The Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) were the first party in the European Parliament to publish their manifesto ahead of the 2014 European elections (and you can read it on their website). As part of our coverage in the run-up to the elections in May, we’ll be taking a peek at the Liberal Democrats‘ manifesto below. We’ll also be taking a look at the manifestos of the other parties, and we’ll publish those over the coming weeks.
So, what do ALDE believe? We’ve taken some of the main points from their manifesto and presented them below (click for a bigger image). There’s much more in the manifesto itself, but these are some of the policies that stand out:
If you like the sound of these policies, make sure to support the Liberal Democrats in the Debating Europe Vote 2014! Or, if you think the ALDE manifesto is the wrong direction for Europe, stay tuned as we will be looking at each of the others parties’ positions in turn.
Vote 2014
Voting is closed in our Debating Europe Vote 2014! The results are now in, so come and see what our readers thought!
31 comments Post a commentcomment
YES!
their priority is to make us slaves to corporations by neoliberalism.
:/ sound like a cheap ex-communist reaction. True, there is a lot of neoliberalism, and a lot I would like to have different. But “to make us slaves of” is a false, thus non-argument. :)
Boy, talk about being off beam. What is the matter with you people. Do you not want a stable democratic EU.
First of all, why on earth do you think it a good idea to be in a trade agreement with the USA? What do they have, as far as trade goes that you wish us to emulate or partake of? Are you seeing straight or are you in the pocket of their lobbyists?
Number 2 is a good idea. We could do with a lot of that. However, what plans are in place for this to happen and if you have to be part of a coalition will you, akin to the UK Lib/Dems, sell out your voters in order to be in partial power, ready to give way on all important issues the electorate expected you to demand and stick to?
Number 3 ditto. What is your plan, how will you make sure we are not taken to the cleaners by power companies who are presently bleeding us all dry? Are you intending to Nationalise the energy companies and make them not for profit organisations who put the needs of the public before the needs of their CEO and top salary earners?
You know having got this far down the list I find I have no trust in any of the proffered policies. I don’t see in any of this bowing to the will of the majority under and democratic rule. Example, Direct Democracy.
Open door immigration policies are not working and are against the will of the people as a whole. In fact you promise everything and expain nothing. It is empty in all aspects of why and how it would work.
So, no, I would not vote for this party. Although, off the cuff, some of it sounds good, but overall, I’d say that the tasty promises are the fly in the centre of the web and should one try to feast off it, by stepping into the threads to vote, it will only lead to ones own demise.
No thank you.
.
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Not sure I understand your problem with immigration as described above. It’s just a bullet point in a list, if you want implementation details, check their website. There are some good ideas there. Open-door migration in this conception means controlled migration to focus on supplementing skills missing from the EU job market right now.
*some* people oppose this because they think that keeping startup companies prisoners to the EU job market they will be able to force them to pay certain salaries, which isn’t true. Not sure if you ever tried your hand at running a business, but I was in the position of needing 10 people that I could pay only about 40k/year for a given skillset. Nobody took that for the amount of work required. I found some people overseas but I was unable to secure work permits in time so I faced a choice: give up the most important projects and get a bad reputation or move to the east. So I moved to Vietnam together with the founding members until we grew enough to be bought.
Yeah, in 2-3 years we would have definitely grown in EU to pay the needed salaries to hire locally (not to mention the auxiliary jobs created during growth) but that would’ve required about 10 initial foreigner to allow about 100 local jobs to be eventually created (the 100 were create at close to EU salaries given that we did lose a couple of local partnerships – had we stayed it would’ve been better)
Too superficial, no concrete change.
An EU seat in the UN security council and in the IMF, not concrete change? That’s a huge change.
Number 10? Why on gods earth should that need to be in a party manifesto, it should be enshrined in EU law
Every taxpayer in Europe has a right to know what goes on and where the money goes
Like the Eden that is the minimum-state politics of Somalia
Like the Eden that is the minimum-state politics of Somalia
This is total populism. Needs more details to be even near credible. Even if it was, I wouldn’t support ALDE. No way!
Largest ALDE member party in my country is the Center of Finland. It used to be our prime minister party for eight years in row. In 2011 they lost the parliamentary elections and fell from 23,1 to 15,7 percent of the votes. As they were a party that lost most votes and mainly for anti-European The Finns party. They changed totally their views in the opposition and they claim to be euro critics now. So, if this is what they do in euro parliament, it is completely against what they say to the people in our home country. So there is no sense of voting them!
Did you bother reading? just before the manifesto it clearly states that ”there’s much more in the manifesto itself, but these are some of the policies that stand out”. They’re not trying to have all the detail on that 10 point manifesto, because the more detailed one is on the ALDE party website!
not really
No. Because of Verhofstadt, he’s a mortal enemy of democracy.
As for this manifesto, my easter bunny (I say this instead of my god) what a load of tosh. When did ignorance become a point of view?
Also, they support the free trade treaty with the US that will destroy tens of thousands of jobs. Normal people don’t believe the corporate propaganda about this worthless treaty.
I also don’t vote for Alde. But not because of Guy verhofstadt, who is in my opinion a good coalition partner with the Greens and Social democrats, and very important, has shown as PM of Belgium with way to many parties to be able to govern! This Sunday noon he was on Flemmish TV in debate with the Belgian (Flemish) green and social democrats. And sure, they have their differences, but the agreements and willingness to come to a more than reasonable compromise was very clear. As Green as I am, I know that we have to compromise with both soc.Dem (+ Left) aswell as the Alde. And vise versa! :) unless you want a right, conservative and anti-EU. :(
I say YES ! A great manifesto, ALDE is the best party in the European Parlaiment.
Yes ! A great party, a great manifesto !
Very populist and not concrete, no details, and where do they propose to get the money for all of these policies? They should focus on one or two areas in detail i.e. the environment, or employment.
Too normative and unrealistic
No 1. Of course we all want to boost the economies of Europe . A better start than the one suggested though would be to ditch the euro and allow countries to set their own tax ,interest rates ect .
No 2. OK . We have neglected the training of young people for too long .
No 3. You are setting policy on an unproven science
No 4 Ditto 3
No 5 . Reducing waste is always a good idea , the single seat proposal needs explaining further
No 6 No problem with immigration as long as it is restricted to people we need . With proper management of No 2 though training people in the skills shortages required I would expect this to be minimal .
No 7 , no chance , the EU has been shown to be an economic nightmare . Its one size fits all policies has led to sending southern Europe back to the 19thC
No 8. No thank you the UN stands for United NATIONS , the EU is not a nation .
No 9 . The UN charter should cover it no need for a European level of interference . (another reason to say no thanks to No.8)
No 10 . Oh yes please , with referenda in all countries on accepting it
Looks good. Especially the focus on education and renewable energy.
Still, I know too little about the different groups and parties in the EU Parliament to make my choice already. What is a good place to learn more about them. Which are the truly European parties? As far as my understanding of this all goes, most of these alliances like ALDE are formed by representatives of national parties of a certain political colour. I would much more prefer to give my vote to politicians that are not part of national parties, because they have too much temptation to put the national agenda above the common agenda.
Some good ideas, but no words about the central problem:
euro like this cannot work = need for more eurozone integration (way more than banking union) = how do we achieve this asap?
”NO”
You don’t agree the euro like this cannot work?
Agree : 5,6,9,10. Questioning : 1,2, Disagree : 3,4.
Europe dependency on cheap russian gas will make room for so called dealers of alternative, green, clean, etc equipment and technology. They are greedy and aggressive in equal measure, my concern is that that’s “the next big deal” is in fact a hoax enforced by law. Sustaining crooks is not the way to promote yourself differently.
ZERO words about unemployment.
ZERO words about mistakes made by the european economic governance.
Are you even trying, ALDE?
This party works for businessmen, not people.
This is a Neo-Liberal manifesto, cut European funds is another way to abandon people when they need money to ear, go to school and Public Health.
As a liberalist of course i support the ALDE party manifesto.
You don’t even know how a peace symbol looks like. That’s the Mercedes-Benz logotype on #9, lol.
ALDE – no thank you.
Is there liberal country which is not advanced?
All most scientifically advanced countries are liberal.
Nothing happens, because majority are right wind loonies and you know that they never invented or started anything rational and useful, ever..
Yes, I am. Support