Dutch liberals, who formed an alliance with the far-right Party for Freedom (PVV) as part of a government deal in the Netherlands, are unlikely to continue to sit in the centrist Renew group in the European Parliament, a estimated Tuesday May 21 Valérie Hayer, the head of the majority list in the European elections.
“It is an option [to remain allies] which is not understandable, because they do not respect our values by making this alliance,” declared on BFM-TV – RMC Ms. Hayer, who currently chairs the Renew group . “My red line is clear (…). The sanitary cordon [against the extreme right], we have always respected it. This is part of the absolute values of the group and I will take my responsibilities the day after the election so that these values continue to be respected,” she added.
However, the MEP expects “to have a discussion with all the members of the Renew group on June 10, the day after the elections, “in accordance with the group’s statutes”.
An alliance criticized on the left
In the Netherlands, an agreement was reached for a coalition government almost six months after the electoral victory of PVV leader Geert Wilders, who will not be prime minister. This agreement links four parties, the PVV, the Farmer-Citizen Movement (BBB, agrarian), the New Social Contract (NSC, center right) and the People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD, liberal), which sits within of the Renew group in the European Parliament.
This coalition agreement, which notably provides for the “strictest” asylum policy ever adopted in the Netherlands, with the possibility of departing from European rules, was particularly widely criticized in France by the head of the PS-Place publique list for the Europeans, Raphaël Glucksmann.
“This was already the case in Sweden: the liberals, therefore Emmanuel Macron’s group, made a government agreement with the far right. There, it’s happening in the Netherlands with the party of Geert Wilders, which is an extremist, pro-Putin, xenophobic, Islamophobic party. This party will now be dominant in a government agreement with the Liberals,” he denounced on Public Senate.
For Mr. Glucksmann, Renew must “exclude parties that seal deals with the far right.” “Otherwise, we overplay the barrage at each election in France, wanting to permanently re-establish this match between Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, Gabriel Attal and Jordan Bardella, even if it means kidnapping the elections each time, and then in the European Parliament working with parties which make government alliances with the extreme right: we are here in the most absolute absurdity,” he believes.