Opposition by a large majority of the EPP Group, together with the traditional rejection by Eurosceptic and Europhobic parties, quashed the idea backed by the constitutional affairs committee (AFCO) to set up a European constituency allowing some 30 MEPs to be elected on transnational lists to the European elections of May 2019.
On Wednesday 7 February, a comfortable majority (368 to 270 with 34 abstentions) of Parliament's plenary session adopted identical amendments by the EPP, ECR, GUE/NGL groups doing away with all reference to transnational lists in the Hübner/Silva Pereira draft report on the composition of the European Parliament (see EUROPE 11955).
“Not only is there no legal base for such an experiment, what we are looking at (with transnational lists) is yet another elite-driven project in Europe that will only end up making the EU even more remote from the voters than they already are”, said György Schöpflin (EPP, Hungary), the author of amendments by the EPP group.
There were only 27 MEPs within the EPP Group who supported the idea of transnational lists, mainly Spanish MEPs and a few French (Danjean, Juvin, Lavrilleux), according to the results of nominal voting. There was no sign of the name Hübner during the vote.
“Out of short-sighted motives, the EPP led the campaign against European lists and prohibited that all Europeans can vote directly for one of the lead candidates (“Spitzenkandidaten”) for the offices of Commission president”, Jo Leinen (S&D, Germany) criticised in a press release. “Today”, put in Philippe Lambert (Greens/EFA, Belgium), “the horizon of European democracy is closing in, leaving it confined to national territory”.
Officially, the stance held by Parliament, which called, at the end of 2015, for the creation of transnational lists as part of EU electoral reform, remains as it was (see EUROPE 11429). However, according to one parliamentary expert, politically the message sent by Parliament on Wednesday will be that which European leaders will retain during the informal summit on Friday 23 February devoted to institutional issues.
“The position of Parliament is quite clear. (...) It is up to Council to take final decision on this issue”, said Pedro Silva Pereira (S&D, Portugal), co-rapporteur of the report.
705-member Parliament after Brexit
A large majority of the Parliament, however, supported the composition of Parliament for the 2019-2024 legislature as suggested by the relevant parliamentary committee (AFCO). In favour of reducing the size of the Parliament without a loss of seats for any country, it supports reallocation of 27 seats out of the 73 that will become vacant once the United Kingdom withdraws from the EU.
“We propose a Brexit-proof solution for the composition of Parliament”, said Hübner.
The 27 seats would be attributed as follows to the countries currently insufficiently represented: +5 seats for France (making 79) and Spain (59), +3 seats for Italy (76) and the Netherlands (29), +2 for Ireland (13), +1 seat for Poland (52), Romania (33), Sweden (21), Austria (19), Denmark (14), Finland (14), Slovakia (14), Croatia (12) and Estonia (7).
Franck Proust (EPP, France), who was pleased that the French delegation will receive a further five seats, promised to ensure that France’s President Emmanuel Macron does not trade seats for France against the creation of transnational lists. In his view, Macron was hoping that Parliament would take a symbolic stance in favour of transnational lists which, according to Proust, would be a “pointless, unfair and inapplicable gadget”. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)