Greek questions which make no sense 2: How not to run a referendum
Another Hellenic question which makes little if any sense ...
Britain has begun, and will doubtless continue to have, a serious debate about how the question should be worded for the forthcoming referendum on whether Britain should remain a member of the EU and what the rules are about the campaign.
That is as it should be.
It is really important that we get as close as possible to the situation where everyone on both sides accepts that the election has been conducted fairly. I think all sides will recognise this and after a frank exchange of views we will reach a broad consensus on how to do that which will deal with most of the complaints which have been made.
The Greek government seems to be rather less bothered by this. Courtesy of the BBC, here is a translation of the question on their bailout ballot paper
As the BBC put it, there is still a question over when and how voters will be presented with those two documents referred to in the referendum question, "and whether world-class economists will be on hand at polling stations to explain them."
Let's just hope we can all learn a few lessons from this nonsense when it comes to the debate about our own referendum.
Britain has begun, and will doubtless continue to have, a serious debate about how the question should be worded for the forthcoming referendum on whether Britain should remain a member of the EU and what the rules are about the campaign.
That is as it should be.
It is really important that we get as close as possible to the situation where everyone on both sides accepts that the election has been conducted fairly. I think all sides will recognise this and after a frank exchange of views we will reach a broad consensus on how to do that which will deal with most of the complaints which have been made.
The Greek government seems to be rather less bothered by this. Courtesy of the BBC, here is a translation of the question on their bailout ballot paper
As the BBC put it, there is still a question over when and how voters will be presented with those two documents referred to in the referendum question, "and whether world-class economists will be on hand at polling stations to explain them."
Let's just hope we can all learn a few lessons from this nonsense when it comes to the debate about our own referendum.
Comments
In fact its better than the proposed EU referendum question "SHOULD THE UK REMAIN A MEMBER OF THE EUROPEAN UNION?"
YES / NO
its better for many reasons, firstly and formost what is YES - does that mean we take the Full EU membership and adopt the EURO, or do we accept DCs unjudgable negotiation who wont even state what he is asking for?
What is NO - does that mean we take the FLEXCIT route, or the WTO route, the swiss option, the norway option, another different option?
If I had to guess I suspect this may be easier said than done.
I agree that if there is a "No" vote it is then necessary to decide which option other than EU membership we want to go for.
You could argue for specifying the "No" option in the referendum - for example, by adding a second question which choses between, say, the Norwegian or Swiss options, or alternatively by specifying a particular solution as the "No" option.
The difficulty is that those who want to leave probably support a range of different alternative models and it is not immediately obvious who should get to pick which of them would be put forward in the referendum.
If the government tries to pick the "No" option in advance of the referendum, there will be deafening cries of "foul" from Eurosceptics who will claim that an "In" PM is claiming the right to chose the position of the other side.
But who has a mandate to speak for the "Out" supporters? The person with the nearest thing to an electoral mandate to do so is probably Nigel Farage, but I think you and I both agree, as do some members of UKIP although it is clearly career-limiting for a UKIP politician to say to publicly, that making Nigel Farage leader of the "No" campaign would be the most guaranteed method of ensuring "Yes" wins - unless at the same time you sabotage "Yes" by appointing Tony Blair as their campaign leader.
its really that people are trying to pollute that choice that is the problem.
Here you go