Movement for European Reform
The Movement for European Reform (English Movement for European Reform , MER ) was founded in 2006 alliance moderate-conservative Eurosceptic parties . It was the successor organization to the European Democrats and, after the 2009 European elections , led to the creation of the European Conservatives and Reformers (ECR), a political group in the European Parliament . In October 2009 the members of the EKR founded a European political party , the Alliance of European Conservatives and Reformists (AECR), in which the MER was also absorbed.
Member parties
- Conservative Party , United Kingdom
- Občanská Demokratieická strana , Czech Republic
history
The MER was planned as the successor organization to the European Democrats (ED), which constituted an independent group in the European Parliament from 1979 to 1992. After this group had achieved a certain importance in the early 1980s, numerous member parties converted to the European People's Party (EPP) at the end of the 1980s , so that the ED consisted almost entirely of the British Conservative Party . In order not to be completely isolated, the remaining ED members founded a group with the EPP in 1992, within which the ED increasingly lost importance as a separate organization despite the addition of the group name in 1999.
In 2005, during the internal party election campaign for leadership within the Conservative Party, later leader David Cameron called for the party to leave the EPP-ED Group. After his victory this led to the establishment of the Movement for European Reform on July 13, 2006 by the Conservative Party and the Czech ODS.
At the beginning of March, the Bulgarian EPP member party Sajus na Demokratitschni Sili (SDS) announced that it would join the MER, but this led to fierce criticism within the EPP. After the defeat in the first Bulgarian European elections in 2007, in which the SDS did not achieve a single seat in the European Parliament, it dropped its plan and announced that it would remain in the EPP.
Although the attempt to induce further EPP members to join the MER was initially unsuccessful, the MER planned the constitution as a European party and the establishment of its own parliamentary group after the 2009 European elections . However, this required member parties from at least seven EU countries. While the membership of the Northern Irish Ulster Unionist Party , the Italian Partito Pensionati and the Portuguese Partido Popular , which had previously belonged to the ED, was initially considered largely certain, the membership of other parties was uncertain. Other possible candidates were in particular several parties in the likewise Eurosceptic Alliance for a Europe of Nations (AEN), such as the French RPF or the Polish PiS . After the AEN had already lost two members at the beginning of 2009 for various reasons (the Irish FF switched to the liberal ELDR , the Italian AN joined the PdL , which belongs to the EPP ), a full merger of MER and AEN was considered instead .
On May 30th, 2009, the party leaders of the British Conservatives, the ODS and the Polish PiS announced their decision to found a new political group in the European Parliament after the 2009 European elections . This took place on June 22nd, the new parliamentary group was named European Conservatives and Reformers . It included the MER members, a large part of the former AEN and the Northern Irish UUP, but not the Portuguese Partido Popular, which joined the European People's Party , nor the Italian Partito Pensionati, which no longer achieved a seat in the European Parliament.
Finally, on October 1, 2009, the members of the ECR Group announced the founding of a new European party, the Alliance of European Conservatives and Reformists (AECR). MER had thus fulfilled its purpose and ceased operations.
Individual evidence
- ↑ EurActiv June 2, 2009: New pan-European Eurosceptic alliance takes shape .
- ↑ EurActiv, 23 Jun 2009: Anti-Federalist Group in Parliament: A Fragile Coalition? .
