Yesterday’s inaugural meeting of the 2009 – 2014  Culture, Education, Media and Sport Committee turned out to be a little more than the expected rubber stamping event.  The members of  the Socialists and Democrats (S &D) Group, including myself, broke with tradition and abstained in the vote on one of the Vice-Chair candidates.

Usually these inaugural meetings merely vote through the Chair and Vice-Chair candidates agreed by the Group leaders after hard bargaining with delegation heads.  It is not really a stitch-up in the way that the President of the Parliament itself was this time and has been in the past.  It is, however, a complicated system whereby each national delegation (the EPLP, for instance, is a national delegation) gets a certain number of points allocated to it and can bid for positions up to the number of ponts available.  This method was originally set up for the best of reasons, to allow smaller countries and smaller political groups to have seats at the table.  In other words to stop the large German, French and British parties cornering the market.

This is all very well in theory.  The practice is rather more difficult.  This time one of the nominations for Vice-Chair for the Culture and Education Committee, agreed by the Political Groups I must add, was a Mr Soini from the EFD (the Europe of Freedom and Democracy Group) of which UKIP is a member.  As you would imagine, given that UKIP is not only in this Group, but their leader is the bumptious Nigel Farage, the EFD is right-wing, Eurosceptic and nationalist, though, of course, a small Group.

The Socialsts and Democrats Group members on the Culture and Education Committee took the view that we couldn’t vote for the EFD, despite whatever our Group leaders had decided in negotiations.  I wasn’t too surprised when our call for a vote in Committee didn’t go down well.  In the end after a bit of banter there was a secret ballot with all Committee members being given a ballot paper, tellers appointed and the votes cast in a ballot box guarded by one of the European Parliament ushers.

All the S&D members abstained, thereby making what I think was an important point – we will not always accept the candidates put before us and there are political groups who we would not wish to support.  Mr Soini was, of course, elected, though not be acclamation as was the new Chair, German Doris Pack from the EPP and the three other Vice-Chairs: Green Group member Mme Trueper, Mr Bisky from the Nordic Green Left and Liberal Mr Lokkegaard.