturday and Sunday. It must also have brought a sigh of relief to the Home Secretary, because if Spain's complaint had been upheld, over a million commonwealth citizens in the UK would have lost their right to vote in elections.

In Gibraltar I became the first MEP ever to address the crowd at the strange pop concert cum political rally which the Gibraltar government organises.

Our Westminster MPs generously allowed me to exercise a privilege previously enjoyed only by them. It is hugely valuable to me: I spoke to 12,000 of my constituents in one go! Thankfully, they cheered me; their own Chief Minister had to face a barrage of booing and heckling when he spoke. His chances of re-election next year look pretty slim.

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From Gibraltar I went to Vienna to support the Leader of our sister party

Liberales Forum in a General Election campaign in which he knows he'll be elected. Sadly, he'll be the only Liberal MP, though currently they have none. The party decided not to contest an election in which it is unlikely to pass the threshold of 5% of the vote needed to enter Parliament. Instead, they did a deal with the Social Democrats in which our man is 15th on their list, more or less guaranteeing him a seat. With one MEP too they will at least have a platform.

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President Musharraf of Pakistan paid an official visit to Brussels; I met him on Wednesday. He spoke in glowing terms about Pakistan and the need for co-operation in the War on Terror. I have never visited his country, but I read the statistics on adult illiteracy (over 50% of all women) and the horrific reports of women being raped in police stations when they go to seek protection. I suspect Musharraf is part of the problem rather than its solution.

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The European Commission decided this week how much money each member state should receive from the rural development fund. A total of 77.66 billion euros is available over the period from 2007 to 2013. The UK will get EUR 1.9 bn, which must go to the poorest regions, and must now decide how to divide it up. I will be lobbying hard for Cornwall.

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The Commission also decided that from now on they will send all EU documents directly to national parliaments as soon as they are published. It should help them in their job of oversight. In Brussels we'll be campaigning this autumn to have national governments publish their 'concordance tables' so that we can do a better job of scrutiny by comparing how they comply with EU legislation.

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At the Party Conference I'm launching my new book 'Liberalism - something to shout about'. This collection of essays argues that the Liberal Democrats need to be bolder in their liberalism if they are to build a constituency of votes capable of sustaining the Party in government.