Italian conservative leads in vote to head EU parliament

Italian conservative Antonio Tajani established a strong lead on Tuesday in voting for the next president of the European Parliament, which can block or amend EU laws and will have the final say on whether to approve a Brexit deal with Britain.

Tajani won 287 of the 691 valid votes in a second ballot, following a coalition deal with the liberals intended to curb the influence of anti-EU parties.

He held a strong lead over centre-left candidate and fellow Italian Gianni Pittella, on 200. Four other candidates had scores between 42 and 66. If no candidate in the 751-seat chamber wins a majority in a third afternoon vote, the top two will contest a decisive fourth round on Tuesday evening.

The last-minute withdrawal of centrist Guy Verhofstadt, a former Belgian prime minister, strengthened the hand of Tajani and underlined how mainstream, pro-EU parties are trying to keep a grip against a vocal eurosceptic minority.

Verhofstadt, a leading European federalist who is also the Parliament’s point man on the Brexit negotiations, highlighted the challenges the Union faces in dealing with Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who predicted this week that more countries would seek to follow Britain’s example and leave the bloc.

The vote has been unusually controversial since the centre-left Socialists and Democrats (S&D) group, the second biggest after the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) group, broke a grand coalition with the EPP and the liberals in order to field its own candidate to succeed President Martin Schulz.

The S&D had previously agreed, when its candidate Schulz was re-elected in 2014 with EPP backing, to support an EPP candidate this time round. That rift in the mainstream has been seen as giving a potentially greater voice to eurosceptics who have been bolstered by Britain’s referendum vote last year to quit the EU.

The showdown could give a kingmaker role to anti-EU parties, including Marine Le Pen and her French National Front and British Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage and his 20-strong delegation from the UK Independence Party.

However, EPP efforts now focus on attracting the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group, whose candidate finished third in both early rounds. Led by Britain’s ruling Conservatives and including Poland’s right-wing PiS ruling party, the ECR’s votes would take Tajani close to a majority.

POWERS

Schulz, who is returning to German politics, had worked in the framework of the grand coalition to ease legislation through with centre-right Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker.

A win for Tajani would now give the EPP control of all three presidencies of the key EU political institutions, raising calls in some quarters for either Juncker or European Council President Donald Tusk to make way for a figure from the left.

However, there is no clear consensus on that happening.

Verhofstadt said of his party’s alliance with the centre-right: “It is a first and important step in the building up of a pro-European coalition … that is absolutely necessary with Trump, with Putin, with many other challenges Europe faces.”

Tajani, 63, has been a close ally of Italy’s former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.

Parliament will also have to sign off on the divorce deal with Britain, probably by late 2018 or early 2019, just as lawmakers are campaigning for an EU-wide legislative election in May 2019.

Tajani said: “We need to be very balanced, we need to defend the rights of Europe but we also have to think that in the future the UK will be an important partner for us.”