Who's bothering to vote in the European elections?

June 4-7, depending on where you live in the European Union, will see the 27-nation bloc's circa 380 million eligible voters go to the polls in what's billed as the "biggest trans-national elections in history".

Well that's the theory at least, because while there are reasons aplenty for everyone to get out there and exercise their right to vote, it's unlikely to happen.

Economic growth, unemployment and inflation might well be the major themes both the outgoing parliamentarians and national governments want to be at the centre of the upcoming election, but one thing alone is likely to characterise the vote.

Apathy.

All polls indicate that this, the seventh time EU voters will have gone to the polls to elect a European parliament of 736 members (MEPs), promises to be one with a low turnout.

According to the latest Eurobarometer survey, only 34 percent say they intend to vote, with 15 per cent saying they won't vote under any circumstances.

A recent report in the New York Times says that the European parliament itself has "gone on the offensive" in trying to encourage people to vote, but there's still little sign that the campaign is having the desired effect.

In fact the call - generally speaking - seems to be falling on deaf ears.

Given the powers that the new parliament will have in terms of the potential for rejecting or amending proposals made by the European Commission, and the influence it has on legislation affecting the everyday lives of a majority of its citizens, it's perhaps more than worrying that governments throughout the EU can't drum up a little more enthusiasm among the electorate.

Worrying, but perhaps not surprising as, again according to Eurobarometer, so few people actually know who their MEP is - 68 per cent.

There's plenty of information out there apparently. It just doesn't seem to be hitting home - not even in France, one of the founder members of the EU.

It's barely six months since France held the six-month rotating presidency of the EU, and it'll be returning 72 MEPs to serve for five years, but only 44 per cent of the French say they intend to vote, according to a recent poll published by Ipsos.

The French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, is out on the stump campaigning, and there are some high profile cabinet ministers standing for election, including Michel Barnier (agriculture) and Rachida Dati (justice) but the enthusiasm of the electorate would seem to be, well less than overwhelming.

All right so there was a brief flash of media interest last week when the opposition Socialist party maintained that the governing centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement, UMP) party was using a televised spot aimed at encouraging the French to vote, as political propaganda.

In other words the government, it was claimed, was trying to persuade the electorate to cast their ballots for the UMP, and the Socialist party made a complaint to the Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel (CSA) calling for the clip be suspended.

The CSA rejected the request.

Elections Européennes - 7 juin 2009
by SIG-PM

But television schedules have hardly been dominated by stories stressing the supposed importance of the election.

And one final thing, which might just be anecdotal.

It's now just two weeks before voters in France go to the polls - and how much info has popped through my letter box?

None - absolutely nothing.

Maybe 50 kilometres from the French capital is of little interest to the parties fielding candidates.

It surely comes as something of a surprise in an election in which not only are high level candidates heading the lists for the Ile de France region, the area surrounding and including Paris, and but one that's also, so we're constantly being told by politicians, important for the future of the 27-nation bloc.

If that's a pattern being repeated throughout the whole of the EU, then there's perhaps little wonder that so few will be making the effort to cast their vote.