National divisions within the Party of European Socialists. Recently, this lack of coherence showed with the inability of the PES to present a candidate to succeed to Jose Manuel Barroso, head of the European Commission. Out of “Iberian” solidarity, Spanish socialists support the former Portuguese Prime Minister, as the British labor and… the European People’s Party (right-wing). The Greens, the smallest party (6 French for 42 MEPs while the PES has 31 French for 217 MEPs) want an anti-Barroso coalition and propose Nyrup Rasmussen, president of the PES at the head of the European executive. Together though, the Greens and the PES do not have a majority to appoint a president supporting their social agenda. National division within the PES show with certain cases of the last legislative term: for the “working time” directive, the PES’ rebel MEPs wanting to keep the opt-out are British, Polish and Maltese. Of the 14 socialists opposed to the amendment considering on-call time as working time, 4 are British, 5 Bulgarian, 3 Maltese, 2 Polish and 1 Danish. This vote reveals the attitude of eastern countries and the British, who sometimes think that the French socialists are archaic. When the “Bolkestein” directive on the free provision of services was voted, the French socialists voted in favor of all the amendments – the principle of the country of origin was removed – but they didn’t vote for the global for fear of offending French electors (see our dispatch No. 06151). However, fewer compromises were found on social issues than on other European issues. According to a study carried out by the London School of Economic and the Free University of Brussels, EPP and PES voted together in 70% of the cases during the last legislative term, which is necessary because absolute majority is 393 votes, and the ALDE votes are not enough for the EPP and the Green votes are not enough for the PES. On the contrary, this figure drops to 56% for social issues and 52.5% for economic issues.
point a president supporting their social agenda. National division within the PES show with certain cases of the last legislative term: for the “working time” directive, the PES’ rebel MEPs wanting to keep the opt-out are British, Polish and Maltese. Of the 14 socialists opposed to the amendment considering on-call time as working time, 4 are British, 5 Bulgarian, 3 Maltese, 2 Polish and 1 Danish. This vote reveals the attitude of eastern countries and the British, who sometimes think that the French socialists are archaic.
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