The European Parliament must get the right to propose legislation

Currently, the European Commission is the only institution in the European Union that has the right to propose new legislation. However, as the EU has been criticized for lack of democracy, there is a need to question the Commission’s monopoly on proposing new legislation. One way to increase the democracy in the European Union is to give more power to the European Parliament, and the possibility of the European Parliament to gain a right to propose legislation might provide a good tool for this.

European Parliament is the only institution of the European Union that is directly elected by the people of the EU member states. Therefore, with the ability to propose new legislation the Members of the European Parliament could try to create new legislation according to the will of their voters, which would be a democratic improvement.

Nevertheless, even if the Parliament had the right to propose legislation, it is very likely that most of the proposals of new legislation would be proposed by the Commission, because members of the European Parliament do not have equal resources in creating legislative proposals compared to the Commission. Thus, it could be easily argued that enabling the MEPs to propose legislation would not bring a major change when it comes to improving the democracy of the EU. However, the right to propose legislation would still be an improvement.

The right to propose legislation would strengthen the role of the Parliament in the decision-making of the Union. The reason for this is that in this situation the Parliament’s opinions must be taken into account more seriously than currently as the Parliament’s opinions could become new legislation much more easily. This, on the other hand, would also increase the democracy of the Union as the Parliament could bring the will of the people much more effectively.

In conclusion, giving the power to propose legislation would be one improvement in the state of democracy of the EU. This is a needed change since the European Parliament is elected directly by the people, but it still does not have the power it deserves.