Senior figures in the European Union have deployed a method to bypass the growing influence of the EU Right in a method even their own insiders describe as “not democratic”.
Leadership within Ursula von der Leyen’s European People’s Party — of which Fine Gael is a member — has reportedly coordinated with left-wing groups to abuse a legal loophole that allows proposed EU legislation to largely bypass the bloc’s parliament throughout its drafting stage.
Under the rules of the Brussels parliament, individual European Parliament committees — which are usually made up of between 25 and 90 voting members — can approve a piece of legislation going to plenary without getting the approval of a majority of the European Parliament’s 720 MEPs when it is viewed that said approval would be obviously forthcoming.
However, the rule has recently been deployed in legislative cases where it has been anything but obvious that the parliament would vote in favour, prompting outcry from representatives outside von der Leyen’s centrist alliance.
According to reporting from Commission-aligned outlet Politico, such a development represents an intentional shift on the part of the EU’s pro-government politicians, with it becoming the policy of von der Leyen’s allies to abuse the rule to force through contentious issues.
One reportedly senior MEP involved in the scheme, whom the Brussels outlet granted anonymity to for them to speak freely, fully admitted that it was “not democratic” to prevent the vast majority of parliamentarians from voting on these measures, but that such an approach was now justified due to the centre’s declining influence.
“That’s the trade-off,” they said, arguing that divides inside the European centre meant that they had little choice but to force measures through using the backdoor tactic.
The method is not foolproof. Individual committees are always given the opportunity to vote against refusing to pass any legislation to parliament before the plenary stage, with such a veto having been successfully deployed against efforts to push forward the bloc’s first omnibus legislation earlier this year.
Such vetoes can be difficult to implement in many European Parliament committees however, with von der Leyen’s supporters having deployed restrictions on right-wing MEPs within such groups at the start of the parliamentary term in 2024.
For instance, despite making up a large part of the Brussels parliament, members of the Patriots for Europe group have been entirely locked out of senior committee positions, with smaller left-wing factions being handed greater powers instead.
The political efforts to lockout the EU opposition is not total. While the measures implemented by von der Leyen’s coalition have effectively frozen much of the European right from influencing the drafting and inter-institutional negotiations regarding new laws and directives, the European Parliament nevertheless must grant a final approval at plenary for the final draft of any such legislation.