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Neena calls for more communicative EU

In a speech to the European Parliament ,Neena Gill, the Labour MEP for the West Midlands called for more transparency in the European institutions.

Speaking in a debate on parliamentary legislation by Hungarian Socialist MEP Gyula Hegyi entitled ‘Active dialogue with citizens in Europe’, Neena said: “I voted in favour of this report because I believe we are losing our citizens.”

“MEPs complain that our voters don’t understand the importance of what we do here; that not enough of our citizens are interested in what we do to turn out to vote in the European elections on June 4th.”

“The UK has the worst level of knowledge about the EU than any European country. Communication is therefore key. If people don’t know what we do here, it’s not their fault, but rather ours for not making it easy enough for people to find out.”

Neena highlighted how active schemes such as the European Youth Parliament – which recently organised a very successful event at Birmingham University for local sixth form students – show that proactive engagement really works.

“Engagement will be vital not only for the European elections in June, but to clear up much of the Euro scepticism that is wrecking the European project.”