European elections and why they matter

there is every chance that the average turnout will be the lowest ever - it has fallen at every election since the first time that Europeans directly elected their MEPs in 1979, and sank to 45.6% in 2004. writes Hugo Brady over at Open democracy.

Yet we should take an interest says the writer.

The future political balance of the parliament will be largely determined by the outcome of voting in the big six member-states: Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Spain

and one of the decisions that the new Parliament will take is that of the next European commissioner which will take place this autumn and the remaining commissioners early next spring.