How it works: How many MEPs are there?.mp4
609 views · Published 18 February 2013 · 3:30 · Indexed 30 September 2026
Channel: European Parliament · 2013 · News & Politics
Hello. My name is Agnes Rajacsics. I am from Hungary. How many MEPs will there be next June? A simple question with a not so simple answer. Right now there are 754 MEPs. 736 were elected in June 2009, and another 18 joined in December 2011. It's a trick of the Lisbon Treaty, as the maximum number should be 751. Three less than now. Confused? In 2009, the European elections were organised under the rules of the Nice Treaty, so only 736 MEPs were elected, although 18 extra MEPs on top of that were elected. That's more than 751, so you might think it's illegal to have more MEPs than the Lisbon Treaty allows, but under national constitutional law and according to an old EU Treaty dating back to the '70s it's impossible to send back MEPs that are elected. So this explains why we have 754, but the extra MEPs elected in 2009 didn't arrive in the Parliament until two years later. Until 2011 they were known as ghost MEPs, elected but not allowed to vote, like MEP Eva Ortiz. Spain got four new seats. Austria, France and Sweden got two. Bulgaria, Italy, Latvia, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia and the United Kingdom have one more MEP. Although most ghost MEPs were observers since 2009, the situation was different in France, as ghost MEP Yves Cochet explains. Since France was entitled to two more seats, we took two deputies from the National Assembly and we put them in Strasbourg. The Lisbon limbo means that Germany, with the highest number of MEPs, should lose three seats in 2014 to bring the number down to 751. But the story doesn't end there. With every successive enlargement the composition of the Parliament will have to be adjusted and there will be fewer Members of Parliament from old Member States because they must make room for new Member States. Enlargement creates another conundrum for MEP maths. Of the candidate countries, Croatia will be the first to join the EU in 2013. 12 observers joined MEPs in April 2012. By July 2013, new Croatian MEPs will join the Hemicycle taking the number to... 766! However, when the 2014 elections come round, this number will go back to 751 again. With such a system of musical chairs, surely this Parliament is a one-off. In Belgium, there has been a lot of state reforms and there also you had this fluctuating arrangement that needed to be made in order for the thing to work, so it's by no means exceptional. So, to answer the question, next summer the Parliament will have 766 MEPs. That is, if everything goes according to plan. EuroparlTV video ID: 93b252a8-f8e0-4da9-b7c1-a03f00e5e0f2
