On Thursday 10 July, the European Parliament rejected the motion of censure tabled by Romanian MEP Gheorghe Piperea (ECR) by a comfortable majority (360 votes against, 175 in favour and 18 abstentions). It targeted the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and the entire College of Commissioners (see EUROPE 13675/1).
Since the beginning of the week, it had been clear to the EPP, S&D, Renew Europe and Greens/EFA groups that not a single vote in their ranks would support the censure tabled by conservative and far-right MEPs. The ECR group was split down the middle, while the PfE and ESN groups declared their support for the motion of censure.
When it came to the vote, some members of The Left group supported the motion.
The only thing at stake on Thursday was the exact expression of the vote, between abstention and no vote. The day before, the S&D had announced that it had obtained a guarantee from the Commission President that the ‘European Social Fund’ (ESF+) would be maintained in the post-2027 EU budget, and not merged with the Cohesion Fund (see EUROPE 13678/2). In exchange, the Social Democrat group undertook to vote against the motion, rather than abstaining.
An abstention would not have allowed the motion to be adopted, but would have sent a signal of rejection of Ursula von der Leyen’s policy.
No blank cheques. From now on, the S&D, Greens/EFA and Renew Europe groups will be watching the Commission’s decisions closely, and the prospect of another motion of censure in the future cannot be ruled out. Several MEPs have told Agence Europe that a motion of censure from the left cannot be ruled out in the future, if the President of the Commission and the EPP continue to rely on the support of the far right to secure a majority on certain issues.
“The Commission President must understand that we will not turn a blind eye to the double game played by the EPP Group and its President, Manfred Weber, in the European Parliament”, stated the S&D President, Iratxe García Pérez (Spanish) after the vote. For her group, Ms von der Leyen’s State of the Union address in September will be a turning point.
The president of the centre-right group Renew Europe, Frenchwoman Valérie Hayer, listed the conditions for maintaining her group's support: “An ambitious ‘Competitiveness Fund’ (...), stricter conditionality in the EU budget and a functional platform agreement to involve the centrist groups in the Parliament”.
On the far right of the political spectrum, the PfE group is already considering tabling a new motion of censure in September, should Ms von der Leyen decide to split the EU/Mercosur trade agreement into two parts to make it easier to ratify, according to the group’s co-president, the Frenchman Jordan Bardella.
In any case, according to the President of the EPP, Germany’s Manfred Weber, the rejection of the motion of censure illustrates the key role of his group in the Chamber. “The EPP has shown again today that we are the stability factor for the EU project. We gave the EU Commission the strength it needs in this period of global turmoil”, he said. (Original version in French by Léa Marchal)