Monday

11th Dec 2023

MEPs keen to harmonise EU election rules

  • Danuta Hübner, co-author of the EP report hopes to have the issue before the council already this year (Photo: epp group)

The European Parliament is pushing for minimum standards, including an electoral threshold of between 3 and 5 percent in member states, for the 2019 EU elections.

MEPs in the constitutional affairs committee on Monday (28 September) backed a report that would “strengthen the European dimension” of the 2019 vote if member states agree in the EU Council.

Read and decide

Join EUobserver today

Become an expert on Europe

Get instant access to all articles — and 20 years of archives. 14-day free trial.

... or subscribe as a group

The report calls for thresholds - a minimum of 3 percent and a maximum of 5 percent - for parties in member states to post deputies to Brussels.

The draft law, that would amend the 1976 Election Act, also proposes that European political parties should nominate their candidates for the position of European Commission President - something which de facto happened in the 2014 election.

The report introduces the right to vote for EU citizens living outside the EU, the possibility of electronic and internet voting, as well as voting by post.

It would also introduce a 12-week deadline for finalisation of electoral lists to avoid last-minute changes to nominations of candidates, and calls for lists of candidates to be gender-balanced.

It says the provisional outcome of results should be communicated simultaneously in all member states.

“The last European Parliamentary elections were a trauma for all of us, because it didn’t manage to be fully European, and it was visible in the turnout. We wanted to make the EP elections more European and less national,” Danuta Huebner, a Polish centre-right MEP who co-wrote the report, told EUobserver after the committee vote.

Given how jealously EU capitals guard their national rules, Huebner and Jo Leinen, a German centre-left MEP, the other co-rapporteur, said they went for “realistic” proposals.

The report will go before the EP plenary at the end of October, and will need the unanimous support of member states to go through.

“We had to be practical and realistic,” said Huebner, who admits that thresholds are a difficult issue, but who also recalled that 15 member states have obligatory thresholds already.

Doru Frantescu, the director and co-founder of Votewatch Europe, a Brussels-based NGO, described the draft new rules as a “big leap forward towards ‘Europeanisation of the European elections’,” if they’re adopted.

“It is precisely because these elections are seen as secondary that the new rules may actually get some traction in the Council, as the national politicians may feel that they don’t give away too much”, he told EUobserver.

Besides the sensitive issue of nominating the Commission president, Frantescu thinks the electoral thresholds will be the most tricky.

“It will be disputed in countries such as Germany, where the Constitutional Court has abolished the threshold for the European elections. However, if the new rules will be stated in an EU law, the position of the Court is likely to be different”, he said.

“We have a lot of hurdles, but we made the first step,” Huebner added, highlighting that the report had the support of both of the EP’s biggest political groups.

Huebner said she’s already in contact with the Luxembourg EU presidency and hopes to have it on the Council agenda before the end of the year.

“We want to start moving on this,” she added.

EUobserved

The European Parliament's institutional coup

Member state leaders have been backed into a corner. They have, as it were, been overtaken by the campaign bus; or outspoken at the TV debate. Yes, the European Parliament is in the process of staging a rather successful coup.

EU leaders to review 'Spitzenkandidat' process

EU leaders have said they plan to review the process for choosing EU commission presidents in the future after having found themselves left with little room for manoeuvre following a parliament-pushed process.

MEPs seek to harmonize EU election law

MEPs have endorsed a proposal on electoral reform that would make citizens vote for the EU Commission president and bring in Europe-wide party lists by 2019.

Polish truck protest at Ukraine border disrupts war supplies

Disruption at the Polish-Ukrainian border by disaffected Polish truckers is escalating, potentially affecting delivery of military aid to Ukraine. A Polish request to reintroduce permits for Ukrainian drivers has been described as "a shot to the head" during war.

Agenda

Final EU summit of 2023 plus rule of law in Spain This WEEK

EU leaders will gather in Brussels for their final summit of 2023, with a tough agenda that includes Ukraine, the Middle East, enlargement, and the revision of the EU budget, including €50bn financial aid for Kyiv.

Opinion

Why this week's EU summit must agree a new budget deal

There are claims by some member states that there are pots of unused cash sloshing around in the EU's coffers. This is simply untrue. By European Parliament budget rapporteur MEPs Jan Olbyrcht and Margarida Marques.

Latest News

  1. EU's 'do no harm' Libya policy hit by militia revelations
  2. Final fight over oil and gas phase-out at COP28 looms
  3. How EU must follow through on Iran womens' Sakharov prize
  4. COP28 focuses on EU failure to cut livestock emissions
  5. Final EU summit of 2023 plus rule of law in Spain This WEEK
  6. Why this week's EU summit must agree a new budget deal
  7. How Moldova is trying to control tuberculosis
  8. Many problems to solve in Dubai — honesty about them is good

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. Nordic Council of MinistersJoin the Nordic Food Systems Takeover at COP28
  2. Nordic Council of MinistersHow women and men are affected differently by climate policy
  3. Nordic Council of MinistersArtist Jessie Kleemann at Nordic pavilion during UN climate summit COP28
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersCOP28: Gathering Nordic and global experts to put food and health on the agenda
  5. Friedrich Naumann FoundationPoems of Liberty – Call for Submission “Human Rights in Inhume War”: 250€ honorary fee for selected poems
  6. World BankWorld Bank report: How to create a future where the rewards of technology benefit all levels of society?

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. Georgia Ministry of Foreign AffairsThis autumn Europalia arts festival is all about GEORGIA!
  2. UNOPSFostering health system resilience in fragile and conflict-affected countries
  3. European Citizen's InitiativeThe European Commission launches the ‘ImagineEU’ competition for secondary school students in the EU.
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersThe Nordic Region is stepping up its efforts to reduce food waste
  5. UNOPSUNOPS begins works under EU-funded project to repair schools in Ukraine
  6. Georgia Ministry of Foreign AffairsGeorgia effectively prevents sanctions evasion against Russia – confirm EU, UK, USA

Join EUobserver

Support quality EU news

Join us