Euroskeptics In Free Fall At European Parliament
Leadership battles, financial problems and looming departures spell trouble for anti-EU groups.
By Maia De La Baumer
Politico EU
September 11, 2017
Having failed to win major victories in national elections, anti-EU parties are now in disarray in the European Parliament, where they have long fought Brussels from within.
Leading figures have bowed out or will soon depart, MEPs in their ranks are fighting corruption charges, and Brexit will seriously deplete their numbers.
In the latest blow, Ludovic de Danne, the secretary-general of the Europe of Nations and Freedom (ENF), one of the two main anti-EU groups in Parliament, was dismissed last week in what he described to French media as an “inevitable divorce,” partly due to his alleged role in the group’s recent problems with its finances and corruption allegations.
Even before de Danne’s ouster, the 40-member ENF was left rudderless by the departure of its charismatic leader, Marine Le Pen, who lost to Emmanuel Macron in this year’s French presidential election. Le Pen has taken up a seat in the French parliament, and her former colleagues are struggling to chart a path forward without her.
“Marine Le Pen was our leader, replacing her will be a challenge,” said Gerolf Annemans, a Flemish MEP and treasurer of the ENF. “She maintained coherence and stability in the group.”
Anti-EU politicians had hoped to surf a wave of populism to victories in national elections following Britain’s referendum vote to quit the EU and the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States. Instead, they have stumbled, mostly notably with the defeats of Le Pen in France and Geert Wilders in the Netherlands.
And in a twist, even the Euroskeptics’ success on Brexit has worked against them in the European Parliament: the other main anti-EU group of MEPs, the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy (EFDD), now stands to lose 20 of its members from the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) when Britain leaves the EU in 2019. Without UKIP, the EFDD would fall short of the minimum of 25 MEPs required to form a group in Parliament, and may have to disband.
“The expected tidal wave of the Euroskeptics has not taken place,” said Alain Lamassoure, a senior French MEP from the center-right European Peoples Party. “Brexit has shown them that exiting the EU is not an option,” he said, adding that Macron had played a significant part in curbing the wave of Euroskepticism by having “the courage to lead a resolutely pro-European campaign.”
Pro-EU officials may, however, want to hold off on popping the champagne.
The populist Alternative for Germany party is expected to win seats in Germany’s parliamentary election later this month and other anti-EU parties like the National Front in France and the Populist Party for Freedom in the Netherlands made gains in their national legislatures, even though they fell well short of their targets. In Austria, the far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) is expected to make a strong showing in parliamentary election next month.
France’s National Front is under investigation over allegations of “breach of trust,” “organized fraud,” “forgery and use of forged documents,” and “undeclared work.”
But in the European Parliament, the weakening of Euroskeptics suggests that pro-EU leaders have had at least some success in imposing their cordon sanitaire — essentially an effort to choke off the anti-EU groups and deny them influence in policymaking. Leaders have also sought to keep the Euroskeptics off balance by pushing for investigations into alleged corruption, including misuse of Parliament funds for national political purposes.
De Danne, the ousted secretary-general of the ENF, said he believes his dismissal was linked to these allegations and “rumors” of several raids of his office by EU anti-corruption investigators.
Having failed to win major victories in national elections, anti-EU parties are now in disarray in the European Parliament, where they have long fought Brussels from within.
Leading figures have bowed out or will soon depart, MEPs in their ranks are fighting corruption charges, and Brexit will seriously deplete their numbers.
In the latest blow, Ludovic de Danne, the secretary-general of the Europe of Nations and Freedom (ENF), one of the two main anti-EU groups in Parliament, was dismissed last week in what he described to French media as an “inevitable divorce,” partly due to his alleged role in the group’s recent problems with its finances and corruption allegations.
Even before de Danne’s ouster, the 40-member ENF was left rudderless by the departure of its charismatic leader, Marine Le Pen, who lost to Emmanuel Macron in this year’s French presidential election. Le Pen has taken up a seat in the French parliament, and her former colleagues are struggling to chart a path forward without her.
“Marine Le Pen was our leader, replacing her will be a challenge,” said Gerolf Annemans, a Flemish MEP and treasurer of the ENF. “She maintained coherence and stability in the group.”
Anti-EU politicians had hoped to surf a wave of populism to victories in national elections following Britain’s referendum vote to quit the EU and the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States. Instead, they have stumbled, mostly notably with the defeats of Le Pen in France and Geert Wilders in the Netherlands.
And in a twist, even the Euroskeptics’ success on Brexit has worked against them in the European Parliament: the other main anti-EU group of MEPs, the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy (EFDD), now stands to lose 20 of its members from the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) when Britain leaves the EU in 2019. Without UKIP, the EFDD would fall short of the minimum of 25 MEPs required to form a group in Parliament, and may have to disband.
“The expected tidal wave of the Euroskeptics has not taken place,” said Alain Lamassoure, a senior French MEP from the center-right European Peoples Party. “Brexit has shown them that exiting the EU is not an option,” he said, adding that Macron had played a significant part in curbing the wave of Euroskepticism by having “the courage to lead a resolutely pro-European campaign.”
Pro-EU officials may, however, want to hold off on popping the champagne.
The populist Alternative for Germany party is expected to win seats in Germany’s parliamentary election later this month and other anti-EU parties like the National Front in France and the Populist Party for Freedom in the Netherlands made gains in their national legislatures, even though they fell well short of their targets. In Austria, the far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) is expected to make a strong showing in parliamentary election next month.
France’s National Front is under investigation over allegations of “breach of trust,” “organized fraud,” “forgery and use of forged documents,” and “undeclared work.”
But in the European Parliament, the weakening of Euroskeptics suggests that pro-EU leaders have had at least some success in imposing their cordon sanitaire — essentially an effort to choke off the anti-EU groups and deny them influence in policymaking. Leaders have also sought to keep the Euroskeptics off balance by pushing for investigations into alleged corruption, including misuse of Parliament funds for national political purposes.
De Danne, the ousted secretary-general of the ENF, said he believes his dismissal was linked to these allegations and “rumors” of several raids of his office by EU anti-corruption investigators.
Searching For A Future
The setbacks have left anti-EU MEPs casting around for a way to revitalize their efforts, perhaps by creating a new group in the Parliament, and trying to put a brave face on their predicament.
“We are in the process of creating a great movement of EU critics,” Annemans said. “But it’s going softly, not abruptly.”
Gilles Lebreton, a French MEP from the National Front, said discussions were under way within the ENF to attract the Polish members of the European Conservatives and Reformists group, the third largest in the Parliament, and some members of the EFDD.
“We get on well with the Poles,” Lebreton added. “We will succeed in re-forming the group because we are less dependent on the British delegation than the EFDD is.”
But the potential expansion of the ENF is unlikely to improve the image of a group marred by leadership fights and accusations of fraud. This year, the Parliament ruled that ENF’s accounts for 2016 were out of order and demanded clarification on a €500,000 expenditure on information and communication.
France’s National Front is in the midst of an investigation by OLAF, the EU’s anti-fraud agency, and the Paris prosecutor involving allegations of “breach of trust,” “organized fraud,” “forgery and use of forged documents,” and “undeclared work.” The investigation will determine whether some assistants in the group were paid by the Parliament to carry out non-parliamentary work.
At the request of French legal authorities, the Parliament estimated earlier this year that the damage caused by the National Front’s misuse of EU funds was worth €5 million.
The European Parliament is also still seeking to recover €339,500 from Le Pen herself, who is accused of breaking Parliament’s rules by directing two assistants — Thierry Légier and Catherine Griset — to carry out non-parliamentary work while being paid by the EU institution.
The Parliament is entitled to seize an MEP’s salary, reception allowance, or general allowance expenditure if he or she has been found liable for breaching internal rules.
The future of the EFDD is not rosy either, though arguably it is a victim of its own success, with its UKIP members going home in 2019, when their long-term campaign to get Britain out of the EU will be complete.
Last year, the Parliament suspended payment of some €90,000 to a think tank linked to Nigel Farage’s UKIP because of suspicions that it accepted donations from firms and individuals, only to pay the money back using cash from the Parliament by awarding them contracts that far exceeded the amount they had donated.
‘Little Sins’
In interviews with POLITICO, however, MEPs in the anti-EU groups sought to minimize the disorganization in their ranks.
Members of UKIP argued that their group is not in disarray. One UKIP MEP, Raymond Finch, said Brexit had provided another reason to fight against what he called the “Remainiacs” of Europe.
“As long as we are here, we will consolidate the huge gains of Brexit,” Finch said, adding that the group was “in talks with other parties” to expand the EFDD.
Annemans, the ENF treasurer, called his group’s recent financial troubles “little sins,” which were linked to “how we managed our accounts.” He added, “I will make sure that [financial] management will be done impeccably in 2017.”
Since June, the group has been in a leadership battle to replace Le Pen, who left without designating any successor.
The party has now four candidates, including French MEPs Edouard Ferrand, Nicolas Bay, Bernard Monot and Jean-Luc Schaffhauser, who are competing for the co-presidency of the group. “It is not a leadership crisis,” insisted Lebreton. “It is a democratic transition.”
“The sovereign movement,” he added, “has a bright future ahead of it.”
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