European Congress Season

We've just had the Party of European Socialist's Congress at the end of September, but the congresses of the other Europarties are still coming up. The European People's Party will hold their Congress this week in Bucharest on the 17th and 18th, which you can follow here.

The other Europarty Congress dates are:

European Liberal Democrats: 8th-10th November, Dublin.

European Greens: 9th-11th November, Athens.


I wasn't able to find Congresses for any of the other political parties, but I did find that the European Alliance for Freedom (part of the anti-EU Europe of Freedom and Democracy Group in the European Parliament) held a Congress on the 24th-27th June in Malta. You can find it here, but there doesn't seem to be much in terms of policy or tactics that came out of it.

So though there are 12 recognised Europarties as of 2012, there only seems to be Congresses for a minority of them (though they are the big mainstream Europarties). Their activity needs to ramp up next year in the run up to the 2014 election if they're to prove their worth.

Dutch Elections: "The Political Centre is Back!"

The centre is back is the news out of The Netherlands today - from De Volkskrant:

"De PvdA en de VVD boeken vandaag allebei een enorme verkiezingsoverwinning. Samen met het CDA en D66 behalen de middenpartijen maar liefst 106 zetels. Het politieke midden is terug. En Europa is de grote winnaar van de avond.

[Own translation: 'Today Labour and the Party of Freedom and Democracy (right-wing liberals) have had a enormous election win . Together with the Christian Democrats and Social Liberals, the parties of the centre hold up to 106 seats. The political centre is back. And Europe is the biggest winner this evening.]"

At the time of writing with constituencies still to be declared, the results are (Europarty/seat change in brackets):

VVD (ELDR): 41 (+10). [This is the party of the outgoing Prime Minister Mark Rutte].
PvdA (PES): 39 (+9).
SP (GUE-NGL): 15 (0).
PVV (None): 15 (-9).
CDA (EPP): 13 (-8).
D66 (ELDR): 12 (+2).
GroenLinks (European Greens): 3 (-7).
Christen Unie (ECR): 5 (0).
SGP (EFD): 3 (+1).
PvdD (None): 2 (0).
50Plus (None): 2 (+2).

De Volkskrant is predicting a coalition of the centre and notes that the old coalition of VVD-CDA with support from Geert Wilders' anti-Islam and anti-Europe PVV  would not have enough seats to form a majority (now around 69 seats) and that governments of the left and right blocks are only "theoretically possible". Clearly despite the big gains for the centre right and left the Dutch political system is still quite fragmented. If a grand coalition is formed it will be interesting to see if the return to the political centre will continue, or if the extremes will grow in opposition. The head-to-head race between the VVD and PvdA with different outlooks on key policy areas has probably been a big factor in attracting voters to the political centre, and now compromises need to be made to form a government. 76 seats are needed for a majority.

The election confirms the centre-right liberals (VVD) as the dominant party of the right in The Netherlands, with the formerly dominant Christian Democrats (CDA) continuing to decline. On the left, Labour (PvdA) has not only retained its position, but the far-left Socialist Party has failed to make the inroads widely expected at the start of the campaign. The SP had been doing well in the polls, but a poor performance in the leaders' debates (which were widely seen to have been won by Labour's Diederik Samsom) meant that they couldn't keep up their electoral momentum.

The result is a big boost for the pro-European parties. Geert Wilders, who pulled the plug on the last government, wanted to make the election into a referendum on Europe (and against austerity and EU membership) and the SP were also Eurosceptic on the left (against further bail-outs).

The next challenge will be for the VVD and PvdA to form a coalition government.

Europarty Congress Season and a Third Term for Barroso

There have been some comments in favour of Barroso winnning a third term as Commission President. It's interesting that the comments come from Reding, who was considered one of the front-runners for the race in 2014. However it's not an idea I'd warm to exactly - I'm not the biggest fan of Barroso - but it does raise an important question for the European conference season: how will the Europarties approach the next European elections and the election of the next Commission President?

The Commission President is nominated by the European Council (by Qualified Majority Voting), but it's the European Parliament that elects the Commission President, and later the President elect's nominated College of Commissioners. Since the Parliament elects the Commission, the European Council nominates a candidate from the same Europarty as the one that won the election. The European People's Party endorsed Barroso for the presidency in 2009, and the Party of European Socialists failed to make any nomination so the presidency wasn't an election issue. The centre-left PES governments of the UK, Spain and Portugal backed Barroso, preventing a common PES candidate, but the PES has committed itself to picking a candidate for the post in the future, and will hold primaries for deciding its candidate. The vote adopting these procedures will take place during its September Congress:

"The European Socialist Party is due to vote to change its party statute on 29 September. The plan is to have national parties put forward a candidate for commission president. The final socialist nominee is then expected to be unveiled in February 2014, just ahead of the June elections"

EUObserver reports that ELDR, the liberal Europarty, also intends to consider procedures for selecting a candidate:

""We will be making a recommendation to our party congress this autumn on what the procedure should be for the selection of a liberal candidate for the president of the commission. And we would see that process taking place in the autumn of next year," Graham Watson, leader of the European Liberals, told this website.

He said it is the first time the party has ever tried to set down rules for the procedure. Previously names "sort of emerged" from a "conclave of liberal leaders."

The European People's Party is likely to discuss the possibility of candidate selection as part of its election strategy at its conference.

Being able to vote for a policy platform and for candidates for the Commission presidency is essential if the EU is to become more democratic and open. This Congress season will be an important early test to gauge the commitment - and ability - of the Europarties to present alternatives when it comes to election time. It's not enough to blame the Commission and the Member States from the Parliament Chamber: Europarties have to be able to present and fight for alternatives if they're to pass themselves off as political parties.

The PES Congress will take place at the end of the month in Brussels, the EPP's will be held in October in Bucharest, and the ELDR Congress will be held in early November in Dublin.

Where exactly are the Europarties?

The Europarties are supposed to be forums for political debate and participation in the EU - that's very much the theory, anyway. So during the Euro crisis (and particularly during today's summit), what have the Europarties been up to?

The Socialists and Democrats.

The S&D have been somewhat active. There was a conference recently in Barcelona that resulted in the "Barcelona Declaration" (designed to make Social Democrats electable to take power in the EU by 2014):

"In the "Barcelona Declaration", Socialists and Democrats say they will:

•WORK for fair and progressive financial recovery focused on job creation and the protection of the welfare state;
•PROMOTE inclusion and integration in the face of populism and xenophobia;
•BRING more representation into the democratic system through new ways of participation; and
•STRENGTHEN the EU based on solidarity and combating growing nationalisms and euroscepticism."

The Declaration itself (which you can read here [PDF] in French) pretty much says the same thing, but it pads it out to fill the page. Sadly it's all too vague to really mean anything - and this during a major economic crisis! Even though it's aimed at 2014, how can the second biggest political force have no ideas or strategy at this stage? That the PES's campaigns on the Financial Transaction Tax and on Eurobonds haven't even got a mention simply demonstrates that the PES's leadership can launch internet campaigns separate from the actual power structure in the party without any impact.

The S&D group has endorsed the European Trade Union's day of action in Luxembourg, and points to anternet campaign Change for Europe (I assume it's cross-party with the Greens). While there are a few noises about transaction taxes and shifting the taxation burden, it's not clear that this is leading anywhere other than a party-political endorsement of the Parliament's aim of some own resources (read: taxes) for the EU.

The S&D is, on the surface, in a difficult position as its member parties are engaged in different levels of austerity while its European leadership calls for less austerity and more investment. However, it's not a massive gap, as its member parties also want this too, at least in general. With the S&D* opposition pretty much across Europe, they should really be doing more to throw their political weight around - after all, they don't have enough voices in Council or the Commission, so surely they should want to create a more vocal public response if possible?

Of course, it's not quite that simple as there are divisions between the member parties and within them. But a greater effort to have a common platform is necessary, particularly if they want to be electable in the face of a European culture of austerity.

The PES has announced that it has collected the signatures of 1,000 elected MPs of their member parties for a transaction tax - why not try to make use of this to establish an effective pan-European position?

*The PES ("Party of European Socialists") is the actual party, but in the EP they're known at the S&D. Poor branding, but what can you do?


European People's Party.

The EPP is "in government" in the EU, with a big majority in the Commission and Council, and as the biggest party in the EP. It's been enjoying a period of huge electoral success and it hasn't needed a common programme, and it shows. The party seems to be obsessed with finishing their articles with a "note to the editor" about the EPP's dominance in whatever institution features.

I'm happy to be corrected, but it doesn't look like the EPP has done much in the way of stating policy decisions that haven't been an initative of the (EPP-run) Member States. The EPP acts as a pro-government party for whatever the Council or Commission puts in front of it, unless it was proposed by the S&D side or there's an EP interest against it.

Update: Reuniting Europe has a blogpost on the EPP summit before the European Council summit.


European Liberal Democrats. (Which are part of the ALDE Group).

I'm pretty sure this says it all:

"Annemie Neyts-Uyttebroeck MEP, President of the European Liberal Democrats re-iterated her views on the need for the European People's Party (EPP) to take a more pro-active approach towards developments in Greece, "the EPP needs to shoulder responsibility and help bring about relief to the Greek situation given that some of the main political actors in this scenario belong to its European political family"."

While the S&D may be more active, as the opposition, the onus is on them to be more active and creative than the incumbant party(ies) - and, in an ideal world, actually effective as an opposition. Reforming Europarty structures to make them more coherent could go a lot further than changing the EP electoral system. What's the point of having "more European" elections if the parties refuse to campaign publically on pan-European issues?



[I just quickly dashed off this post - feel free to bombard me with info on what the parties want to do or what the issues are with their internal structures].

The Eurozone and the Europarties: ELDR

Given that there's a lot of discussion on how to reform the Eurozone, I thought I'd send some quick questions by email to some of the Europarties on what there positions are on Eurozone reform, and what role they play in the debate.

The first to reply was the European Liberal Demoract and Reform Party, and I've included the questions and ELDR's answers below. I've included some of my own notes to explain what the links included contain, but read the links in full to get the full sense of the proposals. Thanks to ELDR for replying.

As a further note, ELDR now has Associate Membership (hat-tip Stephen Spillane). I wonder how this might start to change the party, if at all. Will the addition of the ELDR's "own" members (as separate from the membership of its constituent parties) start to have influence its positions in the European Parliament?


1. So far the high-profile discussions on economic governance have been at the level of Heads of State and Government during European Council summit meetings. What do you see the role of Europarties in this debate to be, and what role is ELDR trying to play?

ELDR has for many years already been organizing liberal Prime Minister summits preceding the European Council meeting. By those meetings, ELDR assumes a coordination function among the member parties to bring together the positions of liberal governments.

See here the links to the two past liberal summits.

http://www.eldr.eu/en/news/2010/12/european-liberals-back-common-crisis-mechanism-

http://www.eldr.eu/en/news/2010/10/liberals-support-calls-for-crisis-management-mechanism



2. Is the European Financial Stability Mechanism a good method of combating the debt crisis in the Eurozone? Are you satisfied with how it works in ensuring lending to certain countries, or should it be changed, and why?

This mechanism has been conceived as a temporary mechanism and should orderly phase-out in 2013. Permanent crisis mechanisms such as the EFSM risk moral hazard behavior of EU member states as they provide for the wrong incentives concerning budget policies. Only a comprehensive package of measures can prevent future debt crisis as called for by the ELDR in 2010.*


* Own Note: As an extract:

"[ELDR] Calls for:

Strict budget discipline in all member states of the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). As laid down in the treaties, member states ought to aim for balanced budgets, with a three percent budget deficit being the maximum allowed under extraordinary conditions. Stronger emphasis should also be laid on staying below the maximum debt level of 60% of GDP as defined in the second criterion of the SGP, and on surveillance of both public and private debt;

A stronger enforcement of the criteria of the Stability and Growth Pact by creating gradual and automatic sanctions in the preventive and corrective arms of the Stability and Growth Pact which are not only financial, but also political, and calls for a new Stability and Growth Pact that would allow for temporary suspensions of payments from the cohesion and structural funds to countries that repeatedly violate the SGP. However, this does not exempt the Member States from fulfilling their obligations toward their citizens and businesses;

The depoliticisation of the power to enforce the Stability and Growth Pact, by moving the decision from the ECOFIN council to an independently enforced mechanism executed by the European Commission;

The orderly phase-out of the EFSF on 30 June 2013, as planned and promised at the time of its creation;

The introduction of European standards for EMU member states’ financial accounts, including clear and enforceable reporting standards that are cross-checked by EUROSTAT"

3. More fiscal integration is often mentioned as a key part of economic governance: what does this mean to ELDR? How far should integration go in this area (for example, should there be Eurobonds?): what should the EU do on one hand, and the Member States on the other?

Europe needs the Euro but a common currency also demands greater fiscal and economic coordination. The key is a stricter budget discipline of member states and stronger enforcement of the criteria of the Stability and Growth Pact as adopted by the ELDR Party in Helsinki in October 2010.

European Liberals are at the forefront of discussing proposals how to go about Eurobonds. Among them former ELDR Vice President and chair of the European Parliament’s economic and monetary affairs committee Sharon Bowles** or the liberal group leader in the European Parliament Guy Verhofstadt.*** In this respect it is equally clear for Liberals that the EU must not become a monetary transfer union or falling into the trap of member state to run down the same fatal spiral huge budget deficits.


** [Own Note: this proposal is for the bailed out countries to be refunded some of the high interest that they have paid when all debts have been paid off].

*** [Own Note: proposal for Eurobonds].



4. In the budget discussions at the end of last year, the European Parliament thought it was important to leave the question of own resources, including the idea of taxation (e.g. financial/environmental taxes), open for future budget discussions. Where do the European Liberal Democrats stand on EU taxation? Is this an important part of economic governance, or a separate issue?

Taxation (be it national or European) is obviously an important part of economic policies, particularly for liberals. The ELDR Party is about to launch its focus year 2011 (www.eldrfocus.eu) on the next multi-annual framework of the EU budget. The question of EU taxation will be an essential part of the discussion and the ELDR Party is expected to adopt a theme resolution on those issues at the party congress in November. The possibility of levying EU taxes has always to be reviewed in the context of national austerity measures and national taxation. Europe cannot afford to generally burden citizens with more dues.



5. Financial regulation is a big issue and the EU has tried to tackle this on a macroeconomic level and in hedge fund regulation last year. Has the EU done enough in this area? What, if anything, should be done differently and why?

At the beginning of the financial crisis there was a substantial failure in governmental supervision as well as in the financial institutions themselves. Even though everyone loves to blame hedge funds, they were certainly not the cause for the crisis.

In its resolution on a new prosperity from November 2009, ELDR has spelled out that existing regulation needs to be reviewed but that more intervention will not lead to economic recovery.

ELDR Conference 2010

ELDR, the pan-European Liberal party that is part of ALDE in the European Parliament (and counts the UK Liberal Democrats, Irish Fianna Fáil and Dutch VVD among its ranks), is holding its last day of its annual congress in Helsinki today. I've only found out about it today, due to a blog post disappointed that the pro-European Liberal Democrats have not sent some MPs to the congress, and EUobserver's reporting of ELDR unease with the VVD-led government's reliance on Geert Wilders' PVV party in the Dutch Parliament. Recently I haven't been that attentive to Twitter, so I may have missed any party buzz from it, but a quick look at the ELDR Twitter account shows that there have only been 12 Tweets since the start of the congress, at the time of writing.

Still, now that I had discovered the ELDR Congress, I went to their website to check up on any news. So far there have been 3 news articles - on the opening of the congress, on the increased turnout at the congress, and one congratulating the VVD on becoming the senior governing party in the Netherlands. Not only is there no press release so far on discussions about the congress's theme - Demographic Change - but there seems to be no mention of the congress on the party's blog, or any of the blogs linked on its blog page, apart from a short descriptive one in Swedish.

The theme of the congress is one that's very relevant today, as immigration and welfare state reform in the face of the economic crisis are clearly the major issues, so it's disappointing that so far little has emerged on the Eurozone economy, the welfare state, or immigration. It's important to have a coherent position on this, given the free movement of workers within the EU, and that the Lib Dems in the UK and (more pressingly) the VVD in the Netherlands have to deal with demands for restrictions on immigration. Indeed, Geert Wilders has supposedly vetted the new Dutch immigration minister. The ELDR leader, Annemie Neyts-Uyttebroeck, said that she was sure that the VVD would stick to liberal principles, but also supported the mooted banning of the burqa in the Netherlands (Neyts-Uyttebroeck is from Belgium) - something that I consider to be an illiberal position.

The last day isn't over yet, and some news and party positions - or even a clearer overview of what was discussed - might emerge after the Congress ends. It seems unlikely that anything very interesting will suddenly come to light when everyone has packed up and gone home, however. Even if interest in the ELDR Congress would have been low even if it was more open and accessible, ELDR have missed a chance to promote themselves as a party online, and I wonder at the political will of a party that seems to not even bother to reach out with such an event.

[In other news, I've just noticed that ALDE's website has undergone a redesign].

Polls will open in a matter of hours for European Elections 2009

With only a few hours to go until polls open for the European elections in the UK and the Netherlands, there hasn't been much activity on the online campaigns of the main groups since my short update a few days ago.

The EPP has rejected Czech President Klaus' assertion that the EP elections are unnecessary.

Some former socialist leaders call for a challenger to Barroso - a bit late, mind you. Via a_new_president.

The PES has attacked Barroso's plans for the Social Funds, using some strong rhetoric:

“Shifting around the European Social Fund while unemployment rockets to 27 million unemployed next year is not the answer. Micro-credit is unlikely to have macro results in a hurry. Raising awareness of job mobility is not going to help when there aren’t enough jobs anywhere. This is a weak conservative answer to the deepest social crisis for decades.”

Still, without proposing an alternative leadership with more concrete proposals it is hard to see what makes them electable, except perhaps the chance of ousting Barroso with sheer force of numbers - something that's unlikely to happen in these elections. Poul Nyrup Rasmussen has made a closing campaign statement, urging people to vote.

The European Greens have also given a closing campaign statement. I can't find anything similar for the other groups.

There are concerns that the Netherlands will influence the poll by releasing preliminary election results. While it's illegal under EU law to release the results of the election before all the countries have voted, the Netherlands might get around this by claiming that the preliminary results don't count as a breach since they're not official. On the upside, if such results are released, it will keep bloggers occupied. Exit polls are expected to be published in some countries.

The Swedish Pirate Party (focused on internet downloading liberalisation and that became famous after a Swedish court ruling on internet downloading) has indicated that it will consider the Liberals or Greens as likely partners should it manage to get some of its candidates elected. It would be extra votes for the group line on issues outside internet civil liberties.

(And here's an interesting blog post on the number of Poles abroad voting via consulates and locally).

The BBC has an overview of the major legislation passed by the sixth European Parliament, which might help you decide what issues are important in deciding your vote. And please do vote.

The most "European" debate I've seen so far was today by France 24 (on the video 3/6/2009 - I can't seem to link the video itself).

Finally, and perhaps not surprisingly, Libertas still have "The Libertas programme for a better Europe will be published on this site in the coming weeks." on their policies page.

Irish voting already started on Friday, and some political ponderings

Some Irish voters have already voted in the European and local elections. Normally some of the islands vote before the mainland, but this time the voting was officially started by patients in the Central Mental Hospital in Dundrum. It seems that there's been a 60% turnout there, though naturally there will probably be a much lower turnout by the general public on June 5th.

The European elections may have the effect of - or be proof of - shifting the national politics into a more traditional European direction. It may also be the point where national politics became more integrationist (in a society sense), with EU immigration starting to have an impact on the political parties.

First of all, Irish politics may finally be moving towards a left-right contest, as the conservative Fianna Fáil party is stuck on 20% popularity - and this is the political party that has dominated Irish politics since the 1930s. The European elections have become a contest between Fine Gael and Labour in a sense, though the media doesn't make it out to be quite so adversarial as it would if it was a government-opposition set up.

However, if the shift is taking place, it will be a long road. The STV system of voting means that candidates are important, and despite FF's vast unpopularity, one of its candidates, Brian Crowley in the Ireland South constituency, will probably be the candidate to attract the most votes in the country (he's at 30%, well over the 25% quota to get elected). For a number of reasons, Ireland is likely to return pretty much the same MEPs as in the last election.

Still, it's FG vs Labour in Ireland East, with Labour on course to win a seat at the expense of FG who had unexpectedly won two seats in the 3 seat constituency in 2004. If Labour becomes the second party in the next general election, they will need to fight the temptation to go into government with FG (the temptation will be very strong since the leadership is aging) and force them into a coalition with civil war enemies FF. (Interestingly, however, there have been reports that up to one third of the Irish electorate could be floating voters, which is more than previously thought).

[See Frank Schnittger's Th!nk About It article on the European elections in Ireland here].

In terms of the political balance of the EP, these elections are unlikely to change much given the stability of the MEP delegation. The PES may gain 1 or even 2 seats (though an extra second seat is becoming less likely as Kathy Sinnot (InDem group) experiences a surge in the last two weeks. Still, a second seat is not beyond the realms of possibility. The EPP will lose one seat. Though FF could lose a seat in Dublin, if it does it can't really be considered an ELDR loss, as the FF MEPs won't join them until the next EP assembles, so ELDR will gain at least 3 seats in Ireland.

In Northern Ireland, there's an outside possibility that SDLP candidate, Alban Maginness, could win the third seat if the unionist vote is split. So the PES could be in for a 1-3 seat increase from the island as a whole, but it would be a big upset for this to happen. I've written a basic overview of the election in NI here.

Another factor which could emerge from this election is the participation of non-Irish EU citizens. I briefly pondered about this a good while back, and it has been good to see that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have polish versions of their websites (I didn't include a link for FF because it doesn't seem to be working at the moment). Of course, there are immigrants from other big bang member states, especially from the Baltic states, as well as immigrants from Africa (mostly Nigeria), so hopefully there is a drive for inclusion there too.

This Irish Times has an article on immigrants and political party partcipation (link here). Will more partcipation and the experience of availing of the free movement of workers lead to a good turnout? Or will the registration system and lack of information put people off?

I really liked the article's fantastic English-Polish Irish political phrasebook:

"We are where we are - Jestesmy, gdzie jestesmy.

I have a deep passion for pot- hole-related issues - Mam glebokie zainteresowanie dla problemów zwiazanych z dziurami w drogach.

Poles before politics - Polacy przed polityka.

This is a damning indictment/ appalling vista - To jest potepiajace oskarzenie/ przerazajaca perspektywa.

We cannot let this country go backwards, going forward - Nie mozemy pozwolic, aby ten kraj sie cofnal, idac naprzód.

The money was just resting in my account - Pieniadze tylko spoczywaly na moim koncie. [My favourite]

I’m glad you asked me that question, but if I could just return to an earlier point - Ciesze sie ze Pan mnie o to zapytal, ale czy móglbym powrócic do wczesniejszego punktu."

Virtual Political Clashes

There have been a few web-based political clashes recently, mostly PES-related. All of the European Parties are being denied the "oxygen of publicity" during these elections, but there are a few sparse glimmerings of something approaching a political political campaign online - though sadly "sparse" is the key word here, and many of the online battles are far less interesting to read than the "Letters to the Editor" pages in newspapers. A little more passion or vision, please?

The PES have gone for a cross-group attack (though still quite focused on the EPP) in their "12 Terrible Candidates" press release, attacking its rival groups on the basis of the kind of fringe membership they have. It hasn't entirely worked, with the Economist (which I read via Julien Frisch) criticising the PES for including the former Minister for Justice of Romania, Monica Macovei, in their list. Macovei has a good reputation for fighting corruption, and her inclusion in the list has perhaps reflected more on the Romanian branch of the PES than on their EPP rivals. The EPP has dismissed the list as another aspect of a populist campaign by the PES in similarly combative language.

On the ELDR front, Poul Rasmussen has criticised the ruling ELDR-aligned government in Finland for its response to the crisis and for simply copying the policies of others:

"...why is the liberal Finnish Prime Minister, Matti Vanhanen, just copying the inaction of conservative leaders such as Merkel and Sarkozy when it comes to fighting the worst economic crisis for generations? ... [T]he tax cuts that he has enacted are just not enough. According to current estimates, by next year 250,000 people will be unemployed in Finland."

The Finnish PM has defended his government on the ELDR site, saying:

"...fiscal policy is in Finland one of the most expansionary in the OECD area. Discretionary stimulus measures amount to over 3 per cent of GDP in 2009 and 2010. For example, infrastructure investments are higher than ever. My government is committed to increasing resources for labour market policies as needed. Most recently, this week, 61 million € were added to labour market activities. Similarly, we have taken several measures to help municipalities in their financing difficulties.

At the same time as we are handling this acute crisis, we look further ahead. We need to manage the huge debts we now take without burdening too much our children. Therefore my government has continued efforts to improve our educational and innovation system, taken initiatives to lengthen working careers and launched a new growth project, among other things. Unfortunately Mr. Rasmussen's Finnish colleagues have not been very helpful in these efforts."

It's a political battle of sorts (though Rasmussen didn't advance specific policies in his blog post; he just supported his Finnish allies), but how relevant is it? Has it made an impact? I doubt much has been made of Rasmussen's attack in the Finnish media (though I may be wrong), but the engagement of the Finnish PM shows that the European Party-level could have some relevance to the campaign. Does anyone know if the Finnish PES party has played up this PES attack on the government?

Rasmussen has also been attacked by ELDR over some comments on the Estonian government's handling of the crisis, with the ELDR claiming that he wants Estonia to remain out of the Euro by increasing its debt (and breaking the criteria).

In the end I think that it will take a big effort of the European Parties' respective leaderships over the course of the next EP to raise the public awareness of their groups and themselves. It is nigh on impossible to generate a political campaign out of thin air, and despite the possibilities the internet opens up for politics, without the mainstream media reacting to a European political debate, there's almost no point in having one. Or in trying to generate one.


[Out of the 3 major EP political groupings - EPP, PES and ELDR - I think that the PES has made a good effort online (it seems the most active to me out of the 3), with ELDR's website not looking too bad, even if it's campaign is quite sketchy. The EPP-ED's site is functional, and the EPP have set up "Dialogue TV".]

Cowen Throws his weight behind the move to ELDR

While Brian Crowley, Fianna Fáil MEP and current co-leader of the UEN group, tried to reverse the decision of the FF party at their recent Ardfheis to join the Liberal grouping of ELDR in the EP, it seems that there's no backing out this time. Brian Cowen, FF president and Irish Taoiseach, has thrown his weight behind the decision - Cowen's position may have been weakened by the economic crisis, and his government's bumbling (and at times frankly incompetent) response to it, but I'd say that there's no chance of Crowley getting his way now.

Not only did Cowen hold private talks with ALDE head Graham Watson, but he appeared in a Liberal press conference alongside leading liberal-aligned politicians from the national political arena of other member states.

I wonder what the outcome for Crowley will be within the FF party at the end of all of this? He should be safe electorally since he's the biggest vote-winner for FF in European elections, but will he loose more than a co-presidency of a EP group?