@Bradstowe Added and welcome!

Sunday, 19th August, 2018  
Article by Gisela Stuart

Opinion: Europe Needs a Positive Vision

Premier Commissioner Gisela Stuart, who announced her re-election bid earlier this week

As my first term in office draws to a close, I've been casting my mind back to the situation we were in back in February, when I was first elected. We had three positions up for election, four candidates, and, shockingly, four votes. The only thing the Council had done in the previous four months was pass an amendment removing the disastrous confirmation hearings system from Commission elections - and even that had passed with just three votes and virtually no debate. Several major member states had simply withdrawn from the European political process.

I like to think that, over the last six months, I've done my part to end that crisis of legitimacy. Many long-standing nations have returned to Europolis, and many more new countries have arrived. Our overall membership as a region has gone up, and the activity here in Europolis has gone up with it. It's a testament to the work we've done to bring new nations to the EU, and to make Europolis more accessible to new member states.

Moreover, thanks to the work of my colleague, Internal Commissioner Chelsea Clinton-Mezvinsky, the Council is hard at work again, implementing much-needed reforms to our region's approach to issues like climate change, and removing legislation that simply doesn't work. My common-sense goal of a Europe that does less, more effectively is closer than ever to reality. And the ECoJ is about to swing back into action too.

I'm glad that we've got to where we are today because it gives us the opportunity to start work on the important projects that have had to take a back seat during our recent crisis. That's what I hope my second term will be about, if I have the privilege of being re-elected as Premier Commissioner.

A new European budget, for instance, is well overdue. It's time we brought clarity again to how the EU receives and spends its money. I aim to hold meetings with stakeholders and propose a budget within three weeks of being re-elected. I'll also be speaking to member states about how we can boost our regional economy, with a particular view towards breaking down trade barriers within the region. Being an EU member state should offer countries something, and that should include basic protections against unfair trade practices.

Speaking more widely, I'm looking forward to working with the Office of Internal Affairs on revising the Constitution to make it more effective and more accessible. Right now the Constitution ties itself up in matters about electoral systems, while failing to detail what EU membership actually offers. We can build a better Constitution, one that's more accessible, more inviting, and more about the realities of EU membership than ECoJ election tie-breaking.

But alongside this, we still have to keep pressing to ensure we never return to the dark days of the winter just gone. I aim to step up our recruitment and accessibility efforts, in part aided by Constitution reform, and to work with my colleague Vincent Drake, the continuing Foreign Affairs Commissioner, to keep expanding our diplomatic network and ensure that the name of the European Union is known around the world. We're more secure and more active than we were not even that long ago - but there's definitely still more to do.

I want this to be a positive campaign about good ideas and bringing the region together. We know all too painfully how damaging for our community of nations an acrimonious Commission election can be. But if my fellow candidates choose a darker path, then I won't be shy to defend my record, face-to-face, on the debate stage next week. I'll stand for positivity, and I'll stand for my ideas, but I'll also stand for truth and unity.

The EU is a great region with great potential, and whatever happens over the next couple of weeks, it's been an honour to serve it these last six months, and watch it blossom out of some hard times. I'm looking forward to meeting more people, and having a productive discussion with my fellow candidates, during this campaign; and I hope that the next Commission term can be a time when our region enters the new golden age that its nations and peoples deserve. If you join with me, that's what I hope we can achieve together.

Candidate Name: Gisela Stuart

Home Nation: Angleter

Office(s) sought: Premier Commissioner

Incumbent?: Y

Eurogroup Affiliation: EL

Biography:

Gisela Stuart worked as a bookseller and later as a law lecturer before being elected to the Angleteric Parliament in 1997. She served in a variety of shadow ministerial roles before leaving Parliament in 2012, after which she founded a think tank and ran Sam Courtenay's successful SDP leadership campaign. Courtenay appointed her as Angleter's European Councillor in 2015, a role she held until being elected Premier Commissioner in 2018. In the Council, she gained a reputation as a tough scrutineer of legislation, and called for the EU to 'do less, more effectively'. Stuart ran for Premier Commissioner on an emergency agenda of reviving the region's membership and activity in Europolis, and in her first term has focussed her efforts on achieving these goals.

Added, and welcome!

It's time once again to start the nomination process for the next Premier Commissioner and Commissioner for Internal Affairs. Please note that the role of Commissioner for Foreign Affairs is NOT up for election this time. All candidates interested should fill out the form below.

As is traditional, I shall quote the words of our Returning Officer back in January 2011, who opened these nominations thus:

"These elections are supposed to give our member-states fair representation in this region - if candidates cannot take it upon themselves to be active, then I in particular, question their ability and willingness to take part in a body who must be active, accountable and able. I do not wish to threaten nor scare, but I want, for once, our European Commission to consist of Commissioners who are active and who play a part in the region both on and off this forum."

Interested candidates should fill out all information below for themselves and their running mates:

[Candidate photograph or image]
Candidate Name:
Home Nation:
Office(s) sought:
Incumbent? (Y/N):
Eurogroup Affiliation:
Biography:

Nominations open NOW and close at 23.59 GMT on 23rd August, 2018. 

@Spain-In-The-S Added, and welcome!

@Trifecta Plot 63 is already taken - if you could select a plot that's free, that'd be great.

said:

The Democratic Republic of Intelligentia et Prospera
Intelligentia et Prospera
N/A
13
Capital: Munich
Currency: Dollar
Languages: German, Latin
Head of State: Mr. Robert Gronert
Mr. Jake Pinckney
Governing Party: SDP
European Councillor: Mr. Jim Gooeur
Political group:  European Liberals
Player History:  Recently Joined
Constitution: Y

Hi there! Please create an account so I can give you permission to post in the other forums when I add you to the map

Sunday, 12th August, 2018 
Article by Mary Pitt

Opinion: Two Months On, Has Angleter Got What it Wanted?

Writer, author, and former SDP aide Mary Pitt

Next Sunday will mark two months since Angleter went to the polls and declared that it had no idea who it wanted to govern them. In that time our politicians have shown that they have just as little idea as we do. It’s been a time where few, if any, leaders have covered themselves in glory.

Perhaps the first bad omen was when Sam Courtenay decided to proceed as normal with the opening of Parliament, as if nothing at all had happened. On June 25^th, things went exactly as anyone with a slight degree of foresight might have expected. Following the pageantry, the sitting descended into chaos.

Emryc Isla’s decision, announced within hours of the news that Parliament’s re-opening would be going ahead as planned, that he would instantly seek a no-confidence vote in Courtenay, was as predictable as it was stupid.

The 181 SDP MPs dutifully voted against the motion, while an unlikely alliance of the Citizen Alliance, the CSL, and Kilroy made it 180 votes for the motion. This left the Democrats, who, in a rare and, frankly, quite impressive display of unity, all abstained and let the motion fail.

Courtenay survived by a single vote, and then promptly prorogued Parliament. Isla went into backpedal mode, insisting that it was more about signalling the end of the confidence-and-supply deal that had propped Courtenay up for the last three years. Usually symbolic gestures do not come within one vote of removing the Prime Minister from office.

Some wags pointed out that if Emryc Isla had decided to remove Edeva Ziert, which he wants to do, first, and then replaced her with an SDP MP, then he could’ve had the necessary votes. This assumes that a) Ziert would be willing to side with Emryc Isla against Sam Courtenay, and b) the Democrats would’ve played along with the whole plan. Neither are true.

But the real story, as it has been all along, is in the Democratic Party. There’s a line of thinking which says that Sue Fareham could’ve got us a stable government in days if she’d shown ‘decisive leadership’ and picked either option quickly. Anyone who’s vaguely familiar with the Democrats’ infighting would know this idea is for the birds.

The most ‘decisive’ thing Fareham could’ve done is throw the issue as far away from herself as possible, which she did by announcing early on the morning of June 20^th that the party membership would choose the party’s course of action.

Even this drew the instant ire of Robert Rice, Michael Gourieli, Maria Sakrakur, and a whole host of others who rejoice slightly too much in the term ‘heavy hitter’. Within hours Fareham was clarifying that the final deal would be subject to the rubber-stamping of the membership.

Fareham and a small coterie of party bigwigs have since engaged in successive rounds of increasingly fruitless negotiations with both the SDP and the Citizen Alliance. It can’t have escaped her attention that the longer this drags on for, the further the inevitable leadership challenge against her gets pushed back.

In any case, Angleter is in a sort of happy limbo. We have a government, but it’s just not really doing anything. It cannot legislate, and it cannot really be removed until something happens on the Democrats’ side of things. Perhaps this is how we wanted it all along.

#AngleterElections

7.26am

JB: Nigel Martin elected in Hotspring there, rounding out our new Parliament, and as you heard, some slightly acrimonious scenes where Si- sorry, of course, he's not actually a Sir, Pete Waterman, was once again bottom of the pile, defeated by the Sir Not Pete Waterman Party twice in a row now.

Actually, let's just go to this for a second:

PW: WHO ARE YOU TO DISAGREE WITH SIR PETE WATERMAN? I WROTE NUKE THE ECOJ!

Sir Not Pete Waterman: Look, I don't wa-

[PW rushes towards SNPW. The SDP candidate separates the two. PW points at audience.]

PW: I keep losing hundreds of thousands of pounds a year because of you idiots pirating the songs I write, and the moment I do anything to try and stop it, you all laugh and vote for him! You're crazy! Thieves! And you just can't not build more railways! You've got to do it, Nigel! Got to do it! Simple as that. There's no economic evidence against building a railway no matter how much it costs. You can't not afford it. You're ludicrous!

[PW walks off stage, shrugging his shoulders and shaking his head.]

JB: Right. So, anyway, that's the end. Nigel Martin comfortably re-elected in Hotspring, the largest constituency in the country, for the Citizen Alliance. 497 MPs have been elected. Some new faces, some less new. But let's get a final look at the map. Pauline?

PA: Yes, we've got the map here:

So it might look from that like the Citizen Alliance are the largest party by some way, followed by the Democrats, and then by the SDP, but that's because the SDP are a lot stronger in more densely-populated, smaller seats. You could probably fit all their seats into Hotspring alone, for instance. But here's an animation showing just what's changed compared to the notional results from the last election three years ago.

Huge gains there for the Citizen Alliance, from the SDP in the north and northwest of the country - Maien, Fitzon, Maron - and also in parts of Orontes and Sham. But big gains too for Emryc Isla's team from the Democrats in the east. The east used to be Democrat country, but now it's most definitely Citizen Alliance heartland.

JB: It's almost like the Citizen Alliance are encircling the country.

PA: Yes, they've had a very strong appeal in the peripheral areas, and especially the border areas. Mountains, deserts, oil towns, and also some of the less fashionable commuter suburbs - look at that ring around New Birmingham for instance. It's a real coalition of what Emryc Isla calls the 'unfashionable, neglected, and proud'.

RM: What's interesting is how the rural vote has broken down. More marginal farmers have gone decisively for the Citizen Alliance, while Angleter's breadbasket - Dayra, Eastern Berea, Quareytene, parts of Elkhand and Kerkesion - have all stuck by the Democrats. That big blue ball in the centre of the country.

PA: That's right, and there is one border area that hasn't gone to the Citizen Alliance - Neolombardia, and the border with Neo-Venetia in the southwest. They love the Democrats' hawkish stance there, and it's fast becoming one of that party's few remaining strongholds.

And as for the SDP - our winners tonight, if you can call it that - this is basically a map of their traditional strongholds, plus a few marginals with the Democrats, and minus quite a few seats in Orontes and Sham that they've lost to the Citizen Alliance. Very few seats outside the southwest and the big cities. If the right wasn't so split, then this would be not far off the classic map of an SDP drubbing. But we are where we are, and that means this is enough to come away with the most seats. Will it get them back in power? Who knows?

PK: Well, as was said earlier on, what if the left wasn't split? A lot of SDP people will be wondering if things could've been very different if they'd stopped the rise of the CSL, or even kept them at 6% or 7%.

JB: And what we can be sure of is that, until something changes, Sam Courtenay will remain Prime Minister. That's how this country's constitution works - until a new coalition is formed that topples him, or he loses the confidence of Parliament or the party or the monarch, then the Courtenay government will continue. It won't be able to do anything of note, but we do actually have a government. Ish. Now, let's see the full results.

PA: Certainly.

So there's twelve seats in it, and just under 300,000 votes in it too. But going different ways - SDP for the seat count, and Citizen Alliance for the popular vote.

PK: This actually puts real strain on the Democrats now. There's no clear winner who they can justify throwing their weight behind on those grounds - if they try backing the SDP because they've got the most seats, then someone unhappy with that decision would point out that the Citizen Alliance have got the most votes. And vice versa. So it's a real quandary for Sue Fareham, and that's what will dominate the news cycles for the days, weeks, or even months to come.

JB: Indeed. Interesting times ahead. But this is where we leave you. It's gone 7am, if you've been up with us all night and you don't have to go to work, then I'd suggest you get a bit of sleep. Certainly what I'm doing, and certainly what our excellent team here at Sirion should be doing too - my thanks to them, and to all of you who've stuck with us or dropped in every now and then. If you're going to bed, there'll be plenty of news to go around when you wake up, I can assure you of that. But to sum up, once again, we've asked the Angleteric people who they want to govern them, and the answer is, we don't know. That's all from us - good morning!

The theme music plays once again as the camera pans out and the lights dim in the studio, followed by a montage of scenes from the studio and around the result declarations over the night, finishing once again with the ELECTION 2018 title card over the same shot of Parliament House, this time in the morning sun.