Barries eh ;)

[Testin da Cable]

Wij matey, everyone will still vote in the council elections etc. The scale of things is different tho: in effect the country will have become larger.
As to influencing things at the local level, this can still be done by talking to the councils etc. That's what they're there for innit. I know they don't always seem to pay attention tho, heh but if they do a bad job they don't get reelected. [very democratic if you ask me ]

There's this tho:

How much democracy was showed in the countries that didn't get a referendum on the Euro ?

You beat me to the punch on this one hehe. Holland is one of those. We didn't get our say, and in some cases this has caused very bad blood heh. I consider this a facet of the 'poor implementation' I mentioned, but I'm not going to hold it against the governement: I want the EU/Euro more than I'm ticked off so it can slide afaic.

 

[Wij]

My point was that people don't vote against the local council no matter what they do. They just vote for their favouriite party, even if their council has fucked them over. Trust me, I've spoken to plenty of people who've been shafted by the council but still will vote for them because they are Labour/Conservative or whatever. Throughout most of Europe the idea of local democracy is ignored completely The governments don't encourage it. We have an almost Russian attitude to politics. We like to discuss the big ideas but we seem to feel that we can't make any difference so we shouldn't bother. It's like living in a Dostoyevsky novel

 

[Summo]

I work in local council and the best way to get things changed is to write a clear, intelligent letter to your MP (get the assistance of your Citizen's Advice Bureau if you can't write clearly or intelligently. )

If your MP agrees with your point, or you can 'touch' him/her on a personal level (my kids can't get into school/care/home etc) it will get changed.

Within the Council what the MP says goes. I've seen departments sent into a frenzy because they've suddenly been given a tight deadline to improve a road/school/whatever just because a letter from a member of the public highlighted a good point.

Last MP here was notorious for latching on to a 'public project' and making sure it happened. Great for the public.

 

[Testin da Cable]

^^that's it innit
not all of them are good tho

 

[]SK[]

€€€€€€€€€

cool

 

[Mellow-]

Look j00 lot, quit talking about filthy foreign currencies and talk about having Barries instead...

 

[old.CJ Ravey]

OK. Having Barries is like wearing a bobble hat of courage.

 

[Speccy]

I'll never change from pounds shillings and barries! Dont undestand this new fangled metric system. I mean, how much is 10 New Barries worth in the old system?

[continued ranting about how we kicked johnny foriegner in double u double u one]