From a British perspective…
July 9th, 2009 | 
Author: 
There was an amusing Editorial in the Independent today concerning the “Democratic Deficit” of the EU. The key problem for the UK is that the “Continental System” based upon Napoleonic principles whereas the UK and indeed the Anglo-Sphere are based upon the “Adversarial System”.
To write “And that deficit adds fuel to the arguments of its muddle-headed critics.” is to insult people with genuine reservations. Further it is frankly arrogant in assuming that the orthodoxy so beloved of the chattering classes that the EU is a wonderful and “inherently good thing” without exception, is pots.
The Key is the Rule of Law
Forget those who are emotionally opposed to the EU, from a British perspective there are some very real issues that disadvantage the citizens of these islands and a good illustration being the awful Human Rights Act. Although this legislation is common across the EU, it is applied very differently in France and so on – think Gallic shrug.
In the UK our interpretation of Law is very literal with some very undesirable results when it comes to removing undesirable people from these shores. But it is also worse than that in that previously the Courts would interpret the legislation against the background of “What Parliament intended in passing a law”. Now because everything is subservient to European Courts, we have in effect Judges making and altering laws and not our elected representatives at Westminster
The Principle
Historically the basis of our democracy is that we can eject the incumbents from Office at the next General or Local Elections, however with the EU now we not only have unelected people in Brussels to contend with but also British Judges who we the citizens cannot remove no matter what they do.
What arrangements a future British Government will come to with regard to participating in the EU, I do not know but, it is perfectly obvious that we need to withdraw from the various EU Courts and repatriate Law Making and interpretation back to the British Parliament.
Posted in Politics
But the ECJ is an instrument of the EU for the very purpose of ensuring EU supremacy. This was hammered home in the Lisbon Treaty which gave the EU single Legal personality and the ECJ part of that personality. You cannot be part of the EU and withdraw from the jurisdiction of its courts. That would be like Mendip Council withdrawing from the jurisdiction of British Courts. You are in or you are out. You might want to note this part of the Lisbon treaty
27. Declaration concerning primacy
The Conference recalls that, in accordance with well settled case law of the EU Court of Justice, the Treaties
and the law adopted by the Union on the basis of the Treaties have primacy over the law of Member States,
under the conditions laid down by the said case law. The Conference has also decided to attach as an Annex
to this Final Act the Opinion of the Council Legal Service on the primacy of EC law as set out in 11197/07
(JUR 260):
“Opinion of the Council Legal Service
of 22 June 2007
It results from the case-law of the Court of Justice that primacy of EC law is a cornerstone principle of
Community law. According to the Court, this principle is inherent to the specific nature of the European
Community. At the time of the first judgment of this established case law (Costa/ENEL,15 July 1964, Case
6/6411) there was no mention of primacy in the treaty. It is still the case today. The fact that the principle of
primacy will not be included in the future treaty shall not in any way change the existence of the principle and
the existing case-law of the Court of Justice.”