Parliament’s co-rapporteur Charles Goerens (Renew Europe, Luxembourger) spoke, on Tuesday 4 April, about the difficult negotiations underway with the Council of the European Union on the reform of European political parties and their foundations, following unsuccessful interinstitutional trilogue negotiations at the end of March (see EUROPE 13153/22).
The two co-legislative institutions are divided on two main issues: the participation in European political parties of parties from non-EU countries and the possibility for European parties to become involved in referendum campaigns at national level.
“There should be no limits to the practice of democracy”, Mr Goerens said. Since other political movements outside the EU defend European values, “why not unite with them?”, he asked, citing the example of the movement of Alexei Navalny, currently imprisoned for his opposition to Vladimir Putin.
European Parliament co-rapporteur pointed to the situation in the Council of Europe, which excluded Russia in the spring of 2022 after the outbreak of military aggression in Ukraine, but where representatives of political parties from EU and non-EU countries sit in the same political family. And the Council of Europe has put in place safeguards to ensure that these parties respect fundamental democratic values.
“From this point on, the participation of parties from non-EU member states in European parties becomes inevitable”, Mr Goerens said.
Citing a risk of foreign interference in European politics, Member States are sticking to their guns. After initially excluding participation from non-EU countries, they are now considering extending the scope of the legislative proposal to political parties from EFTA countries, EU candidate countries and Kosovo, countries using the euro as their official currency and former EU Member States.
Last week, at the trilogue, the inclusion of parties from countries that have signed an association agreement, including a free trade agreement - in other words, Georgia - was reportedly agreed by both negotiating parties.
However, according to the mandate of the Swedish Presidency of the Council, third country parties would not be full members of a European political party as they would not be able to contribute to its funding or have voting rights. On the contrary, this is a red line for the European Parliament. However, in the interests of compromise, MEPs are said to be less firm in their refusal to allow a party from a non-EU country to contribute to the budget of a European party.
Furthermore, Mr Goerens admitted that he did not understand why the EU Council refuses to allow a European party to participate in referendum campaigns on such important European issues as the entry or exit of a country from the EU.
In the European Union, “the gravediggers of democracy have a free pass and we, the European political parties, should stand by and watch helplessly?, he asked. He also called for any measure that strengthens the financial independence of European political movements, including an increase in European co-financing to their budgets. The Commission suggests co-financing of 95% for the first 4 years and 100% in the election year.
However, according to our information, the EU Council would no longer totally exclude the participation of European parties in financing the organisation of “joint events” with national parties.
It now seems certain that an interinstitutional agreement on this dossier is no longer possible to ensure that the reform is in place in time for the European elections in spring 2024. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)