The European elections mark a change in the composition of not just the Parliament but also the Commission, election of the new president of the European Council and of the High Representative of Foreign and Security Policy, who is at the same time the vice-president of the Commission responsible for external affairs, head of the European External Action Service and chairs the meetings of the Foreign Affairs Council (all other Council configurations being chaired by the respective minister or prime minister or head of state of the country holding the rotating six months presidency of the Council, depending on the configuration).
Civil servants do not change, only some directors general may change posts (usually remaining directors general, just in another Directorate General), but this is a much smaller change even among directors general than the usual rotation after they have spent about five to seven years on their post. It is not going without attention, however, at least in some member states, how they are represented among civil servants of the EU (see here the British and here the French), in particular on management posts.
So we will give a little analysis of what can be seen now in the “strength” of Hungarians in the EU.
The data and positions of the MEPs are public, and the Commission also publishes regularly different staff statistics. As far as the Parliament is concerned, the blog of Julien Frisch published overall nationality data. No data were found about the Council secretariat. Here is what Julien Frisch knows about it. Here you can find interesting research about the attitudes of Commission staff.
Hungary has 21 members in the European Parliament. Two of the members of the FIDESZ-group (EPP) are from the Hungarian minority in the neighbouring countries (Romania and Serbia) while three MEP-s won mandate from the Hungarian parties, one in Slovakia and two from Romania.
One representative of the FIDESZ party was elected vice president of the Parliament – the FIDESZ-group already gave a vice president in the last cycle so this is confirmation of their position. As the EPP lost places, the support of the relatively large FIDESZ-group is important.
The distribution of Hungarians in the committees is not quite even, in some (the Committee of Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs) there are too many Hungarians (OK, this will or could be the scene for discussions of the rights of national minorities, as here are two of the representatives of the Hungarians in Romania and in Slovakia in this committee besides the two MEPs from FIDESZ and one from Gyurcsány’s party; also, this was the committee which prepared and approved the famous “Tavares report” and also in the Committee for the Environment while there is no Hungarian in the important committees “Economic and Financial Affairs” and “Budget”. As far as vice-presidents of the committees are concerned, of the 20 committees and 2 sub-committees, four have Hungarian vice-president, among them one from the Socials and Democrats grooup (but not the leader of the Hungarian delegation of this group, who eyed a vice president's position in the Employment Committee,. The real power in the committees belongs, however, to the co-ordinators. Out of 56, 21 are German, 4-4 are Dutch, Spanish and French. All other countries have less posts – Hungary ne, and one vice-coordinator, both from FIDESZ.
The Parliament disclosed in 2010 the number of its officials by nationality (MEPs and their assistants have a special status, they are probably not included): out of 7652, 210 are Hungarian, which is a little more than the 2% (a little less since the accession of Croatia) Hungary represents in the number of inhabitants in the EU.
More detailed data (although only the latest status) are available from the Commission which is the biggest institution and also very important in preparing decisions. Although final decisions are taken in the Council and the Parliament, their staff has less influence on the decision of their institutions.
In the Commission there were 2.39% Hungarians among the officials (and temporary agents, a category to replace them when their status is empty), this increased to 2.59% by now. This is important even if not a big increase, as slowly the return of officials to Hungary started: some didn’t like the environment or working abroad, the spouses could not accommodate, or, they were temporary agents and their contract expired (this was the case of several management officials).
The proportion of Hungarian administrators (the higher of the two main employee categories till the 2013 reform – as a third, lower category was introduced in 2013, their numbers are not meaningful) is higher than of assistants (the other group).
Statistics on management positions are currently not available (got hold of some before, when they were new) but we know that there are about 1200-1400 heads of unit in the Commission. We also see the composition of officials by grade and as Hungarians are not long ago in the organisations, it could be assumed for a while that those who are in grades where managers are, are indeed managers and not clerks who rose through time to a high grade. 2009 and 2011 data were published on the overall number of heads of unit and the proportion of Hungarians among them was only 1.89% in 2009 but 2.43% in 2011. Slowly, however, administrators who entered the Commission as AD5 or AD7, reach the level of AD 9 which is the lowest grade for heads of unit. So today’s figure of more than 3% can be misleading. A quick count through the EU Official Directory (showing management staff) and allowing for some people with Hungarian-sounding names who are not Hungarians but only of Hungarian origin – and the other way round, there are about 25-30 Hungarian heads of unit (so a little still more than 2%) and about 10 directors and equivalents, which always was above the 2%. Further analysis, however, shows that in at least three important central department (DG) there is no Hungarian manager: in the Secretariat General, the Legal Service and the Budget Directorate General. This darkens a little the bright picture shown by the numbers.
Showing posts with label EPP. Show all posts
Showing posts with label EPP. Show all posts
Sunday, July 20, 2014
Sunday, June 8, 2014
The "fight" for the presidency of the European Commission
There was no big opposition against the idea that the European parties should nominate their candidate to the presidency of the European Commission as it was expected that this could boost participation. Apparently the participation did not fall as expected but many doubt ( see for example here) whether this was due to this so-called "Spitzenkandidaten" system.
The same newspaper demanded already in 2009, before the previous European elections in an editorial that: "Voters must be told what they vote for. The Parliament's groups should tell votes who they want to be the next Commission's president. ... European Parliament elections have for far too long been presented... as a vote for Europe or against it. Political parties should change their approach and make clear that these elections are about what kind of European Union voters want."If the debate were about whether naming the candidate for Commission president is just that, it would make sense. I will try to answer this question below.
After the election, however, political actors start to discover the inconveniences of this idea and thus their disagreement with the principle.
The principle comes from an extending interpretation of the Lisbon treaty:the Council proposes "taking into account the result of the EP elections" a president for the Commission and the Parliament has to approve him/her by vote. It is only after that, that the commissioners can be nominated by the governments (one by each) and it is even after that, that the High Commissioner for Foreign and Security Policy (who is vice president of the Commission and chairs the External Affairs Council) and as the last, the president of the European Council (which is different from the different formations of the Council of the European Union, of which the the External Affairs Council is one) are nominated.
The system of institutions and the way the EU works is a delicately constructed framework and there is no doubt that the European parties threw a stone into this - actually never quiet and sometimes murky - pond.
So it is the European Parliament who finally approves the Commission president while it can only vote about a proposal brought forward by the Council. So it sounds logical that the parties in this Parliament can express whom they are ready to vote for. On the other hand, the separation of powers of initiative and approval is a feature of the EU which among others gives a power to the Commission national executives do not have - while the Commission lacks some other powers of national executives -, thus it is an important part of the above-mentioned delicate construction. The Parliament was in fact limiting the choice of the Council in whom to propose. The more so, as the Council has a majority of conservatives (mainly in the EPP) and this party is also the strongest in the Parliament. Had the Socialists won the EP elections, and the Council proposed Juncker the EPP candidate, not Schulz, the Socialist's favourite, the EPP could have still assembled a majority in the Parliament to approve Juncker. A nomination of Schulz could also been digested, in particular by Juncker, whose ambitions always pointed more towards the presidency of the European Council, which he could have won in exchange. But the time of these bargains is over, it seems taht eithe Juncker, or another EPP candidate will be proposed by the Council.
But why is Juncker's nomination in question? He is supported by Angela Merkel, the strongest national leader in the EPP (the French government is socialist). The opposition came first from Viktor Orbán, the Hungarian prime minister, and then from Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and - Britain.
What makes the situation bizarre, is that although the question to be put was whether the voters want an EPP or a socialist candidate, the reservations against Juncker (and also against Schulz) are that they are too federalist. So we are back to the "more Europe" or "less Europe" question, which we should have forgotten. On this, however, the voters could not decide, as neither the ECR, to which the British conservatives belong, nor other eurosceptics staged a candidate for the Commission presidency. And - again no one knows whether due to that or not - all non-europhiles gained only 30% in the EP. A clear minority. We cannot go into the question whether this is much or little, why and how the people voted. It is widely discussed in the political press.
Before we deal with the Hungarian aspects, let's be up my promise: what can the European elections decide in terms of where Europe goes? Clearly, the power relations in the Parliament influence the direction, although no party has a clear majority and coalitions have to be forged. These are occasional coalitions, not like a government coalition. And some analysts like Professor J.H.H Weiler, president of the European University Institute (still a few but nevertheless I think they found the real problem in European-level democracy, the so-called "democratic deficit" of the EU) say, that in a real democracy, a governing coalition should be formed and it should define the way the executive works. The Commission, however, is not quite like a national executive. And its members are nominated by the member states and are usually adherents of the governing national coalitions or parties. Thus, the majority in the Commission will be conservative, but it is not automatic and there will be members from socialist and liberal parties. And the programme of the Commission will be set up by its members. Based on this, some could argue that finally the main political line will be defined by the political stream supported by the majority of the electorate (through both the choice of their governments and the elections to the European Parliament) but to explain to the common voter how this works is not easy. So the voters do not see that their vote has a real influence on the direction the EU takes. And the imperfections of the national vote (that you vote a general direction and a government may have individual measures and even policies you do not like but there is no party with whom you can 100% agree) is also present.
As explained in the previous post, the EP elections in Hungary had a domestic significance in spite of the fact that the national elections were less than two months before. It is more interesting to examine the reactions of the winner of both elections, the governing FIDESZ party to the nomination of Juncker. Of course, during the election campaign they did not mention the topic, it would have been couter-productive. But immediately afterwards, Orbán already declared that they do not support Juncker, who was the figurehead of Eurozone austerity, who is a "man of the past" and wants a Europe they do not want (i.e. too federalist).
And then Mr Szájer, MEP, explained (in the title of the article on the homepage of FIDESZ, the name of Juncker is incorrectly spelled since the 2nd June) the opposition in more popular terms: he repeated the antifederalist argument, that the interests of the nation states should be represented in the EU, but then recalled that during the government Juncker in Luxembourg, Hungary was significantly attacked. He called Asselborn, then foreign minister of Luxembourg the member of Juncker's party (which he is not) and also recalled that Viviane Reding attacked the Hungarian media law. Which in fact she didn't, she did deplore other laws which were more in her remit as European Commissioner and in this quality not reporting to Juncker. The latter mentioned this is his response.
Angela Merkel still appears to support Juncker, but left herself a back door: whe does not want to lose Britain for the EU. About this discussion next time.
The same newspaper demanded already in 2009, before the previous European elections in an editorial that: "Voters must be told what they vote for. The Parliament's groups should tell votes who they want to be the next Commission's president. ... European Parliament elections have for far too long been presented... as a vote for Europe or against it. Political parties should change their approach and make clear that these elections are about what kind of European Union voters want."If the debate were about whether naming the candidate for Commission president is just that, it would make sense. I will try to answer this question below.
After the election, however, political actors start to discover the inconveniences of this idea and thus their disagreement with the principle.
The principle comes from an extending interpretation of the Lisbon treaty:the Council proposes "taking into account the result of the EP elections" a president for the Commission and the Parliament has to approve him/her by vote. It is only after that, that the commissioners can be nominated by the governments (one by each) and it is even after that, that the High Commissioner for Foreign and Security Policy (who is vice president of the Commission and chairs the External Affairs Council) and as the last, the president of the European Council (which is different from the different formations of the Council of the European Union, of which the the External Affairs Council is one) are nominated.
The system of institutions and the way the EU works is a delicately constructed framework and there is no doubt that the European parties threw a stone into this - actually never quiet and sometimes murky - pond.
So it is the European Parliament who finally approves the Commission president while it can only vote about a proposal brought forward by the Council. So it sounds logical that the parties in this Parliament can express whom they are ready to vote for. On the other hand, the separation of powers of initiative and approval is a feature of the EU which among others gives a power to the Commission national executives do not have - while the Commission lacks some other powers of national executives -, thus it is an important part of the above-mentioned delicate construction. The Parliament was in fact limiting the choice of the Council in whom to propose. The more so, as the Council has a majority of conservatives (mainly in the EPP) and this party is also the strongest in the Parliament. Had the Socialists won the EP elections, and the Council proposed Juncker the EPP candidate, not Schulz, the Socialist's favourite, the EPP could have still assembled a majority in the Parliament to approve Juncker. A nomination of Schulz could also been digested, in particular by Juncker, whose ambitions always pointed more towards the presidency of the European Council, which he could have won in exchange. But the time of these bargains is over, it seems taht eithe Juncker, or another EPP candidate will be proposed by the Council.
But why is Juncker's nomination in question? He is supported by Angela Merkel, the strongest national leader in the EPP (the French government is socialist). The opposition came first from Viktor Orbán, the Hungarian prime minister, and then from Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and - Britain.
What makes the situation bizarre, is that although the question to be put was whether the voters want an EPP or a socialist candidate, the reservations against Juncker (and also against Schulz) are that they are too federalist. So we are back to the "more Europe" or "less Europe" question, which we should have forgotten. On this, however, the voters could not decide, as neither the ECR, to which the British conservatives belong, nor other eurosceptics staged a candidate for the Commission presidency. And - again no one knows whether due to that or not - all non-europhiles gained only 30% in the EP. A clear minority. We cannot go into the question whether this is much or little, why and how the people voted. It is widely discussed in the political press.
Before we deal with the Hungarian aspects, let's be up my promise: what can the European elections decide in terms of where Europe goes? Clearly, the power relations in the Parliament influence the direction, although no party has a clear majority and coalitions have to be forged. These are occasional coalitions, not like a government coalition. And some analysts like Professor J.H.H Weiler, president of the European University Institute (still a few but nevertheless I think they found the real problem in European-level democracy, the so-called "democratic deficit" of the EU) say, that in a real democracy, a governing coalition should be formed and it should define the way the executive works. The Commission, however, is not quite like a national executive. And its members are nominated by the member states and are usually adherents of the governing national coalitions or parties. Thus, the majority in the Commission will be conservative, but it is not automatic and there will be members from socialist and liberal parties. And the programme of the Commission will be set up by its members. Based on this, some could argue that finally the main political line will be defined by the political stream supported by the majority of the electorate (through both the choice of their governments and the elections to the European Parliament) but to explain to the common voter how this works is not easy. So the voters do not see that their vote has a real influence on the direction the EU takes. And the imperfections of the national vote (that you vote a general direction and a government may have individual measures and even policies you do not like but there is no party with whom you can 100% agree) is also present.
As explained in the previous post, the EP elections in Hungary had a domestic significance in spite of the fact that the national elections were less than two months before. It is more interesting to examine the reactions of the winner of both elections, the governing FIDESZ party to the nomination of Juncker. Of course, during the election campaign they did not mention the topic, it would have been couter-productive. But immediately afterwards, Orbán already declared that they do not support Juncker, who was the figurehead of Eurozone austerity, who is a "man of the past" and wants a Europe they do not want (i.e. too federalist).
And then Mr Szájer, MEP, explained (in the title of the article on the homepage of FIDESZ, the name of Juncker is incorrectly spelled since the 2nd June) the opposition in more popular terms: he repeated the antifederalist argument, that the interests of the nation states should be represented in the EU, but then recalled that during the government Juncker in Luxembourg, Hungary was significantly attacked. He called Asselborn, then foreign minister of Luxembourg the member of Juncker's party (which he is not) and also recalled that Viviane Reding attacked the Hungarian media law. Which in fact she didn't, she did deplore other laws which were more in her remit as European Commissioner and in this quality not reporting to Juncker. The latter mentioned this is his response.
Angela Merkel still appears to support Juncker, but left herself a back door: whe does not want to lose Britain for the EU. About this discussion next time.
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Quick commentary on the results
Although the victory of the governing FIDESZ was expected, the low turnout and the activation of its voters - or rather the results of the latest allegations against the third on the list of the far-right, eurosceptic Jobbik to have worked for Russia brought FIDESZ to a better result than in the April national elections. They won more than 50% of the votes while in the national elections they pocketed 43.55%. Jobbik is the clear loser: 14% versus 20.
The most interesting question was how the three leftist liberal parties fare compared to each othe, given that they tried to win together in April. DK, the social democrat party of controversial ex PM Gyurcsány won two seats - a big feat but merited by the activity of its campaigners - this was the main factor in the joint results in the April elections too - while the purported umbrella organisation Együtt (Together) which then became an independent paty due to election rukes changed by FIDESZ not long before the National polls, won one seat, which is a result but puts it behind the DK. The socialists scored worth than expected - showing that their traditional srength is over.
The third-route green LMP remained a weak but existing force, with just over 5% (thet threshold to gain a seat) will have one MEP.
Due to the low turnout, much cannot be deducted (e.g. FIDESZ did not get more than some 60% of the number of votes than in the national elections in spite of its win in percentage) than above.
The most interesting question was how the three leftist liberal parties fare compared to each othe, given that they tried to win together in April. DK, the social democrat party of controversial ex PM Gyurcsány won two seats - a big feat but merited by the activity of its campaigners - this was the main factor in the joint results in the April elections too - while the purported umbrella organisation Együtt (Together) which then became an independent paty due to election rukes changed by FIDESZ not long before the National polls, won one seat, which is a result but puts it behind the DK. The socialists scored worth than expected - showing that their traditional srength is over.
The third-route green LMP remained a weak but existing force, with just over 5% (thet threshold to gain a seat) will have one MEP.
Due to the low turnout, much cannot be deducted (e.g. FIDESZ did not get more than some 60% of the number of votes than in the national elections in spite of its win in percentage) than above.
Saturday, June 1, 2013
Other conflicts between the EU and Hungary
The excessive deficit procedure was not the only point of conflict – in fact not even the main one – between the EU and Hungary. And although some people in Hungary complain that the EU has lost leverage on Hungary by letting it out of the procedure, I would not support measures designed for economic purposes to be used on political disagreements. First of all, this would further fuel anti-EU propaganda, but probably also anti-EU sentiment in Hungary and could also lead to a legal defeat of the EU which would harm its prestige even more.
I also doubt whether the EU is the right institution to be judge and even less one fighting party in political conflicts in Hungary.
There are, however other pending questions – the fourth amendment of the fundamental law (ex constitution) and also the general questions around the measures limiting democracy and political freedoms, the Tavares-report (or in Hungarian ) and the article 7 procedure it proposes (working documents can also be found here ). The Commission on its part indicated that infringement procedure may be launched because of the fourth amendment (which in Hungary has a totally different connotation than the fourth amendment of the U.S. constitution).
Of course to launch of the article 7 procedure is not so simple. It can be initiated by one third of the Member States, the Parliament or the Commission. The Council will most probably not initiate it, the Commission is reluctant to apply the „nuclear option”, in particular as this – and the Romanian – case supports strongly the quest for a less drastic but more flexible tool for the Commission to sanction a breach of European values (mentioned in Article 2 of the Treaty on the European Union). (The Commission also wants a framework be created to analyse the conditions for applying Article 7 .) Rui Tavares proposes this step to be taken by the Parliament.
There are in fact three phases:
Phase 1: The Council, acting by a majority of four fifths of its members after obtaining the consent of the European Parliament, may determine that there is a clear risk of a serious breach by a Member State of the values referred to in Article 2.
Phase 2: The European Council, acting by unanimity on a proposal by one third of the Member States or by the Commission and after obtaining the consent of the European Parliament, may determine the existence of a serious and persistent breach by a Member State of the values referred to in Article 2,
and Phase 3: The Council, acting by a qualified majority, may decide to suspend certain of the rights deriving from the application of the Treaties to the Member State in question, including the voting rights of the representative of the government of that Member State in the Council.
Phase 2 can only be proposed by one third of the member states of by the Commission, i.e. the Parliament has no right of initiative in this phase. Phase 3 requires no specific initiative, it can be (but is not automatically) a consequence of phase 2. See: here
So a majority in the Parliament and a four fifth majority in the Council is necessary even for the first phase (and unanimity in the European Council to start the second phase). This is not possible without consent of at least part of the members of the EPP to which FIDESZ belongs. Several analyses has appeared in the Hungarian press, in particular following the leak of a purported discussion on the Dubrovnik meeting of EPP leaders (where FIDESZ was not present) about extraditing the FIDESZ from the EPP. This was vehemently denied afterwards. In the following EP debate on Hungary – while in previous debates Joseph Daul, the leader of the EPP faction forcefully defended the Hungarian government – the EPP was represented only by Frank Engel, who resorted to general statements and was very lukewarm. (His contribution is only published in French ) It is, however, very doubtful whether ever the necessary majority will be achieved. The amendments to the Tavares report are arriving, so let’s wait what will be the final text.
I retort from details of diplomatic and less diplomatic exchanges between Orbán and other conservative European leaders, as it is totally unforeseeable when they will decide to take steps and whether this will not be attributed to personal sensitivity rather than to political differences by FIDESZ propaganda.
Sunday, March 17, 2013
Storms
Demonstration near to the National Museum in Budapest two days after the day of independence when - according to legend - the national poet of Hungary (Petőfi, born Petrovics) declamated the National song on the stairs of the Museum, Snowstorm on the roads (that's wha the demonstration was postponed), storms all over Europe and the U.S. around the fourth amendment (how classical this sounds) of the Basic Law of Hungary, The forint plunging in response to - not the nomination but the first measures of the new president of the Hungarian National Bank -.
ANd the European Peoples Party invites Frigide Barjot (no typo) to perform before the press conference of Commission vice president Viviane Reding (who, by chance, belongs to the same grouping) ti express herself against the marriage of homosexuals which is just being admitted in France. These storms on the surface hide undercurrents which have more importance for the future.
The European Parliament - including the majority of EPP MEP's votes against the compromise long term budget agreed between the member states (but fails to request an increase). Good news: a compulsory mid-term review with qualified majority voting which could mean that a minority of member states cannot stop the EU adjusting its budget to the - hopefully - favourable future economic conditions. Greater flexibility, real own resources are the two further demands and a fourth one, which is in fact an increase in the amount: settling the backlog between commitments (promises to pay) and payments, which grew every year as payment budgets were always lower that commitment budgets. In a time of continuous growth of the budget, this difference would cause no trouble as payments are also later than commitments and thus the increase automatically means that payments - coming partially from commitments in previous years - can be somewhat lower that commitments in any given year. But if the difference is bigger than covered by growth, or there is no growth, the situation aggravates.
Meanwhile, a bail-out is agreed for Cyprus. 10bn EUR instead of 17bn, a further 6bn is to be covered by the depositors of Cypriot banks vie a tax on deposits which averages about 6,5%. The European Federalists Party and the blogger of Reuters are enraged. The Parliament did not have a say (well, the national Parliament of Cyprus will have, and Cypriots already staged a run on their banks), they complain. It must be admitted, it is an unorthodox move. But if we think about the methods other governments (whether bailed out by the EU or not) put their budgets right, it is a song. In Hungary, inflation is 6% per year - the same toll on the value of deposits, just to talk about us. Of course, this tax is just a one-off solution (or will it be annual? I doubt). But it soothes to some extent the "northern" citizens who are already very sour about "their money" bailing out "irresponsible" southern states. And, given the composition of Cyprus deposits, it may be well targeted to some who hid their fortunes there.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Voting patterns in the European Parliament - Hungarians among the illoyals
Do members of the European Parliament (MEPs) vote according to their national interests or their party affiliation? My experience which draws on reading a number of committee amendment proposals to legislation, suggests that professional convictions also play a significant role. On the other hand, decision-making is largely consensual, so the differences in opinion are not necessarily visible in the votes.
The voting behaviour in the EP was subject to two analyses recently:
The Robert Schuman Foundation of France published a two-part report (http://www.robert-schuman.eu/question_europe.php?num=qe-189 and http://www.robert-schuman.eu/ question_europe.php?num=qe-190 while VoteWatch, an independent monitoring organisation, which collects and publishes interesting statistics on its website and also regularly reports on voting behaviour investigated in the first semester of 2011 the dynamics of voting behaviour in the three largest groups in the European Parliament. Their results were also reported in European Voice, a weekly on European affairs. The full report on power in the EP covers the period between 2009 and 2011. I draw the conclusions below from these two reports.
On the website of VoteWatch, also the loyalty of individual members is investigated and it can be seen that their loyalty is above 90% both with their party group and their national majority. This supports the idea outlined above that voting is largely consensual. One more factor has to be kept in mind: there are a number of votes which are not roll-call, so the voting behaviour in them cannot be analysed. This was the case when the motion about the new Hungarian Constitution was voted upon. The evaluation of the politics of the Hungarian government is one of the most controversial issues under discussion (you could even say that the FIDESZ party could polarise the European Parliament to an unprecedented level as they did so already with Hungarians). The vote was won with more than 50% of those present, 331 votes. Although this is mathematically possible without any EPP (to which FIDESZ belongs) vote, the proportions indicate at least that the EPP, the ECR (another centre-right, somewhat more eurosceptic grouping), the eurosceptics and the far right could have blocked the resolution.
Roll call votes can be initiated by the party groups and are usually enhancing
voting discipline but - in case of a difficult decision, can also lead to MEPs not voting, writes the Schuman foundation. Thus, there is no regularity in which question is put to a roll call vote and which one is not. Roll call votes are about one third of the total voting procedures. Since 2009, however, all legislative proposals must be approved by roll call voting (according to the internal regulations of the European Parliament.
Based on 16 votes in the first year of the legislative 2009-2014, the Schuman
foundation concludes in general that the right-left divide plays a smaller role in the European Parliament than on national level, as it coexist with the national affiliations, its role is increasing. There is also another divide: those who favour and those who oppose the enhancement of European integration. This line of course also extends between parties but is still not the same.
There is another trend: increase of the power of the Parliament through the Lisbon treaty has - in the opinion of the foundation - led to an increase of the role of national interests in voting.
The mixture of national and party (ideological) affiliations can lead to strange phenomena: European Voice concludes, for example, that French, Italian and Hungarian delegations in the centre-right EPP are more aligned with the S&D (social-democrat) group than other national delegations. "Among the seven largest national party delegations in the EPP, the Hungarian FIDESZ has voted with the majority least often (95%)." states the VoteWatch report. The biggest deviation was in the area of agriculture, where FIDESZ voted only 69% of the time with the rest of the group. On the other hand: "In the EPP, the highest degree of similarity in voting behaviour between leaders of the largest national party delegations has been between heads of the Polish and the Hungarian delegations." writes the report. European Voice also mentions environment and public health as points of dissent. The Hungarian delegation in other political groups is small and thus their behaviour is not analysed.
As there is no political group with absolute majority, coalitions have to be formed. These are nicely described in European Voice. The consequence I want to mention here is that the liberals seem to tilt the balance in many cases and they were the ones who were on winning side of votes the most frequently.
European Voice also draws conclusions on the dominance of some national delegations in the main political groups. The EPP and the S&D are dominated by the Germans. They form the right wing of the group, together with the Spanish Partido Popular. In the S&D group, the British - being to the right in the group - vote less with the group (this, however, still means 90% loyalty). The influence of the German FDP in the liberal ALDE group was limited due to the fact that the party is the furthest to the right of the group and prefers voting with the EPP. The most rebellious delegation, however, is the French MoDem, to the left of the group in a political sense.
If we add that most decisions are taken together with the Council, where consensus-building is also the rule but qualified majority voting is gaining ground, and that only the Commission has the right to propose legislative acts, a complex mechanism of decisionmaking is unfolding. No wonder it is so badly understood and can be the scapegoat for decisions the national politicians do not want to present to their constituencies.
The voting behaviour in the EP was subject to two analyses recently:
The Robert Schuman Foundation of France published a two-part report (http://www.robert-schuman.eu/question_europe.php?num=qe-189 and http://www.robert-schuman.eu/ question_europe.php?num=qe-190 while VoteWatch, an independent monitoring organisation, which collects and publishes interesting statistics on its website and also regularly reports on voting behaviour investigated in the first semester of 2011 the dynamics of voting behaviour in the three largest groups in the European Parliament. Their results were also reported in European Voice, a weekly on European affairs. The full report on power in the EP covers the period between 2009 and 2011. I draw the conclusions below from these two reports.
On the website of VoteWatch, also the loyalty of individual members is investigated and it can be seen that their loyalty is above 90% both with their party group and their national majority. This supports the idea outlined above that voting is largely consensual. One more factor has to be kept in mind: there are a number of votes which are not roll-call, so the voting behaviour in them cannot be analysed. This was the case when the motion about the new Hungarian Constitution was voted upon. The evaluation of the politics of the Hungarian government is one of the most controversial issues under discussion (you could even say that the FIDESZ party could polarise the European Parliament to an unprecedented level as they did so already with Hungarians). The vote was won with more than 50% of those present, 331 votes. Although this is mathematically possible without any EPP (to which FIDESZ belongs) vote, the proportions indicate at least that the EPP, the ECR (another centre-right, somewhat more eurosceptic grouping), the eurosceptics and the far right could have blocked the resolution.
Roll call votes can be initiated by the party groups and are usually enhancing
voting discipline but - in case of a difficult decision, can also lead to MEPs not voting, writes the Schuman foundation. Thus, there is no regularity in which question is put to a roll call vote and which one is not. Roll call votes are about one third of the total voting procedures. Since 2009, however, all legislative proposals must be approved by roll call voting (according to the internal regulations of the European Parliament.
Based on 16 votes in the first year of the legislative 2009-2014, the Schuman
foundation concludes in general that the right-left divide plays a smaller role in the European Parliament than on national level, as it coexist with the national affiliations, its role is increasing. There is also another divide: those who favour and those who oppose the enhancement of European integration. This line of course also extends between parties but is still not the same.
There is another trend: increase of the power of the Parliament through the Lisbon treaty has - in the opinion of the foundation - led to an increase of the role of national interests in voting.
The mixture of national and party (ideological) affiliations can lead to strange phenomena: European Voice concludes, for example, that French, Italian and Hungarian delegations in the centre-right EPP are more aligned with the S&D (social-democrat) group than other national delegations. "Among the seven largest national party delegations in the EPP, the Hungarian FIDESZ has voted with the majority least often (95%)." states the VoteWatch report. The biggest deviation was in the area of agriculture, where FIDESZ voted only 69% of the time with the rest of the group. On the other hand: "In the EPP, the highest degree of similarity in voting behaviour between leaders of the largest national party delegations has been between heads of the Polish and the Hungarian delegations." writes the report. European Voice also mentions environment and public health as points of dissent. The Hungarian delegation in other political groups is small and thus their behaviour is not analysed.
As there is no political group with absolute majority, coalitions have to be formed. These are nicely described in European Voice. The consequence I want to mention here is that the liberals seem to tilt the balance in many cases and they were the ones who were on winning side of votes the most frequently.
European Voice also draws conclusions on the dominance of some national delegations in the main political groups. The EPP and the S&D are dominated by the Germans. They form the right wing of the group, together with the Spanish Partido Popular. In the S&D group, the British - being to the right in the group - vote less with the group (this, however, still means 90% loyalty). The influence of the German FDP in the liberal ALDE group was limited due to the fact that the party is the furthest to the right of the group and prefers voting with the EPP. The most rebellious delegation, however, is the French MoDem, to the left of the group in a political sense.
If we add that most decisions are taken together with the Council, where consensus-building is also the rule but qualified majority voting is gaining ground, and that only the Commission has the right to propose legislative acts, a complex mechanism of decisionmaking is unfolding. No wonder it is so badly understood and can be the scapegoat for decisions the national politicians do not want to present to their constituencies.
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