Richard Corbett MEP, member for Yorkshire and the Humber, Deputy Leader of the European Parliamentary Labour Party, member of the European Parliament's Constitutional Affairs Committee and co-rapporteur on the EU Constitution, takes to task those who claim that the EU has a democractic deficit:

One of the oldest and most favoured Euromyths bandied about by Eurosceptics is the one regarding the lack of democracy in the EU. The famous phrase, "Brussels bureaucrats", gives the impression of unelected and unaccountable officials in a far-away land creating and passing laws with no regard for democracy. However, the reality is far from this image.

European legislation is adopted by the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament, on a proposal of the Commission. The Council of Ministers represent the national governments of each of our democratic member states. The Parliament consists of directly elected MEPs. The Commission is made up of individuals nominated by the governments of the Member States and confirmed by the Parliament.

The Commission proposes legislation, either on their own initiative, or at the request of either the Council of Ministers or the Parliament. The Commission is usually the institution accused of being the most undemocratic because its members are not directly elected. However, they are democratically accountable because they can be dismissed by the directly elected Parliament, whose confidence they must have in the first place, through a vote of confidence, to take office. This is not dissimilar to the executive branch at national level in most European countries - they are not directly elected but must have the confidence of the elected parliament. In any case, the Commission proposes, but does not decide.

The Council of Ministers represents the national governments of the EU and has to agree to all legislation proposed by the Commission, either by qualified majority voting (needing over two-thirds of the votes in favour for approval) or, for the more sensitive matters, by unanimity.

The European Parliament is directly elected by the peoples of Europe and, in most cases, also has to agree legislation proposed by the Commission. The cases where it doesn't will soon disappear, if the proposed Reform Treaty is ratified. It also adopts the EU budget.

The Parliament consists of MEPs from parties in government and parties in opposition in each Member State (thereby, unlike in most other international structures, giving opposition parties an input), from parties across the political spectrum and Members coming not just from capital cities but all the regions. MEPs sit in political groups (socialist, Christian democrat, liberal, etc), highlighting the political (as opposed to national) issues and choices at stake when decisions are taken.

Under the Reform treaty, all legislative proposals will first be examined by national parliaments before going through the Council of Ministers. This will give national parliaments the opportunity to shape the position taken by their minister before he or she goes to Brussels.

No structure is perfect. But the EU has a level of parliamentary scrutiny that exists in no other international structure. No European laws can come into force without passing the double test of acceptability to Council (national governments) and acceptability to the directly elected European Parliament. So to say that the EU has no democratic accountability is not only far removed from reality, it is simply not true!