Spaanse minister ziet burgerinitiatief als wapen tegen lage opkomst bij verkiezingen Europees Parlement (en)

The Secretary of State for the EU, Diego López Garrido believes that the European Citizen's Initiative "will be the mechanism to boost discussion of many issues that people are interested in".

López Garrido said in statements to Efe-TV that it may also be a way in which to help to combat abstention in the European Parliament elections.

The citizen's initiative regulations, presented on Wednesday by the European Commission in Brussels, provide one million citizens from at least nine countries with the opportunity to propose regulations on matters that the EU is responsible for.

These million people must represent a percentage of at least 0.2% of the EU's total population.

The European Commission is not bound to transform the popular initiatives it receives into proposals, but if it rejects them, it will have to explain its reasons.

The EU proposed the practical operating details for this initiative, included in the Treaty of Lisbon, and it must be approved by the Union's Council and Parliament.

Organisers must register their proposal on the Internet, and set out their reasoning clearly and concisely in any of the Union's official languages.

Brussels will make an initial assessment of the initiative when 300,000 signatures have been collected in three Member States; from there on, organisers will be given one year to obtain the rest.

The EU, after checking the million signatures, will have four months to analyse the proposal and, if it considers it legitimate, will start to prepare the legislative initiative.