According to two polls published on 30 April, the UKIP party is increasing its share in voting intention in the United Kingdom. The TNS-BMRB poll grants him with 7 points more than it did by early April, to reach 36% of voting intention – 9 points higher than the Labour party. The ComRes/ITV poll grants UKIP with 38% of votes, meaning 8 more points than by early April and 11 more points than the Labour party.
One of the biggest Lithuanian parties, the Patriotic Union (Tėvynės sąjunga – Lietuvos krikščionys demokratai) has published its program for the European elections, affiliated to the European People’s Party (EPP), the center-right European Parliament. The final list of candidates and their political programs is available on our website.
Access to the list of candidates
According to a survey from Eurobarometer commissioned by the EP on 29th April 2014 in view of the European Youth Event 2014, European Union membership represents an advantage in a globalised world, according to 70% of young people. The survey was conducted among Europeans aged 16-30 from all member states. It will serve as a source of facts and figures for the 5,000 young people meeting in Strasbourg on 9-11 May as it addresses the event’s five main themes: youth unemployment, digital revolution, future of the EU, sustainability and European values.
On 28th April, the eurosceptic alliance stopped at the Augusteo Theater, in Naples, as part of its campaign for the european elections. Giorgia Meloni and Gianni Alemanno have essentially discussed the economic context in Italy and the new government lead by Renzi. The key argument of their campaign deals with the status of the country within the European Union: “Italy must be respected. Nobody should giving us orders.” This populist alliance is playing- as always – the populist card and declares itself pro “Mezzogiorno” (South), in a country which suffer more and more of the North/South antagonism.
Read the article
The very first TV debate between the candidates for the Presidency of the European Commission – Jean-Claude Juncker (EPP), Martin Schulz (PES), Guy Verhofstadt (ALDE) and Ska Keller (EGP) was organised at the University of Maastricht on 28th April 2014 from 7pm to 8:30 pm. The candidates debated during 90 minutes on European matters such as the rise of populism and euroscepticism, the abstention for the European Parliament election, but they also debated about their projects for Europe in the field of economic, social, energetic, strategic or foreign policy matters. The debat took place an audience of 700 in attendance and was broadcast in 13 languages via Euronews. As the students attending the debate, the internet viewers could ask questions to the candidates via Twitter with the hashtag #EUdebate2014. According to the journalist who selected the questions, more than 10.000 tweets were sent every minute during the debate.
382 million citizens from 28 countries of the European Union are being called to ballot from 22nd to 25th May next to renew the Parliament whose HQ is in Strasbourg, and which is the only European institution to be appointed by direct universal suffrage. The Netherlands and the UK will be voting on 22nd May, Ireland on 23rd; Latvia, Slovakia and Malta will vote on 24th May. The Czech Republic will go to ballot on 23rd and 24th; Italy 24th and 25th May. The other 20 Member States will be appointing their MEPs on 25th May. In all 751 MEPs will be elected for a five year period during this election whilst the Strasbourg Assembly has 766 members today. Germany is the country with the most MEPs (99) but which will also lose the most due to the Lisbon Treaty (-3). Romania, Greece, Belgium, Portugal, Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria, Bulgaria, Ireland, Croatia and Lithuania will each lose an MEP. The other Member States will all retain the same number of MEPs. The minimum number of MEPs is 6 (Malta, Cyprus, Estonia, Luxembourg).
Read the study
The Spanish newspaper El Pais released a new poll on April 27th revealing the vote intentions of Spanish citizens. The poll, conducted by Metroscopia / EL PAÍS, shows most importantly that only 43% of Spanish voters will vote for the European election, that is 3 points less than for the European election of 2009. The poll also shows that the People’s party (PP), the party of the current Spanish Prime minister Mariano Rajoy, and the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE), the PP’s principal opponent, will have similar scores for the European election: this poll forecasts 32.6% of the votes for the PP while the PSOE should obtain 32.2%. Both parties should have more votes than the other lists running for the European election, as the third list, a leftist coalition, will score 12% of the votes.
Read the analysis (in Spanish)
Lists running for the European elections in Spain
As the European elections are in less than a month, the Federal Agency for Civic Education (Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung) created, with the German newspaper Die Zeit, an online quiz on its website in order to help German citizens to make a choice regarding their vote on May 25th. In that sense, the newspaper worked with the main German political parties running for the European elections and identified the main European Union related issues (Euro, foreign policy, energetic policy, financial crisis, enlargement…). Readers of the newspaper are than invited to answer those questions. According to their answers, the quiz relates the reader’s main ideas to the propositions of each political party and shows how close these ideas are from those defended by the political parties. Theses tests, more and more present accross the European Union, intends to bring European matters closer to European citizens and thus to incite them to go and vote for the political party corresponding to their ideas as European elections are the ones where the rate of abstention is at its highest: in Germany, only 43.3% of the citizens voted for the European elections.
Take the test (in German)
Some members of the British Conservative Party have created a new party called ‘4 Freedoms Party (UK EPP)’.They claim to be willing to restore British influence in the European Union, by first and foremost becoming a member of the European People Party again. In an interview to Euractiv, Dirk Hazell explained that the aim of the new party is to provide pro-Europeans who do not sympathize with the Conservatives’ European policy with an alternative to the Conservative Party.
Link to the Party’s website
Link to the interview with Euractiv
A survey by the Radio Télévision Belge Francophone ( RTBF) and La Libre Belgique newspaper published in the latter on 24th April 2014 reveals that Belgian call for former Prime Minister and President of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) Guy Verhofstadt to be the head of the European Commission. This Flemish Liberal is more popular in Brussels and Wallonia than in Flanders , where he collected 47% , 43 % and 25% in favor. Thus , 33 % of respondents across all regions , would like to see him at the head of the EU executive . More surprisingly, it has three times more favorable opinions among the PS supporters Martin Schulz ( who satisfies 16 % in Wallonia and 13% in Brussels ) and attracted voters Humanist Democratic Centre (HDC ) (56 % in Brussels 54% in Wallonia , 12 against and 20% for Jean- Claude Juncker). In Belgium, Guy Verhofstadt would top 33% of ssuffrages for ALDE, followed by Jean -Claude Juncker with 10% for the European People’s Party (PPE) , Martin Schulz with 6 % for the Party of European Socialists (PES) of Franzizska Keller and José Bové with 3 % for the Greens and Alexis Tsipras with 1% for the European Left . 42 % have’nt chosen yet their candidate and 4% did not choose one of the candidates mentioned . Belgian This result does not seem to predict the outcome following the European elections of May.