Another orange envelope on its way to the Netherlands (Pietro Naj-Oleari, 20-05-2009)

Each member of our team will be voting since there is always time to vote. Here at the EP headquarters we will on election night be as much waiting for the results to know how the “camembert“  will be divided as we will be waiting for the turn-out figures.

As an incentive for candidates to continue campaigning: one third of our staff has not made up their mind yet less than two weeks before the elections. What everybody does know, is whether they will be voting for a candidate in their home country or for a Belgian candidate. Remember, for European elections it is possible to vote in the EU-country of residence. Only three people are saving the honour of our unit by making a true European choice: they will be voting in Belgium. Well, actually only two people are saving our honour since one is voting in Belgium because his own government took away his voting rights!

In case you did not make up your mind yet, continue reading to find some tips and tricks to make your choice.

Firstly, if you still barely know what the European Parliament is made of, watch this video explaining the groups with a chocolate cake. It seems the British conservatives taste deliciously! Bear in mind that many parties running for election are not represented in the current Parliament. You can check out the voting lists in your country  to know all participating parties in these elections. You will find the lists on the right site on your county page, once they’ve become available.

You may have a cross-party issue on your mind you want to fulfil. You may want to vote for a candidate that will look after gay rights, or you may want to vote for a MEP with special attention for disabled people. Just contact the spokesperson of the party of your choice and ask if there is a candidate on their list looking after your specific interests.

Finally, many candidates are using this year the social media for their campaign. The candidate you want to know more about may have put a video on YouTube, a page on Facebook or keep a blog and in any case (s)he will have a website. If you were able to find this blog, you certainly will be able to find more info online to make up your mind! 

Most citizens will be mainly interested in knowing how their party did. But what if in the next elections turn-out figures would be as exciting to them as they are to us…. Suppose we would slightly change the rules for the elections in 2014 and let the citizens of each EU-country really get the politicians they deserve…. by number.

We could link the number of MEPs per country to the turn-out in the country (we would need to find a solution for Belgium where voting is compulsory). If citizens would know they could be poorly represented – not necessarily by ideology but by nationality - in case they would not show up, they may be very keen on voting to gain an extra MEP or two for their country. How exciting the elections would be in that case ……

No, I am not only dreaming and actually did last week a down-to-earth thing and casted my vote. So one more orange envelope is on its way to The Hague… And no, I will not tell here what lady I voted for.