Why compromises are essential. Some media have understood. The rise in power of the European Parliament in the European institutional system (highlighted several times in this column, particularly with regard to the REACH legislation and, even more so, the compromise on the “services” directive) has been recognised by the media. The French weekly “Le Point” has written that the MEPs of Strasbourg have become the “real masters” of the EU: thanks to co-decision, they can impose a compromise - by blocking the Council if it moves too far - or bury a Commission proposal of which they disapprove - as was the case with the liberalisation of port services.
Certainly, it is law of compromise that dominates. In most cases, a majority position can only be found by removing the extreme positions and by arbitrating between the various national interests involved. The EP is not a national parliament where the rule is “Government versus Opposition”. But this is not always a fault, because the EU brings together Member States where votes have shifted to the left or to the right as the case may be. It would be unacceptable if one tendency or the other always won, and even more if one State or other always lost out. Jean-Louis Bourlanges thus expressed the situation in the above-mentioned weekly, “The criteria which determine the votes are many and various: being on the right or the left, being Europhile or Eurosceptic, being from a country that is a net beneficiary or a net contributor to the budget. Compromise has to be sought, because one half of Europe cannot systematically reject the other half”. That is why compromises are essential. The compromise on the “services” directive is too liberal for the left, too restrictive for the right, but acceptable to a large majority.
A wrong idea. This new reality is helping to destroy one of the wrong ideas that has done great harm to Europe among some of its citizens: the myth that the European Commission, a huge bureaucracy with no political legitimacy, decides everything. Wrong, the Parliament, which is elected, and the Council, made up of governmental representatives, have shown it so many times. With the increased power of the Parliament, the European institutional system has become more and more democratic.
One factor for unease. There is, however, one factor that has disturbed the balance and caused a few ripples. I am speaking here of the great German coalition. Several MEPs have, sometimes strongly, expressed their concern. In the EP, there are 99 German MEPs, compared with 78 French, Italian and British. Usually, this would not create any difficulties since MEPs of the different nationalities are divided among the political groups. But the great coalition in Germany, by bringing together EPP and Socialist MEPs, may bring about a compact national group which is deemed to have too much power, especially given that both the EPP and Socialist groups have German MEPs, Hans-Gert Pöttering and Martin Schulz, as their leaders. The leader of the Greens, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, said, “Every Monday morning, Pöttering and Schulz have breakfast together to discuss how they can help Mrs Merkel's grand coalition. The EP has become the Bundestag's back-up”. And the leader of the ALDE group, Graham Watson, complained in the Financial Times about behind-the-scenes deals between Pöttering and Schulz, mentioning the “services” directive. The two reject these suggestions, Mr Schulz noting particularly that, within the Socialist group, German MEPs represent only a small minority (23 out of 198) and that it was “absolutely ridiculous” that the majority of non-German Socialists would allow themselves to be directed from Berlin. But the unease persists.
A Eurosceptic political group? Another controversial question is what will become of the 27 British Conservatives in the EPP-ED group. David Cameron, the leader of the Conservative party, made the commitment to activists last December: the EPP-ED is too federalist for him and he intends to base his national electoral campaign on the defence of Member States' sovereignty against the EU institutions. It may be recalled that there was controversy at the time the British Conservatives joined the EPP-ED, with the EPP being accused of selling its European soul for power. Mr Cameron wants to create a new political group of, mainly Polish, Eurosceptic MEPs. The leaders of the parties which form the EPP, including Angela Merkel, Nicolas Sarkosy and Mariano Rajoy, it is said, decided to put an end to bilateral relations with Mr Cameron if he continued with his plans to secede, and the leader of the party Wilfried Martens told him so. We await the outcome. (F.R.)