Women’s representation remains limited in most influential European Parliament posts, while democratic forces achieved a partial 'cordon sanitaire’ on Tuesday (23 July) during the constitutive meeting of the 20 committees — in which one chair and four vice-chairs were formally elected for a two-and-a-half-year mandate.
Most chair positions are held by men, with women occupying about 30 percent of these roles in the committees and subcommittees.
But when taking into account chairs and vice-chairs, women hold just 15 percent of these top positions, compared to 85 percent occupied by men.
Only seven women have been appointed as chairs: German liberal Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann (subcommittee on defence), French socialist Aurore Lalucq (committee on economic affairs), German Green Anna Cavazzini (committee on the internal market), Finnish left-wing Li Andersson (committee on employment and social affairs), German Green Nela Riehl (committee on culture), Spanish socialist Lina Gálvez (committee on women's rights) and Czech right-wing Veronika Vrecionová (committee on agriculture).
Earlier this week, the Socialists & Democrats had said on X that "common sense" and parliament rules approved in April would oblige gender balance for committee posts.
And last month, European leaders had backslapped each other for appointing three women in EU top jobs — the president of the European Parliament, the European Commission, and the EU foreign affairs chief.
Meanwhile, centrist parties successfully blocked the far-right Patriots for Europe from taking top positions in the European Parliament, while the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), led by Italian prime minister Georgia Meloni, managed to secure several important committee chairs.
The move triggered outrage among the Patriots, who announced that they would challenge this decision at the Conference of Presidents, one of the parliament’s governing bodies.
“This is against the rule of law. They are disrespecting EP rules, democracy and even their own gender rules. Outrageous!”, said Kinga Gál, an MEP from the Hungarian ruling Fidesz party and vice-president of the Patriots for Europe, on social media on Tuesday.
Using the D’Hondt method, a mathematical formula which determines bargaining power based on group size, the Patriots of Europe, the third-largest group in Parliament founded by Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán, had claimed the chairs of the culture and education and transport and tourism.
Instead, Green German MEP Nela Riehl was elected as the new chair of the culture committee, while Greek centre-right Elissavet Vozemberg-Vrionidi was appointed head of the transport committee.
The Patriots also sought vice-presidencies in the agriculture, development, environment, legal affairs, civil and home affairs, and budget control committees, but these were given to other parties.
This follows their recent loss of two European Parliament vice-presidencies in Strasbourg.
Meanwhile, Meloni’s ECR secured key top positions: the committee on budgets, led by Belgian Johan Van Overtveldt, the agriculture committee, chaired by Czech Veronika Vrecionová and the less important but symbolic committee on petitions, headed by Polish Bogdan Rzońca.
Rzońca is the first lawmaker from the controversial Law and Justice Party (PiS), a party known for dismantling the rule of law in the country over its past administration, to chair a European Parliament committee.
Additionally, the ECR obtained 12 vice-chair positions across various committees.
Last week, Meloni’s party also gained two vice-presidencies in the European Parliament. In contrast, during the previous mandate, the ECR held only one vice-presidency and chaired the committee on budgets.
"Despite the Left's attempt to boycott us in all Committees, the positive outcome of today's votes shows that the majority has shifted and the Conservatives can be decisive in this next five-year legislature," said ECR co-chairman Nicola Procaccini from Meloni's Brothers of Italy party.