ITALY was yesterday counting the cost, literal and metaphoric, of a spectacular referendum flop on Sunday. Just over 30 per cent of the electorate turned out to vote in seven referendums, falling well short of the required 50 per cent necessary for a referendum to be legally valid.
In the short term, Sunday's flop cost the Italian taxpayer approximately £350 million by way of organisational and promotional expenditure. In the long term, the poor turnout, the lowest in any national ballot since 1945, may cast doubt on a democratic institution that has served Italy well.
Since 1945, the referendum has been a critical factor in public life with decisive votes in favour of the abolition of the monarchy (97.5 per cent turnout in 1946), in favour of divorce (87.7 per cent turnout in 1974), in favour of abortion (79.4 per cent turnout in 1981) and against nuclear power (65.1 per cent turnout in 1987).
Sunday's debacle, however, has rekindled a debate about the relative facility with which highly organised pressure groups can promote their own political agenda via the referendum.
By law, campaigners must gather 500,000 signatures for a petition to the Constitutional Court which then rules whether the issue can go to a referendum.
Six of Sunday's seven referendums - those regarding hunting, the career structures of journalists and magistrates, military service and state shareholdings in privatisations - were promoted by exradical, now reformist Mr Marco Pannella, an old dog for the referendum road.
Italy's political establishment, both centre right and centre left, argues that Mr Pannella abuses the system for self promotional purposes, pushing too many issues, some of which are too obscure to be of immediate concern to the average citizen.
A senior Democratic Left (PDS) figure, Mr Cesare Salvi, a member of the current institutional reform commission in parliament, probably spoke for both sides of the Italian political divide when calling yesterday for the threshold of necessary signatures to be raised, perhaps to one million.
"The intention is not to make it more difficult to hold a referendum. The aim is to make sure that attention is focused on a few issues because citizens also have the right not to be buried under an avalanche of proposals."
Mr Pannella, however, argued that it had been "Italy and not I who is the loser."
Furthermore, Mr Pannella accused the Interior Minister, Mr Giorgio Napolitano, of having deliberately under publicised the referendums as well as holding them on a hot June Sunday when many Italians, apparently, preferred to go to the beach.