Euro Upper House

Like many countries, Europe has two chambers in its legislature. The upper house is known as the European Council (also known as the Council of the European Union) and the lower house, confusingly, is known as the European Parliament. The members of the European Council are not elected but each EU state appoints their own members.  Decisions are usually made  by consensus.  For example in 2008, 128 out of 147 Council decisions were unanimous. Within the remaining decisions, there was a total of 32 abstentions and 8 votes against the respective decision. These opposing votes were cast twice by Luxembourg and once by each of Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Spain, Netherlands, and Portugal.  The British government did not vote against any decision. This put the lie to those who say that Europe imposes rules on Britain that the British do not want.  British politicians often tell the British public that "sorry we cannot help it but Europe is telling us to do it" when, in fact, the British government usually voted for the new rule in the first place. The upper house meets in secret (because countries like Britain want it that way) but I think democracy would be better served if debate in the upper house were open to the public.  Then we could see clearly how both Labour and Conservative politicians have been pulling the wool over the British public's eyes.