The Reform Act of 1832 swept away dozens of Britain’s “rotten boroughs”, where comfortable sinecures were left in the hands of a tiny number of voters. The 2009 Lisbon treaty will give an electorate of 27 the power to choose the president of Europe.

In one of the European Union’s greatest missed opportunities — in a long list — the European elite shunned calls to add the spice of democracy to their bureaucracy by making their first president directly elected by its 500 million citizens.

This is the job created under the EU’s Lisbon treaty that has been linked to Tony Blair, who has declined to confirm his candidacy before the the treaty is ratified by the Czech Republic — the final EU country yet to complete this process.

Almost nothing about the method of choosing a suitable candidate is written down, meaning that, in time-honoured fashion, the EU will revert to the cosy back-room stitch-up.

The first President of the European Council will be chosen by the consensus of the leaders of the EU states, which in practice means weeks of diplomatic horse trading followed by a shouting match at the next EU summit as each country tries to extract what it can from the deal.

If Britain is to get the top job, then France will probably want the new post of EU foreign minister as compensation and Germany must have a key role in the next European Commission, possibly responsible for Europe’s internal market or economic affairs.

No matter if a Pole, Dane or Portuguese has the right credentials for the presidential position. They cannot win, because a Pole heads the European Parliament, a Dane just got Nato and José Manuel Barroso, the former Portuguese Prime Minister, has been chosen for a second term in charge of the European Commission.

Under an unwritten but well-understood rule, these jobs must be shared around the member states in an equitable fashion, so that north and south, big and small, Left and Right are all fairly represented.

The shortlist will be drawn up by Fredrik Reinfeldt, the Prime Minister of Sweden, who holds the current six-month rotating presidency of the EU. He is making up his own rules for this and is planning to ask each state for a maximum of two names, to be whittled down to no more than two or three for the 27 leaders to chew over.

Delays in Lisbon treaty ratifiction by Vaclv Klaus, the Czech President, have delayed the shortlisting process, making it even harder for candidates to know how to play the game. This is because they must pretend not to be campaigning or even to covet the post, in another of the EU’s bizarre unwritten rules that seem to state that to want a top EU job is ground for disqualification.

It is one of the reasons why Mr Blair’s office has stonewalled all inquiries about his interest in the job. It is also quite right to insist that there is no job yet, although allies of the former prime minister have made clear that he would be interested only in a grand new role on the world stage.

The job is meant to answer the question of Henry Kissinger, the former US Secretary of State: “Who do I call if I want to call Europe?” But the EU’s attempt to answer this is now at risk of causing further confusion.

The Lisbon treaty also creates the enhanced position of High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy — effectively an EU foreign minister — along with a “foreign office” called the European External Action Service.

Several small countries, led by Belgium and Luxembourg, argue that the foreign minister figure — and not the president — should be the “face” of the EU. Bigger countries, led by France and Italy, believe that the president is the proper person to represent the organisation on the world stage.

Only the EU could create the job of president and then have an argument over whether the person appointed should be a global figure or hide away in an office in Brussels. But the row has now become a proxy for arguments for and against Mr Blair to become the first president and its outcome may determine if he is to become the first holder of that office.

The citizens of Europe can only wait for the white smoke to go up — and the customary last-minute surprise as someone quite unexpected emerges with the crown.

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