After the upheavals that led to MEP’s rejection of the three Commissioners-designate from Hungary, Romania and France, representatives of the three main pro-European political families took stock of the situation in the European Parliament on Friday 18 October during a breakfast on the sidelines of the European Council attended by the President-elect of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.
Objective: to overcome tensions and seek points of convergence to enable the ‘von der Leyen’ Commission to get up and running at the beginning of December.
Present were Angela Merkel, Andrej Plenković and Krišjānis Kariņš for the Christian Democrats, Pedro Sánchez and António Costa for the Social Democrats, and Emmanuel Macron, Charles Michel and Mark Rutte for the Liberals. These leaders had already met in this format during the discussions on appointments to senior European positions.
“I believe that these discussions have now made it possible to calm down”, said French President Emmanuel Macron.
“We had a meeting because things have changed since the last European elections. It takes three groups to get a majority in Parliament. And that, in itself, has created a situation with which we must all come to terms” and which, in recent weeks, has created “some energy”, said Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte. “We have to help whenever we can to make sure the process [for the constitution of the Commission, editor's note] is conducted amicably”, he added, confident that the tensions observed during the hearings of the Commissioners-designate in Parliament will dissipate.
Returning to the rejection of French candidate Sylvie Goulard (see EUROPE 12346/1), Mr Macron, who had not yet appointed a replacement as of Friday, referred to a “settling of scores” between Parliament’s three main political groups - EPP, S&D and Renew Europe. Based on a “heterogeneous” treatment of the candidates, this "dynamic of pyrolysis” brought down three heads, but “does not allow for a strong Commission”, he said.
As a way out of the crisis, the French President mentioned the establishment of a “High Authority on Ethics and Transparency”, an idea promoted by the GUE/NGL group (see EUROPE 12351/6).
On Monday afternoon, Mrs von der Leyen will brief the leaders of Parliament's three political groups about the discussions held during Friday's breakfast. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion and editorial staff)