Interview with Juan José Gálvez, city councillor for Culture at Alagon

On May 9^th, Europe day, three 4^th ESO students from our school (Nuestra. Señora del Castillo) went to our village’s town hall to help us to resolve some questions about the European’s parliament elections on May 25^th and  they were received by Juan José Gálvez and Lidia.

Juan José Gálvez (city councillor for Culture)

1. What do you think the opinion of the citizens will be?

Nowadays, citizens are reluctant about politics; politicians might have been the cause. Due to the crisis, politicians are trying to find solutions and everyone is well informed of what is happening thanks to the media, so citizens are in a mood that does not induce them to vote.

For us (politicians) abstention is a form of punishment; Let people go and vote what they want but go and vote. People need to be aware of the importance of elections.

It is believed that there will be too much abstention, passivity in relation to the elections in Spain; according to a survey only 17% of people will attend the European elections.

2. Do you think that the town hall should inform citizens more about the elections?

The municipality has to try to mobilize people without focusing on one party or another, encourage people to vote with information above all.

3. How do parties prepare themselves for the elections? Do you agree how the campaigns trails are done?

Each party prepares their candidates, one of them months before and another one leaves it to just some days before the election.

It must be someone who carries out the ideas of Europe well and also those affecting to Spain. It’s done in a different way by each party.

4. What do you think about the participation’s decrease in the elections? Why do you think that happened?

It seems a very sad fact that impoverishes each country and sometimes people are not well informed that there are European elections. People usually participate on a higher degree at Municipal elections.

5. Can you give us an example of a decision taken by the UE which affects our village?

There are different decisions such as the subject of grants, expenditure control and of course, the issue of globalization.

6. What strategy to attract people is the most effective in your opinion?

Clarity on the campaign trail, know what is at stake.

7. What’s your opinion about the rising of minority parties and the related decrease of the major ones?

The big parties work harder so they surfer more and the smaller parties don’t surfer the same as they.

Technically, there is no plurality of parties in other countries like England where there is a bipartisanship. Here in Spain, the big parties work harder so they suffer more and the smaller parties don’t suffer the same, so minority parties know they can propose good things but they do not know if they will be able to maintain them if they win the elections. These parties are more popular or even more populist.
What they propose is a "play to the crowd".

8. Which was the method used to elect your representatives?

They are chosen in Madrid; the Central Committee organises a meeting in which conclusions are drawn, because it’s really difficult councillors would vote to elect their representatives, it would be almost impossible to do.

9. Would you like your opinion was taken into account?

I would if there were optimum information channels

10. Do you agree with the number of deputies in parliament?

It’s decided depending on the number of citizens, I mean, the more habitants a country has, the more deputies they have. The minimum deputies number is 6 for countries as Malta, for example, because if we used another way to choose the number of deputies, they would just have nearly one.

1. Do you agree with that sistem?

Yes, because I think that is a logical proportion.

2. Do you think they are really necessary?

I don’t know, I think that fewer deputies might work better and we could save money.

11.  Would you like to take part in the parliament one day?

No, I think we must let young people take that places. Politics wear you out and one of the causes of disaffection is that politicians are always the same.

LIDIA

Lidia is in charge of representing the administration at the polling station on the 25th May with her partner Ana. She controls 4 of the 7 tables that will be in the village hall “Alaun” the election day.

Some years ago, data was transmitted to the government delegation by phone. Nowadays, it’s transmitted with PDAs and some tablets have an application for people to keep track of real time as elections go.

We have been informed of the steps that take place on the ballot.

Stages:

Stage 1: The representatives of the administration arrive at 8.00 AM with the members and polling supervisors. The polling place opens at 9.00 AM. The secretary takes the information to the Government Delegation

Stage 2: At 2.00 PM the first census of votes is done

Stage 3: At 6.00 PM the census of votes is done to the media

Stage 4: At 8.00 PM the polling place is closed and votes are counted. The secretary fills in the information of the polling tables

Stage 3: At 18:00 PM turns to conduct a census of voters, this time for the media.

Each polling station is chaired by two members and a polling supervisor who take turns. There must be always at least two components at the polling place.

The representatives:

-Agents: They oversee the different tables on behalf of his party. They have to vote in the delegate’s table.

-Controller: He’s the responsible of a table and he has to have the accreditations which must be characterized with the party’s logo