Minority Report

President Nicolas Sarkozy's speech to the European Parliament last week was followed by interventions from the leaders of the parliament's party political groups - in which his fellow Frenchmen were well represented.

Joseph Daul, from Alsace, leads the largest group, the Christian Democratic European People's Party (EPP). Daniel Cohn-Bendit, who has dual French and German nationality, spoke for the Greens. Francis Wurtz, from Paris, is president of the Communist European United Left. Philippe de Villiers represented the eurosceptic Independence/Democracy'group. And from among 31 'non-attached' deputies who are too disconnected to form a political group emerged Jean-Marie Le Pen of France's neo-fascist National Front.

This gallery of characters intrigued those members of the French media who had travelled to Strasbourg for the presidential occasion. It was certainly a good week to pay attention to the party political disposition of the European Parliament. The day before Mr Sarkozy turned up, MEPs had voted to ensure that two of the current party groups cannot survive, at least in their present form, after next June's elections. In a vote of 481 to 203, with 26 abstentions, parliament decided to raise the threshold needed to form a group. At the moment, a political group needs at least 20 MEPs from six of the EU's 27 member states. From next July, a group will need 25 MEPs from seven countries.

It may be wondered why parliament sees fit to make this change, especially when the size of the House is set to shrink, under the terms of the Treaty of Nice, from the present 785 seats to 736. (Even if the Treaty of Lisbon can be salvaged in time the number of deputies will fall to 751.) Advocates of the change - drawn almost exclusively from the two largest groups of the EPP and the Socialists (PES) - have been hard put to justify why it is necessary or desirable. The current number of groups (seven) poses no clearly identifiable problem for the inner workings of the House. Parliament's internal affairs are already firmly managed by a grand coalition of EPP and PES.

It does seem odd at a time when the popularity of the European Union is in question for measures to be taken which risk reducing the pluralism of its parliament.

The EU is a large place with a vast variety of national political parties having a justifiable claim to be heard at the level of the federal parliament - especially at a time when this parliament should be just about to become, courtesy of the Lisbon treaty, a truly powerful institution.

Minority opinion needs to be reflected in Parliament just as the views of small member states have to be respected in the Council. The finance and administration that comes with parliamentary group status greatly help members to form coherent policy and articulate it.

One wonders if all the consequences of raising the party threshold are thoroughly thought through. The two groups prospectively disbanded are the Union for Europe of the Nations (UEN) and Independency/Democracy (ID). The rightist UEN has 43 members drawn from only six countries, including Ireland's ruling Fianna Fail party, Poland's Law and Justice party (of the Kaczynski twins), and Italy's Alleanza Nazionale (of Gianfranco Fini). Although of nine nationalities, the 22 members of the nationalistic ID are heavily dependent on the stability, political and otherwise, of the UK Independence Party. If refugees from the dissolved UEN and ID are to be forced reluctantly into the surviving larger groups they will only add to the incoherence of their inevitably nervous hosts. If, however, they are discarded to swell the ranks of Mr Le Pen's 'non-attached', they will only add to the inefficiency of the House.

The sub-plot of this story is the commitment of British Tory leader David Cameron to divorce his MEPs in the next parliament from their association with the federalist EPP. In order to form a new group, the Conservatives will now need allies from six other states. They will not find them in the Irish members of the UEN who are looking to join one of the mainstream pro-European (and explicitly pro-Lisbon treaty) parties - probably the Liberals. Nor will the Tories find allies in the Alleanza Nazionale who, at the behest of Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, are set to join the EPP.

Mr Cameron hopes to be able to recruit the Czech party of Thatcherite Vaclav Klaus to form the nucleus of a new parliamentary group around an anti-federalist agenda. Paradoxically, he might even reach an accommodation with Italy's bizarre provincial federalists, Lega Nord. There will certainly be some marginal pickings for Mr Cameron from the newer member states, although it is anticipated that the party political scene in Central and Eastern Europe will soon orientate itself along less exotic, more habitual western lines.

Ultimate success for Mr Cameron's bid for party realignment in the European Parliament appears to rely on the prospect of victory of anti-immigrant parties in Belgium, the Netherlands and Scandinavia. Mixing in bad company is not a happy prospect for Tories of a more liberal bent, especially as the party prepares itself for government in 2009-10.

The likelihood of a Tory government in Britain is beginning to alarm Brussels. As the Labour party declines, it becomes ever more urgent to have the Lisbon treaty in force before Mr Cameron gets to Number Ten. Amid the after-shock of the Irish referendum, not enough significance has been given to Britain's U-turn on Europe. Whereas in 2005 Tony Blair limped apologetically behind France and the Netherlands in rejecting the constitutional treaty, Gordon Brown deserves much credit for ratifying Lisbon even after the Irish 'No'.

Yet nobody is betting that Britain's new engagement with Europe will last long. In Strasbourg, President Sarkozy was as encouraging as he could be: 'Europe needs the United Kingdom', he said. 'If Britain has one foot in and one foot out, Europe is weakened'.

Mr Cameron's performance in next year's European election campaign will be watched anxiously. It is not only for him and his party that the stakes are high.

Andrew Duff MEP (Liberal/UK) is the chairman of the Federalist Intergroup of the European Parliament. www.andrewduffmep.org.

Andrew Duff's True Guide to the Treaty of Lisbon can be found on www.andrewduff.eu

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008