Member states should have a right to vote on major EU treaties that supposedly represent 'the EU'. And yet most EU states do not hold referendums on EU Treaties. This should change, and changing this would benefit both the EU by transforming its image into one that is more democratic and accountable to the people it represents, while also benefitting UK citizens by giving them more power to veto Treaties they do not agree with. In other words this would result in a win-win solution to a real problem for both parties involved.

Democracy means delegating the decision making on issues of governance to elected officials, under the assumption that this delegation can be undone by the electorate. The government cannot practically function if it has to ask the opinion of the whole electorate on everything so we entrust them with the power to make most decisions for us.

Only in certain important cases (and a new EU Treaty may be one of them), the requirement to ensure democratic legitimacy warrants the holding of a referendum on the issue.

It is, however, hardly democratic to let any minority block a decision the majority wants to take, yet that is what happens if a negative referendum vote in a single Member State blocks ratification of a treaty all other Member States support.

If a referendum has to be hold on issues that involve more countries than just the UK, like an EU Treaty, it makes much more sense to top up the national ratification process (a vote in Parliament) with an EU-wide referendum instead of a national one.

EU directives must be drafted into domestic law of all the member states within a certain time limit. This means that once something has been passed by Brussels, there is very little that national governments can do about it. EU treaties have a direct effect on the running of the EU and therefore affect not only the law making apparatus of the EU but the laws of all the member states as well.

Democracy is the best form of government. It allows the people being governed to give and renew their consent to be governed, and remind us that the role of the state is to enact the will of the people. As explained above EU treaties have a major effect on the processes of government, so by their implementation the nature of government is changed. If the people are not given a say on this change in the nature of how they are governed then they have not consented to be ruled in this way. This goes against the nature of government, in which the state exists to implement the will of the people with their consent.

It could be argued that it is indirectly democratic because we elect the leaders of our state, who in turn ratify the major EU treaties so if we consent to the state making decisions over important issues such as tax, healthcare, education, and so on, why not Europe as well?

so to follwo your argument to its loical conclusion the fact that the proposed treaty would be detrimental or undesirable to the majority of a sovereign nation should not prevent that nation from being forced to adopt the rules and regulations held within the treaty.

A treaty staing that british fishing waters were the EUU domain whilst Spanish fishing waters are a Spanish domain for example benefits every nation apart from the UK. So we should be forced to accept such a treaty at the whim of our MEP's or more likely unelected EU civil servants without an opportunity to vetoe the treaty?

If all EU member states held a referendum on all EU Treaties, in a scenario whereby referendums in which would require the majority of voters in just one member state voted against it meant the EU Treaty got vetoed, no EU Treaties would get enacted. It is simply unfeasible for 27 member states to have to ALL vote for a particular motion - it is likely that at least one member state will rebel. Although not all EU Treaties are wholly beneficial, having a voting system on motions that are complex and difficult to understand for the ordinary electorate (the Irish voters had trouble verifying what the Nice and Lisbon Treaties actually were) means it is not the optimal scenario in this case. Where there are complex treaties, which comprise thick documents which ordinary voters will not be bothered to read means that voters are vulnerable to those willing to exploit this confusion and lobby one way or the other for their particular purposes, and focusing on one or two particular issues within a Treaty, rather than the dozens of other potentially more important points.

The EU is a supranational body - in other words, it comprises more than one country - in which it has addressed concerns over democracy and accountability AT THE SUPRANATIONAL LEVEL. This is logical - when Westminster wants to vote on legislation, it does so through the parliament, in which smaller 'constituencies' within the UK are represented; the same thing happens at the EU level, with similar constituencies represented by the EU Parliament - their local Member of European Parliament (MEP) representatives do vote on Treaties. The UK didn't even hold a referendum on going to war with Iraq - given this, why should British people be given the power to vote on issues of lesser importance?

This is not an argument against referenda, it is an argument to better educate the electorate. If the government has to put something to a public vote it becomes in their best interest to make sure the public understands the questions involved.

The vast majority of people do not understand the workings of the EU. They have a very limited understanding of how EU laws are made and how much they affect the lives of EU citizens. A referendum on an issue which the public has a limited understanding of is unlikely to produce a desirable outcome because the voters would not fully understand what is in their best interests or those of the country. Because there is a lack of detailed understanding of the issues involved with EU treaties, it is easy for the debate to be misconstrued. Anti Europe campaigners could overstate the potential harms of a treaty, and pro campaigners could understate them. His reduces a referendum to a vote on which campaign had the best PR. This is not just pointless, it has the potential to produce a result which could be detrimental to the long term interests of the country.