Parties in the European Council during 2006

This article describes the party affiliations of the leaders of each member-state represented in the European Council during the year 2006. The list below gives the political party that each head of government, or head of state, belongs to at the national level, as well as the European political alliance to which that national party belongs. The states are listed from most to least populous. More populous states have greater influence in the council, in accordance with the system of Qualified Majority Voting.

The member-states of the European Union by the European parliamentary affiliations of their leaders, as of 1 January 2006.

Summary
Party 1 January 2006 17 May 2006 4 July 2006 4 September 2006 6 October 2006
# QMV # QMV # QMV # QMV # QMV
European People's Party 11 144 10 115 9 108 9 108 10 118
Party of European Socialists 6 102 6 102 7 109 6 97 5 87
Alliance for Europe of the Nations 2 34 2 34 2 34 2 34 2 34
European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party 4 30 4 30 4 30 4 30 4 30
Independent 2 11 2 11 2 11 2 11 2 11
European Democratic Party 0 0 1 29 1 29 1 29 1 29
Movement for European Reform 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 12 1 12

List of leaders (1 January 2006)
Member-state Votes Leader National party European party
Germany 29 Angela Merkel CDU EPP
United Kingdom 29 Tony Blair Lab PES
France 29 Jacques Chirac UMP EPP
Italy 29 Silvio Berlusconi FI EPP
Spain 27 José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero PSOE PES
Poland 27 Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz PiS AEN
Netherlands 13 Jan Peter Balkenende CDA EPP
Greece 12 Kostas Karamanlis ND EPP
Czech Republic 12 Jiří Paroubek ČSSD PES
Belgium 12 Guy Verhofstadt VLD ELDR
Hungary 12 Ferenc Gyurcsány MSZP PES
Portugal 12 José Sócrates PS PES
Sweden 10 Göran Persson SAP PES
Austria 10 Wolfgang Schüssel ÖVP EPP
Slovakia 7 Mikuláš Dzurinda SDKÚ EPP
Denmark 7 Anders Fogh Rasmussen V ELDR
Finland 7 Matti Vanhanen Kesk. ELDR
Ireland 7 Bertie Ahern FF AEN
Lithuania 7 Valdas Adamkus Independent
Latvia 4 Aigars Kalvītis TP EPP
Slovenia 4 Janez Janša SDS EPP
Estonia 4 Andrus Ansip RE ELDR
Cyprus 4 Tassos Papadopoulos DIKO Independent
Luxembourg 4 Jean-Claude Juncker CSV EPP
Malta 3 Lawrence Gonzi PN EPP

^ DIKO's MEP is a member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe group in the European Parliament, but the party is not formally attached to any pan-European organization.

Changes during the year

Affiliation
Date Member-state Leader National party European party
17 May Italy Romano Prodi Independent EDP
4 July Slovakia Robert Fico SMER-SD PES
4 September Czech Republic Mirek Topolánek ODS MER
6 October Sweden Fredrik Reinfeldt M EPP

^ Prodi officially aligns himself only with his The Olive Tree coalition rather than any member-party, but he was previously a member of Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy's ancestor-party and is honorary president of its European parent, the EDP.

Office-holder only
Date Member-state Leader National party European party
14 July Poland Jarosław Kaczyński PiS AEN
gollark: Unfortunately, autobotrobot was moved back out of the "esobot" section.
gollark: Great, they reversed my permission override.
gollark: I was just abusing my admin powers.
gollark: Oh, I unmuted him ages ago.
gollark: Ncurses!

See also
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.