As predicted, the European People’s Party (EPP) will remain the largest political grouping in the European Parliament, following elections that have seen the centre of gravity shift to the right for the next five years.
Results from all EU countries bar Ireland show the EPP, the centre-right group which includes Fine Gael, had a good election. It topped the poll in several countries, picking up extra seats here and there, to come back with at least 186 seats.
The EPP performed well in its traditional base of Germany, where the Christian Democratic Union won twice as many seats as anybody else. Polish prime minister Donald Tusk, whose pro-EU Civic Coalition is in the centre-right group, scored a victory by polling marginally higher than the right-wing nationalist Law and Justice party.
[ AfD in freefall over European lead candidateOpens in new window ]
The second-largest group of parties in the parliament will remain the Socialists and Democrats (S&D), which is due to lose about two seats and return 136 MEPs. Although the overall number of seats in the next parliament increased from 705 to 720, the centre left will be happy.
Former election candidate jailed for assaults after disrupting Tralee drag story event
Sinn Féin plans to move Northern Ireland remit out of DFA in government
The Irish Times view on what voters think: volatility is now baked in
Half of voters decided on party or candidate in final week of local and European campaigns - study
Renew, the centrist and liberal group that includes Fianna Fáil, lost more than one-fifth of its 102 seats. The far-right surge in France dealt a severe blow to Emmanuel Macron’s coalition, which had been the heart of the Renew grouping. The EPP, S&D and Renew make up the effective governing coalition of the parliament. Together, they are on course to command about 400 seats in the next term, giving it a slimmer but stable majority of about 40 votes.
Further on the left side of the parliament, the Greens grouping lost a sizeable number of seats, falling from its record high of 71 MEPs five years ago to about 53 this time. The Left group, where Sinn Féin and Independents Luke Ming Flanagan, Clare Daly and Mick Wallace sat, returned roughly the same number of MEPs with 36 seats.
The hard right and far right saw substantial gains in the elections, performing well in France, Germany, Italy, Austria and the Netherlands. Their corner of the parliament to the right of the EPP increased to about 160 seats. However, the ultra-conservatives, populists and far right are divided between two main groups, with several parties also currently unaligned.
The hard-right European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) won 73 seats, making it the fourth-largest force. The right-wing grouping includes Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy, Law and Justice, and Vox in Spain. Further to the extreme is the Identity and Democracy group which won 58 seats, about half of which now come from Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, which topped the poll in France.
Far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), which won 15 seats, was kicked out of the ID group during the election, following a series of controversies. Hungarian leader Viktor Orban’s hard-right Fidesz, which has 10 MEPs, is out in the cold as well, but that may change if groupings on the extreme right try to form new alliances in the coming weeks.
- Sign up for push alerts and have the best news, analysis and comment delivered directly to your phone
- Join The Irish Times on WhatsApp and stay up to date
- Listen to our Inside Politics podcast for the best political chat and analysis
