EPP-ED Group

Group of the European People's Party (Christian Democrats) and European Democrats in the European Parliament (EPP-ED Group).

The MEPs elected to the 2004-2009 European Parliament represent no less than 457.9 million people.

MEPs sit in the Parliament not by nationality, but by political group.

Nearly all have chosen to join one of the seven multinational political groups which currently exist in the European Parliament.

The British Conservative MEPs are allied members of the EPP-ED Group, the largest political group in the European Parliament today.

Founded as the "Christian Democrat Group" on 23 June 1953 as a political fraction in the Common Assembly of the European Coal and Steel Community, the EPP-ED Group has always played a leading role in the construction of Europe.

The Group changed its name to the "Group of the European People's Party" (Christian-Democratic Group) in July 1979, just after the first direct elections to the European Parliament, and to "Group of the European People's Party (Christian Democrats) and European Democrats" in July 1999.

The European elections of June 2004 were a great victory for British Conservatives, who won 27 seats, maintaining its position as Britain's largest party in Europe. Since 1999, the Conservatives have formed the third largest national delegation in the European Parliament.

The Conservatives' electoral success in Britain of 2004 was mirrored by gains for centre-right parties across the European Union, notably in Germany, Greece, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and Slovenia. The 2004-2009 European Parliament has retained a centre-right majority, giving Conservatives and their allies a real opportunity to change the agenda in Europe and to hold the Council of Ministers to account.

To maximise their influence in a Parliament of 732 MEPs, the Conservative MEPs established a new relationship with their centre-right allies.

EPP-ED Group MEPs come from all 25 EU Member States. The group contains representatives of national political parties which are amongst the Conservative Party's closest allies, including the German CDU/CSU, the Gaullist RPR and DL parties from France, the Spanish Partido Popular, Forza Italia and the Swedish Conservative Party. As well as the British Conservative Party, the "European Democrats" component also includes Ulster Unionist colleague Jim Nicholson MEP, and members from Italy, Portugal, and the Czech ODS Party. As allied members of the EPP-ED Group, Conservative MEPs are free to back the latter's policy positions when they correspond to Conservative policy and to diverge from them when they do not.

As such, the Conservatives' relationship with the EPP-ED Group is quite different in kind to that of the British Labour Party and Liberal Democrats with their respective political groups in the European Parliament. Because Labour and the Liberal Democrats are full members of certain transnational European political parties - the Party of European Socialists and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe - their MEPs are bound by the European manifestos and policy platforms of those transnational parties and by the policy positions of their political groups in the European Parliament.

Internet site of the EPP-ED.