As the parties prepare for the European election campaign, a clear starting line-up is emerging in the polls. In Manuel Müller’s seat projection for the European Parliament, the EPP climbs to 176 seats – its best result in three years. At the same time, the second-placed social democratic S&D group is losing ground and now only has 135 seats.
The polls look particularly bleak for the European Greens, who achieved a record number of seats in 2019, around a third of which could now be lost across Europe. However, according to Müller’s calculations, the Greens have gained slightly compared to January to 48 seats.
With regard to possible alliance options in the new parliament, the Europe expert sees little change to previous forecasts from the beginning of the year: The center-left alliance of S&D, RE, Greens and Left would lose its current majority in parliament, but a center-right alliance of EPP, RE and ECR would also have just under no majority of its own and would always be dependent on votes from other groups.
Our author Manuel Müller explains today what this means for the power options in the upcoming European Parliament and more about the forecasts for the upcoming European Parliament.
I think it will be an exciting read! I wish you a good day.
The trilogue agreement on the EU supply chain law did not receive a qualified majority in the Permanent Representatives Committee (Coreper) today, Wednesday. “Despite the efforts of the Council Presidency, the necessary support was not found”, wrote the Belgian Council Presidency on X. “We must now examine the state of play and will see whether it is possible to address the concerns raised by the member states in consultation with the European Parliament,” it continued.
Many member states announced their abstention during the debate in Coreper I, a spokesperson explained. The reasons included legal uncertainty, the administrative burden, and fears of creating an uneven playing field at global level. However, the Council Presidency is of the opinion “that there is a clear will among member states to legislate on this very important issue.”
This postpones the final vote once again after it was originally scheduled to take place on Feb. 9. Three weeks ago, there was already no qualified majority in the Council. The Council Presidency had therefore tried to “work on the law” again with the member states. As the abstention of the German government is considered certain, the focus is on Italy and other populous member states.
However, many delegations have still not taken a clear position and have indicated that they will abstain. This could also be a strategy to preserve room for negotiation, an EU diplomat told Table.Media.
At today’s meeting, the French delegation proposed limiting the scope of application as a compromise. The threshold could be raised to 5,000 employees in order to accommodate reluctant member states. This would affect considerably fewer companies: The agreement negotiated by the Council, Parliament and Commission sets the threshold at more than 500 employees. However, a French spokesperson explained that this was just one of many solutions proposed in order to reach an agreement. He denied media reports that France was “demanding” a restriction of the scope of application. France supports the law.
Lara Wolters (S&D), rapporteur in the EU Parliament, described the development as worrying. “The text before Coreper was the result of more than two years of careful negotiations,” she said at a press conference called at short notice. “The fact that the member states have once again failed to approve this agreement is a scandal for me.” Many companies were already preparing for the law.
Everyone had been listened to carefully during the negotiation process and had been able to make their contribution, particularly in the later stages, said Wolters. “Withdrawing commitments after the agreement or making further demands shows a blatant disregard for the European Parliament as co-legislator.”
She sees this development as part of a broader trend that is undermining the previous type of trust-based cooperation: “Once we had reached a political agreement with a handshake, the rest was just a formality,” she said. “In recent months, this is clearly no longer the case.” She was alluding to similar blockades in the Council, which most recently concerned the directive on platform work, for example.
She described the situation in the Council as chaotic and called for clarity. So far, Parliament has not received any concrete proposals for change. Instead, politicians in the member states were using the situation to make a name for themselves in the media. If specific requests were received from the Council, the Parliament would “work together constructively as before”, explained Wolters.
The Council Presidency now does not have much time left to reach an agreement. In April, the EU Parliament must cast its final vote on the result. According to an EU diplomat, the Belgians have not yet given up hope. They will probably try to talk to individual member states informally in the coming days and involve the Parliament at the same time. It is possible that Coreper I will discuss the issue again on Wednesday or Friday of next week. Nothing is certain at the moment.
The growing dependence on liquefied natural gas imports is increasingly dividing the member states. At their meeting in Brussels next Monday, the energy ministers will discuss a complaint from several Central European countries without LNG ports about Germany’s increased gas transit fees.
The gas storage levy, which Germany has been using since October 2022 to refinance the costs for the winter stocks of the market area manager Trading Hub Europe (THE), has been criticized. As a reminder, panic broke out in the gas markets in the summer of 2022 following Russia’s attack on Ukraine. The German government legally obliged THE to buy up gas and fill Germany’s storage facilities – whatever the cost.
According to THE, this resulted in total costs of €8.7 billion by October last year. The company recovers this money from traders via the newly introduced gas storage levy, which it passes on to gas consumers. Gas expert Jens Völler from the consulting firm Team Consult estimates that foreign customers will have paid around a fifth of the revenue in 2023. This is because the levy is also due at border crossing points.
Germany’s eastern neighbors find this unfair. They are dependent on Germany as a transit country in order to access liquefied natural gas from the North Sea coast. “The levy penalizes the most vulnerable states without direct access to LNG terminals,” reads a letter from the Czech Republic, Austria, Poland, Hungary and Slovakia, which is available to Table.Media and was first reported on by the Financial Times. “Ultimately, this could force several member states to rely more heavily on gas imports from Russia.” However, when gas transit through Ukraine ends at the end of 2024, the dependence of Central Europeans on gas from Germany will increase even further.
The burden of the levy is quite painful for the affected states. While the gas storage levy was initially €0.59 per MWh, it was increased to €1.86 at the beginning of the year. “In total, transit through Germany costs around three euros per megawatt hour. That’s not cheap at a time when gas is trading at €25 to €28 again,” says Völler. Transit through Germany has already become much more expensive since 2020 due to several political interventions.
At the beginning of February, the Berlin coalition extended the gas storage levy until March 2027. THE estimates that a further €2.6 billion could be incurred by then. Such amounts are now attracting imitators.
Italy, an important transit country, is also preparing a similar levy at border crossing points. Such unilateral measures would significantly impair the European gas market, criticizes the Czech Republic and the other four states.
The German-Italian approach is now also of concern to the EU Commission. “We have emphasized in all our contacts that charges must comply with the EU legal framework,” said a spokeswoman for Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson ahead of the debate on 4 March. According to information obtained by Table.Media from Berlin circles, a “pilot procedure” involving the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs is already underway at the Commission in order to find an agreement.
Eurogas had also expressed doubts about the legality of this. The German approach at least violates the spirit of the EU Gas Storage Regulation, writes the association. However, a ban on such practices only applies to member states without gas storage facilities.
“Gas storage facilities also provide flexibility services for neighboring European countries through flexible exports. There are therefore reasons to levy the gas storage levy at exit points,” explains Sebastian Gulbis, Managing Director of the consultancy Enervis.
The Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs (BMWK) justifies itself in a similar way. “The quantities that are filled into the gas storage facilities are not only intended for the German market but also partly for the European market,” says a BMWK spokesperson.
A renowned energy lawyer believes that possible legal action against the gas storage levy is unlikely. “We once looked into this when it was introduced, but rejected it as futile,” reports Christian von Hammerstein from the Berlin law firm Raue.
If the gas storage levy at the border crossings is nevertheless abolished due to political pressure, some large industrial consumers in Germany would face high costs. Without the contributions from foreign customers, the levy would currently amount to €2.52 instead of €1.86 per MWh, as calculated by Enervis for Table.Media.
For a family of four, that would be less than €10 extra per year. The situation would be very different for industrial customers. With an annual consumption of 100,000 MWh, a company would already be burdened with an additional €66,000. The increase would hit producers of ammonia and individual chemical giants even harder.
According to media reports, BASF had a gas consumption of 37 million MWh in Ludwigshafen alone before the energy crisis – the additional costs for the Group would therefore be almost €25 million. According to THE, there are no legally regulated reductions for large consumers as there are for other energy levies in the case of the gas storage levy.
“Europe must take more money in hand and spend it better, spend it in a European way,” said Ursula von der Leyen in a speech on defense policy to the EU Parliament. The Commission President was preparing the ground for the presentation of the European Defense Industry Strategy (EDIS) planned for next Tuesday. The aim of this strategy and the associated defense investment program (EDIP) will be to give priority to joint procurement in the field of armaments. Ursula von der Leyen cited the European approach to coronavirus vaccines and, most recently, the purchase of natural gas as examples.
Expectations are high given the fragmentation of the industry, but can the Commission meet them? One important element is the creation of a European mechanism, modeled on the US Foreign Military Sales Scheme (FMS), to make arms sales easier and smoother. Since the beginning of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, EU states have invested more in defense, but 75 percent of armaments have been procured outside Europe, two-thirds of which from the USA, an EU official complained on Wednesday. This was because US arms companies could deliver more quickly thanks to the FMS and the principle of strategic reserves.
According to the Commission’s proposal, the EU would draw up a catalog of weapons and weapon systems that are readily available in the member states. The Commission would also provide financial support for the establishment of strategic reserves in order to be able to supply potential buyers quickly, following the American model. The reserves could be managed by different groups of Member States depending on the armaments system. The aim is to initiate a change of mentality in the arms industry so that production does not only start once a contract has been signed, said an EU official.
At the same time, the aim is to increase planning reliability for the defense industry, similar to vaccine procurement, by investing in capacities and advance purchase agreements. This could be used to compensate for periods of weak demand. Von der Leyen said in parliament on Wednesday that it would be examined how guarantees could facilitate fixed purchase contracts. Governments that participate in joint procurement programs should be exempt from VAT. In the event of a crisis, it should be possible to prioritize orders and member states should recognize each other’s certifications. This could remove a hurdle that has proven to be an obstacle in the joint procurement of artillery shells for Ukraine, for example. There is no common internal market for ammunition, explained an EU official.
“We need to produce more, faster, and together as Europeans,” Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton added on Wednesday. The availability of armaments is a question of competitiveness and security for the European defense industry: “In the field of defense, we need a paradigm shift towards a war economy”. However, the financing of EDIP is still controversial and unresolved. A minimum of €1.5 billion from the MFF is envisaged, a far cry from the €100 billion that Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton called for at a Renew event in January.
As a first step, it is important to create a legal framework, said an EU official. If the ambition is there, the money will follow. In its strategy, the EU Commission is once again insisting that the EIB Board lift the self-restriction that has so far stood in the way of investments in defense. However, there are also plans to use part of the interest income from the blocked funds of the Russian central bank to finance armaments for Ukraine: “There could be no stronger signal and no better use for these assets than to use them to make Ukraine and the whole of Europe a safer place to live,” Ursula von der Leyen told the EU Parliament on Wednesday.
“The question with these Commission initiatives is always, do the member states accept them at all, how much money do they make available and to what extent can they actually be coordinated via the EU Commission and then the implementing bodies,” emphasizes Ronja Kempin, SWP expert on European security and defense policy, adding: “The member states often see the EU Commission as a competitor rather than a supporter.”
The arms industry is also skeptical about the Commission’s initiatives, as there is a lack of money and a lack of willingness on the part of the member states to relinquish sovereignty. The sharing of sensitive data is already proving difficult among themselves. One prominent example is the development of the FCAS air combat system, in which Spain, Germany and France are involved and which is repeatedly caught up in national disputes.
According to diplomatic circles, the implementation of the project would probably fall into the next legislative period anyway and the cards could then be reshuffled. According to the EU Commission, Parliament and member states should adopt EDIP by mid-2025 so that there is no gap after the expiry of the ad hoc Edirpa and ASAP programs.
It’s party conference time in the EU: the European parties are meeting over the next few weeks to adopt their European election programs and nominate their lead candidates. The Greens kicked things off at the beginning of February with Terry Reintke and Bas Eickhout, followed a few days ago by the Left with Walter Baier. Next up will be the Social Democrats this weekend and the European People’s Party in the middle of next week, although Nicolas Schmit (PES) and Ursula von der Leyen (EPP) have already been confirmed as the lead candidates. It will be exciting for the Liberals, who will probably not decide on their lead candidate until the end of March. The two right-wing parties ECR and ID are running without EU-wide lead candidates.
As the parties prepare for the election campaign, a clear starting line-up is emerging in the polls. In the base scenario of the seat projection, the EPP climbs to 176 seats – seven more than in the last projection from the beginning of January and also the best figure for three years. At the same time, the second-placed Social Democratic S&D Group loses ground and now only has 135 seats (-6 compared to January). In the dynamic scenario, which also takes into account the possibility of new member parties joining the group after the election, the gap is even greater: Here, the EPP has 181 seats and the S&D 136.
Whether the EPP can actually maintain this level remains to be seen: many of the additional seats in the projection are due to only small increases in the polls, which could also be normal fluctuations that just happened to favor the EPP in several countries at the same time. Nevertheless, things could hardly look more favorable for Ursula von der Leyen’s candidacy for a second term in office at the start of the election campaign: The fact that a political group has lost a lead of over 40 seats in less than four months is unprecedented in the European election seat projections that have been regularly compiled since 2014. In order to become the strongest political group after all, the S&D would therefore need a truly exceptional election campaign.
Behind the EPP and S&D is the liberal Renew Europe (RE) group, which has 87 seats (+1 compared to January/dynamic scenario: 91). This means that the Liberals, who achieved their best-ever European election result in 2019, could lose around a tenth of their seats compared to the current Parliament.
The outlook is even gloomier for the European Greens, who also achieved a record number of seats in 2019, but could now lose around a third of them. Compared to January, however, the Greens increase slightly to 48 seats in the projection (+3/dynamic scenario: 48). In addition, the Greens can still hope for the traditionally high mobilization of their supporters in European elections, which has often helped them do better in the past than the polls would suggest. However, it is questionable how strongly this factor will be reflected this year: as the European elections have generally gained importance in the public perception, the turnout among voters of other parties could also be higher than usual this time.
The Left Party, on the other hand, is projected to have 35 seats (+2/dynamic scenario: 37) and would thus roughly maintain its number of seats in the current parliament. However, the Left is the exact opposite of the Greens in terms of mobilization and has often performed worse in elections than in the polls in the past.
Finally, the parties to the right of the EPP are stronger than ever before compared to previous European elections. Compared to the January projection, however, their momentum has weakened somewhat. The ECR group, for example, has recently lost support, particularly in Poland. The fact that it is still able to make further gains in the basic scenario (78 seats/+3) is only due to the new addition of the previously non-attached French party Reconquête. In the dynamic scenario, in which this new party was already included in the calculation, it falls back slightly compared to January and has a total of 82 seats.
The ID parliamentary group has weakened even more recently, with only 83 seats left in the baseline scenario (-6). This is largely due to the German right-wing extremist AfD, which has lost a lot of support in the polls since January as a result of mass demonstrations. In the dynamic scenario, however, the ID is the parliamentary group with the best growth prospects.
This can also be seen in Viktor Orbán’s previously factionless Fidesz, which actually wants to join the ECR and is also supported by the Polish PiS. However, several smaller ECR member parties are vehemently opposed to Fidesz joining, and Giorgia Meloni’s Fratelli d’Italia (FdI) has not yet committed itself. Fidesz could therefore end up joining the ID parliamentary group instead, which has already shown itself to be open to the idea. If the ID also brings together all the smaller Russia-friendly right-wing parties, which will win seats in Parliament for the first time, it could become the third-largest parliamentary group with 101 seats.
With regard to possible alliance options in the new Parliament, the current projection shows a similar picture as in January: The center-left alliance of S&D, RE, Greens and Left would lose its current majority in Parliament, but a center-right alliance of EPP, RE and ECR would also have just under no majority of its own and would always be dependent on dissenters from other political groups. There is therefore much to suggest that the “grand coalition of the center” will become even more important in the next parliament – i.e. cooperation between the EPP and S&D, which will then be joined by the RE, Greens and/or parts of the ECR, depending on the issue.
Despite the rise of the far right, the parliament remains functional. Nevertheless, the shift to the right is likely to have an impact on political decisions in the future: On the one hand, without the alternative center-left majority, the S&D will lose an important lever to put pressure on the EPP. On the other hand, the EPP could increasingly rely on the ECR as a majority procurer and thus bypass the Greens and the left wing of the S&D and RE.
Whether this actually happens, however, is of course up to the European voters. The seat projection presented here is only a snapshot of the political mood. There are almost exactly 100 days left until the European elections.
As there are no pan-European election polls, the seat projection is based on aggregated national polls and election results from all member states. In the base scenario, all national parties are assigned to their current parliamentary group (or the parliamentary group of their European umbrella party); parties without a clear assignment are shown as “other”. The dynamic scenario assigns all “other” parties to a parliamentary group that they could plausibly join and also includes other possible changes to the parliamentary groups.
Further information on the data basis and methodology of the projection as well as a more detailed breakdown of the results can be found on the blog The (European) Federalist.
Two days before Alexei Navalny’s funeral, Yulia Navalnaya came to the European Parliament and addressed the MEPs. In her speech, she blamed the Russian regime under the leadership of Vladimir Putin for the death of her husband. She said that the act showed that “Putin is capable of anything and you cannot negotiate with him“. She told MEPs that in order to defeat Putin, you have to be inventive. “You can’t hit Putin with the next resolution or a new package of sanctions.” Other conditions apply to Putin: “You are not dealing with a politician but with a bloody mafioso.”
In a short passage introducing her speech, she paid tribute to Strasbourg. In 2020, Navalny had been in southwest Germany. After his stay at the Charité hospital, where he had initially been treated, he had undergone rehabilitation there to recover from the consequences of the poison attack. “He had to try to learn to walk again.” Together with their two children, the whole family traveled across the Rhine to Alsace one day and paid a private visit to the city, which is the headquarters of the European Parliament. “Strasbourg was one of our favorite cities.” mgr
As the parties prepare for the European election campaign, a clear starting line-up is emerging in the polls. In Manuel Müller’s seat projection for the European Parliament, the EPP climbs to 176 seats – its best result in three years. At the same time, the second-placed social democratic S&D group is losing ground and now only has 135 seats.
The polls look particularly bleak for the European Greens, who achieved a record number of seats in 2019, around a third of which could now be lost across Europe. However, according to Müller’s calculations, the Greens have gained slightly compared to January to 48 seats.
With regard to possible alliance options in the new parliament, the Europe expert sees little change to previous forecasts from the beginning of the year: The center-left alliance of S&D, RE, Greens and Left would lose its current majority in parliament, but a center-right alliance of EPP, RE and ECR would also have just under no majority of its own and would always be dependent on votes from other groups.
Our author Manuel Müller explains today what this means for the power options in the upcoming European Parliament and more about the forecasts for the upcoming European Parliament.
I think it will be an exciting read! I wish you a good day.
The trilogue agreement on the EU supply chain law did not receive a qualified majority in the Permanent Representatives Committee (Coreper) today, Wednesday. “Despite the efforts of the Council Presidency, the necessary support was not found”, wrote the Belgian Council Presidency on X. “We must now examine the state of play and will see whether it is possible to address the concerns raised by the member states in consultation with the European Parliament,” it continued.
Many member states announced their abstention during the debate in Coreper I, a spokesperson explained. The reasons included legal uncertainty, the administrative burden, and fears of creating an uneven playing field at global level. However, the Council Presidency is of the opinion “that there is a clear will among member states to legislate on this very important issue.”
This postpones the final vote once again after it was originally scheduled to take place on Feb. 9. Three weeks ago, there was already no qualified majority in the Council. The Council Presidency had therefore tried to “work on the law” again with the member states. As the abstention of the German government is considered certain, the focus is on Italy and other populous member states.
However, many delegations have still not taken a clear position and have indicated that they will abstain. This could also be a strategy to preserve room for negotiation, an EU diplomat told Table.Media.
At today’s meeting, the French delegation proposed limiting the scope of application as a compromise. The threshold could be raised to 5,000 employees in order to accommodate reluctant member states. This would affect considerably fewer companies: The agreement negotiated by the Council, Parliament and Commission sets the threshold at more than 500 employees. However, a French spokesperson explained that this was just one of many solutions proposed in order to reach an agreement. He denied media reports that France was “demanding” a restriction of the scope of application. France supports the law.
Lara Wolters (S&D), rapporteur in the EU Parliament, described the development as worrying. “The text before Coreper was the result of more than two years of careful negotiations,” she said at a press conference called at short notice. “The fact that the member states have once again failed to approve this agreement is a scandal for me.” Many companies were already preparing for the law.
Everyone had been listened to carefully during the negotiation process and had been able to make their contribution, particularly in the later stages, said Wolters. “Withdrawing commitments after the agreement or making further demands shows a blatant disregard for the European Parliament as co-legislator.”
She sees this development as part of a broader trend that is undermining the previous type of trust-based cooperation: “Once we had reached a political agreement with a handshake, the rest was just a formality,” she said. “In recent months, this is clearly no longer the case.” She was alluding to similar blockades in the Council, which most recently concerned the directive on platform work, for example.
She described the situation in the Council as chaotic and called for clarity. So far, Parliament has not received any concrete proposals for change. Instead, politicians in the member states were using the situation to make a name for themselves in the media. If specific requests were received from the Council, the Parliament would “work together constructively as before”, explained Wolters.
The Council Presidency now does not have much time left to reach an agreement. In April, the EU Parliament must cast its final vote on the result. According to an EU diplomat, the Belgians have not yet given up hope. They will probably try to talk to individual member states informally in the coming days and involve the Parliament at the same time. It is possible that Coreper I will discuss the issue again on Wednesday or Friday of next week. Nothing is certain at the moment.
The growing dependence on liquefied natural gas imports is increasingly dividing the member states. At their meeting in Brussels next Monday, the energy ministers will discuss a complaint from several Central European countries without LNG ports about Germany’s increased gas transit fees.
The gas storage levy, which Germany has been using since October 2022 to refinance the costs for the winter stocks of the market area manager Trading Hub Europe (THE), has been criticized. As a reminder, panic broke out in the gas markets in the summer of 2022 following Russia’s attack on Ukraine. The German government legally obliged THE to buy up gas and fill Germany’s storage facilities – whatever the cost.
According to THE, this resulted in total costs of €8.7 billion by October last year. The company recovers this money from traders via the newly introduced gas storage levy, which it passes on to gas consumers. Gas expert Jens Völler from the consulting firm Team Consult estimates that foreign customers will have paid around a fifth of the revenue in 2023. This is because the levy is also due at border crossing points.
Germany’s eastern neighbors find this unfair. They are dependent on Germany as a transit country in order to access liquefied natural gas from the North Sea coast. “The levy penalizes the most vulnerable states without direct access to LNG terminals,” reads a letter from the Czech Republic, Austria, Poland, Hungary and Slovakia, which is available to Table.Media and was first reported on by the Financial Times. “Ultimately, this could force several member states to rely more heavily on gas imports from Russia.” However, when gas transit through Ukraine ends at the end of 2024, the dependence of Central Europeans on gas from Germany will increase even further.
The burden of the levy is quite painful for the affected states. While the gas storage levy was initially €0.59 per MWh, it was increased to €1.86 at the beginning of the year. “In total, transit through Germany costs around three euros per megawatt hour. That’s not cheap at a time when gas is trading at €25 to €28 again,” says Völler. Transit through Germany has already become much more expensive since 2020 due to several political interventions.
At the beginning of February, the Berlin coalition extended the gas storage levy until March 2027. THE estimates that a further €2.6 billion could be incurred by then. Such amounts are now attracting imitators.
Italy, an important transit country, is also preparing a similar levy at border crossing points. Such unilateral measures would significantly impair the European gas market, criticizes the Czech Republic and the other four states.
The German-Italian approach is now also of concern to the EU Commission. “We have emphasized in all our contacts that charges must comply with the EU legal framework,” said a spokeswoman for Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson ahead of the debate on 4 March. According to information obtained by Table.Media from Berlin circles, a “pilot procedure” involving the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs is already underway at the Commission in order to find an agreement.
Eurogas had also expressed doubts about the legality of this. The German approach at least violates the spirit of the EU Gas Storage Regulation, writes the association. However, a ban on such practices only applies to member states without gas storage facilities.
“Gas storage facilities also provide flexibility services for neighboring European countries through flexible exports. There are therefore reasons to levy the gas storage levy at exit points,” explains Sebastian Gulbis, Managing Director of the consultancy Enervis.
The Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs (BMWK) justifies itself in a similar way. “The quantities that are filled into the gas storage facilities are not only intended for the German market but also partly for the European market,” says a BMWK spokesperson.
A renowned energy lawyer believes that possible legal action against the gas storage levy is unlikely. “We once looked into this when it was introduced, but rejected it as futile,” reports Christian von Hammerstein from the Berlin law firm Raue.
If the gas storage levy at the border crossings is nevertheless abolished due to political pressure, some large industrial consumers in Germany would face high costs. Without the contributions from foreign customers, the levy would currently amount to €2.52 instead of €1.86 per MWh, as calculated by Enervis for Table.Media.
For a family of four, that would be less than €10 extra per year. The situation would be very different for industrial customers. With an annual consumption of 100,000 MWh, a company would already be burdened with an additional €66,000. The increase would hit producers of ammonia and individual chemical giants even harder.
According to media reports, BASF had a gas consumption of 37 million MWh in Ludwigshafen alone before the energy crisis – the additional costs for the Group would therefore be almost €25 million. According to THE, there are no legally regulated reductions for large consumers as there are for other energy levies in the case of the gas storage levy.
“Europe must take more money in hand and spend it better, spend it in a European way,” said Ursula von der Leyen in a speech on defense policy to the EU Parliament. The Commission President was preparing the ground for the presentation of the European Defense Industry Strategy (EDIS) planned for next Tuesday. The aim of this strategy and the associated defense investment program (EDIP) will be to give priority to joint procurement in the field of armaments. Ursula von der Leyen cited the European approach to coronavirus vaccines and, most recently, the purchase of natural gas as examples.
Expectations are high given the fragmentation of the industry, but can the Commission meet them? One important element is the creation of a European mechanism, modeled on the US Foreign Military Sales Scheme (FMS), to make arms sales easier and smoother. Since the beginning of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, EU states have invested more in defense, but 75 percent of armaments have been procured outside Europe, two-thirds of which from the USA, an EU official complained on Wednesday. This was because US arms companies could deliver more quickly thanks to the FMS and the principle of strategic reserves.
According to the Commission’s proposal, the EU would draw up a catalog of weapons and weapon systems that are readily available in the member states. The Commission would also provide financial support for the establishment of strategic reserves in order to be able to supply potential buyers quickly, following the American model. The reserves could be managed by different groups of Member States depending on the armaments system. The aim is to initiate a change of mentality in the arms industry so that production does not only start once a contract has been signed, said an EU official.
At the same time, the aim is to increase planning reliability for the defense industry, similar to vaccine procurement, by investing in capacities and advance purchase agreements. This could be used to compensate for periods of weak demand. Von der Leyen said in parliament on Wednesday that it would be examined how guarantees could facilitate fixed purchase contracts. Governments that participate in joint procurement programs should be exempt from VAT. In the event of a crisis, it should be possible to prioritize orders and member states should recognize each other’s certifications. This could remove a hurdle that has proven to be an obstacle in the joint procurement of artillery shells for Ukraine, for example. There is no common internal market for ammunition, explained an EU official.
“We need to produce more, faster, and together as Europeans,” Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton added on Wednesday. The availability of armaments is a question of competitiveness and security for the European defense industry: “In the field of defense, we need a paradigm shift towards a war economy”. However, the financing of EDIP is still controversial and unresolved. A minimum of €1.5 billion from the MFF is envisaged, a far cry from the €100 billion that Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton called for at a Renew event in January.
As a first step, it is important to create a legal framework, said an EU official. If the ambition is there, the money will follow. In its strategy, the EU Commission is once again insisting that the EIB Board lift the self-restriction that has so far stood in the way of investments in defense. However, there are also plans to use part of the interest income from the blocked funds of the Russian central bank to finance armaments for Ukraine: “There could be no stronger signal and no better use for these assets than to use them to make Ukraine and the whole of Europe a safer place to live,” Ursula von der Leyen told the EU Parliament on Wednesday.
“The question with these Commission initiatives is always, do the member states accept them at all, how much money do they make available and to what extent can they actually be coordinated via the EU Commission and then the implementing bodies,” emphasizes Ronja Kempin, SWP expert on European security and defense policy, adding: “The member states often see the EU Commission as a competitor rather than a supporter.”
The arms industry is also skeptical about the Commission’s initiatives, as there is a lack of money and a lack of willingness on the part of the member states to relinquish sovereignty. The sharing of sensitive data is already proving difficult among themselves. One prominent example is the development of the FCAS air combat system, in which Spain, Germany and France are involved and which is repeatedly caught up in national disputes.
According to diplomatic circles, the implementation of the project would probably fall into the next legislative period anyway and the cards could then be reshuffled. According to the EU Commission, Parliament and member states should adopt EDIP by mid-2025 so that there is no gap after the expiry of the ad hoc Edirpa and ASAP programs.
It’s party conference time in the EU: the European parties are meeting over the next few weeks to adopt their European election programs and nominate their lead candidates. The Greens kicked things off at the beginning of February with Terry Reintke and Bas Eickhout, followed a few days ago by the Left with Walter Baier. Next up will be the Social Democrats this weekend and the European People’s Party in the middle of next week, although Nicolas Schmit (PES) and Ursula von der Leyen (EPP) have already been confirmed as the lead candidates. It will be exciting for the Liberals, who will probably not decide on their lead candidate until the end of March. The two right-wing parties ECR and ID are running without EU-wide lead candidates.
As the parties prepare for the election campaign, a clear starting line-up is emerging in the polls. In the base scenario of the seat projection, the EPP climbs to 176 seats – seven more than in the last projection from the beginning of January and also the best figure for three years. At the same time, the second-placed Social Democratic S&D Group loses ground and now only has 135 seats (-6 compared to January). In the dynamic scenario, which also takes into account the possibility of new member parties joining the group after the election, the gap is even greater: Here, the EPP has 181 seats and the S&D 136.
Whether the EPP can actually maintain this level remains to be seen: many of the additional seats in the projection are due to only small increases in the polls, which could also be normal fluctuations that just happened to favor the EPP in several countries at the same time. Nevertheless, things could hardly look more favorable for Ursula von der Leyen’s candidacy for a second term in office at the start of the election campaign: The fact that a political group has lost a lead of over 40 seats in less than four months is unprecedented in the European election seat projections that have been regularly compiled since 2014. In order to become the strongest political group after all, the S&D would therefore need a truly exceptional election campaign.
Behind the EPP and S&D is the liberal Renew Europe (RE) group, which has 87 seats (+1 compared to January/dynamic scenario: 91). This means that the Liberals, who achieved their best-ever European election result in 2019, could lose around a tenth of their seats compared to the current Parliament.
The outlook is even gloomier for the European Greens, who also achieved a record number of seats in 2019, but could now lose around a third of them. Compared to January, however, the Greens increase slightly to 48 seats in the projection (+3/dynamic scenario: 48). In addition, the Greens can still hope for the traditionally high mobilization of their supporters in European elections, which has often helped them do better in the past than the polls would suggest. However, it is questionable how strongly this factor will be reflected this year: as the European elections have generally gained importance in the public perception, the turnout among voters of other parties could also be higher than usual this time.
The Left Party, on the other hand, is projected to have 35 seats (+2/dynamic scenario: 37) and would thus roughly maintain its number of seats in the current parliament. However, the Left is the exact opposite of the Greens in terms of mobilization and has often performed worse in elections than in the polls in the past.
Finally, the parties to the right of the EPP are stronger than ever before compared to previous European elections. Compared to the January projection, however, their momentum has weakened somewhat. The ECR group, for example, has recently lost support, particularly in Poland. The fact that it is still able to make further gains in the basic scenario (78 seats/+3) is only due to the new addition of the previously non-attached French party Reconquête. In the dynamic scenario, in which this new party was already included in the calculation, it falls back slightly compared to January and has a total of 82 seats.
The ID parliamentary group has weakened even more recently, with only 83 seats left in the baseline scenario (-6). This is largely due to the German right-wing extremist AfD, which has lost a lot of support in the polls since January as a result of mass demonstrations. In the dynamic scenario, however, the ID is the parliamentary group with the best growth prospects.
This can also be seen in Viktor Orbán’s previously factionless Fidesz, which actually wants to join the ECR and is also supported by the Polish PiS. However, several smaller ECR member parties are vehemently opposed to Fidesz joining, and Giorgia Meloni’s Fratelli d’Italia (FdI) has not yet committed itself. Fidesz could therefore end up joining the ID parliamentary group instead, which has already shown itself to be open to the idea. If the ID also brings together all the smaller Russia-friendly right-wing parties, which will win seats in Parliament for the first time, it could become the third-largest parliamentary group with 101 seats.
With regard to possible alliance options in the new Parliament, the current projection shows a similar picture as in January: The center-left alliance of S&D, RE, Greens and Left would lose its current majority in Parliament, but a center-right alliance of EPP, RE and ECR would also have just under no majority of its own and would always be dependent on dissenters from other political groups. There is therefore much to suggest that the “grand coalition of the center” will become even more important in the next parliament – i.e. cooperation between the EPP and S&D, which will then be joined by the RE, Greens and/or parts of the ECR, depending on the issue.
Despite the rise of the far right, the parliament remains functional. Nevertheless, the shift to the right is likely to have an impact on political decisions in the future: On the one hand, without the alternative center-left majority, the S&D will lose an important lever to put pressure on the EPP. On the other hand, the EPP could increasingly rely on the ECR as a majority procurer and thus bypass the Greens and the left wing of the S&D and RE.
Whether this actually happens, however, is of course up to the European voters. The seat projection presented here is only a snapshot of the political mood. There are almost exactly 100 days left until the European elections.
As there are no pan-European election polls, the seat projection is based on aggregated national polls and election results from all member states. In the base scenario, all national parties are assigned to their current parliamentary group (or the parliamentary group of their European umbrella party); parties without a clear assignment are shown as “other”. The dynamic scenario assigns all “other” parties to a parliamentary group that they could plausibly join and also includes other possible changes to the parliamentary groups.
Further information on the data basis and methodology of the projection as well as a more detailed breakdown of the results can be found on the blog The (European) Federalist.
Two days before Alexei Navalny’s funeral, Yulia Navalnaya came to the European Parliament and addressed the MEPs. In her speech, she blamed the Russian regime under the leadership of Vladimir Putin for the death of her husband. She said that the act showed that “Putin is capable of anything and you cannot negotiate with him“. She told MEPs that in order to defeat Putin, you have to be inventive. “You can’t hit Putin with the next resolution or a new package of sanctions.” Other conditions apply to Putin: “You are not dealing with a politician but with a bloody mafioso.”
In a short passage introducing her speech, she paid tribute to Strasbourg. In 2020, Navalny had been in southwest Germany. After his stay at the Charité hospital, where he had initially been treated, he had undergone rehabilitation there to recover from the consequences of the poison attack. “He had to try to learn to walk again.” Together with their two children, the whole family traveled across the Rhine to Alsace one day and paid a private visit to the city, which is the headquarters of the European Parliament. “Strasbourg was one of our favorite cities.” mgr
